Don’t break the bank – the way we work, how its changing and what that means for financial services

DISCLAIMER: this article is older than one year and may not be up to date with recent events or newly available information.

By Matthew O’Neill, Financial Services Industry Managing Director, Office of the CTO, VMware

How do we work? It’s a cliché to simply say ‘the way we work is changing’, but like any cliché, at its heart is a truth – that the way we work really is changing beyond all recognition. Even twenty years ago, the idea that you could have a team, not just working remotely, but wherever they chose, using whatever device they wanted to access corporate networks, would give most employers nightmares.

Yet here we are. This idea of anytime, anywhere, any device access is just part of what we at VMware call End User Computing, and it’s a part of our business that has rapidly and radically evolved over the last few years. It’s a unit that for me falls into what I referenced in my last post as some of the things VMware did that I didn’t know about, until I started working here three years ago.

What’s most exciting for me is how the technologies our EUC team have introduced are being used in all sorts of sectors and organisations. Allowing people to connect to your secure networks with whatever device they chose used to be a recipe for disaster for IT departments; now, even the most regulated of industries, such as Financial Services, realise that to attract, retain and empower talent, they need to move away from the idea of work as a place you go to.

That’s why I was delighted that Spencer Pitts, Chief Technologist for EUC in EMEA at VMware, agreed to be part of the second episode of ‘Don’t Break the Bank, Run IT and Change IT’, our new podcast series for curious minds in Financial Services. How banks and other FS providers are transforming how they work, the implications and the steps they take to overcome those obstacles – it’s an incredibly broad topic, covering everything from the difference between office and branch personas, to modernisation of the latter, trading floors and, of course, on and off boarding employees and the sort of experience they enjoy (or don’t).

It all ties back into the need to change organisations versus the very real challenges of running. As mentioned in the first episode with Joe Baguley, we reckon about 80 percent of time and budget is spent on running banks – that’s using IT to keep lights on. When you’ve got that much energy and resource going in to just keeping things afloat, having the capacity to even consider change, which you might know is necessary, is a big ask. But that’s what banks have to do. If they can’t offer their users, whether employees or customers, an exemplary, modern experience, then they will struggle to attract or retain them. In the case of the latter, the rise of FinTech businesses means that it is no longer the case of moving an account from a selection of establishments that act in a similar manner.

There’s no question about it, it is hard to deliver that sort of digital-first experience as a bank, with the regulatory environment that they’re operating in. That’s why we’re here, to shine some light on the sort of things that FS providers need to be thinking about. Have a listen on the link below, and make sure you keep an ear out for our third episode to, in which we’ll be looking at security.

I’d also love to hear your thoughts on the subjects we cover, whether it’s my chat with Joe in episode one, or the conversations with Spencer and others coming up. We’ll be recording more episodes in future, and it would be great if we could address some of the issues our listeners are facing, or answer some of their questions.

Listen to episode two of ‘Don’t Break the Bank – Run IT, Change IT’ with Spencer Pitts: