European banks leverage mobility solutions to boost customer experiences and employee productivity

1. A Custom Technology
Adoption Profile
Commissioned By HP and
Microsoft
July 2015
European Banks Leverage
Mobility Solutions To Boost
Customer Experiences And
Employee Productivity
Introduction
Retail banks need to address customer and employee mobile moments.
Banking customers and employees expect to access any information or
service from any device, in their immediate moment of need. This
consumerization of the banking sector is forcing the transformation of
traditional business processes and enabling new opportunities for both
established and new competitors — that are online-only, telco-backed, or
online giants in other sectors — to gain market share.
Successful banks will enhance their mobility capabilities to engage with their
customers more interactively and empower their staff to work collaboratively
to help differentiate themselves from their competitors. Those banks that
underestimate the opportunities provided by mobility solutions risk their
competitive advantage and may be left behind. Of course, a highly regulated
industry such as the banking sector has unique regulatory, security, and
usability requirements. This profile highlights how retail banks in Europe can
exploit mobility opportunities to empower their workforce and deliver
enhanced customer experiences.
In June 2015, HP and Microsoft commissioned Forrester Consulting to
conduct a custom study of 50 IT and business decision-makers in retail
banks. The study explored the business priorities, technology initiatives, and
mobility initiatives for their customers and employees. All respondents were
manager or director level and above. All respondents clearly understood the
mobile strategy at their organization.

2. 1
FIGURE 1
Improving Information Security, Customer
Experience, And Differentiation In The Market Are
Top Business Priorities For 2015
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on
behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
“Which of the following initiatives are likely to be your
organization’s top business priorities for 2015?”
Critical priority High priority
Improve differentiation
in the market
30% 42%
Improve data/information
security across the organization
22% 56%
Improve workforce
productivity
22% 38%
Improve the experience of
our customers
20% 54%
Retail Banking Business Priorities
Focus On Delighting Customers
Today’s retail banking customers are highly demanding.
Empowered with multiple digital means of engaging with
banks, they expect to find information and purchase
products at any time and from any location. Customers want
to engage with a bank via channels of their choice —
whether that’s by logging into their accounts while on the
move via a smartphone, visiting a branch, or withdrawing
cash from an ATM. To compete on experience,
organizations must create a seamless and relevant
customer experience across all potential interactions and
touchpoints.
In order to deliver great mobile customer experiences, retail
banks must offer the correct mobility services to customers,
as well as arm employees with the right productivity and
collaboration tools they need to delight and meet customer
expectations. Not surprisingly then, IT and business
decision-makers at retail banks across Europe are
recognizing these imperatives and focusing their business
priorities to (see Figure 1):
› Improve differentiation in the market. The most critical
priority of all for retail banks is improving differentiation in
the marketplace (30%). Organizations are looking to
improve their presence in the market by designing
variations of products and services to address a client’s
need and mobile moment. This will help differentiate
banks from well-established competitors and fend off new
digital competitors.
› Improve data and information security. More business
processes are mobilized and more customer engagement
is conducted via mobile solutions. Security is and will
always be a top concern, particularly in heavily regulated
industries such as financial services. So, 78% of retail
banks surveyed said that improving data and information
security across the organization is a critical or high
business priority in 2015.
› Improve workforce productivity. Sixty percent of retail
banks are also looking to prioritize improving workforce
productivity over the next year. Giving better access to
mobile devices and applications, as well as related
customer and market information, will allow employees to
help address a client’s need more efficiently.
› Improve customer experience. Almost three-quarters
(74%) of IT and business decision-makers surveyed
identified improving the experience of their customers as
a critical or high priority for 2015. This means that retail
banks will need to take a systematic approach to the
design and delivery of external business services to
ensure that they are synced to understand, connect with,
and serve customers at their moment of need. This will
require close collaboration between IT and business
leaders to ensure the best user experience is being
delivered.
While revenue growth and cost reduction will
always remain a high priority, they are no
longer the main focus for retail banks. Only
15% of banks said revenue growth and cost
reduction were a critical priority. Retail banks
are looking for new revenue streams and
efficiencies by focusing on improving
differentiation in the market, improving data
security, enhancing workforce productivity,
and boosting the customer experience.

3. 2
KEY TECHNOLOGY ENABLERS HELP BANKS MEET
BUSINESS PRIORITIES
Organizations have ambitious business priorities for the
coming year. To support these priorities, retail banks are
investing in new tools to empower their workforce to deliver
better customer service through (see Figure 2):
› Investment in cloud offerings. Over 80% of retail banks
agreed that, to achieve their business priorities, they must
look to create a comprehensive strategy and implement
cloud offerings. Cloud investments allow banks to open
up and improve mobile user access and the use of
applications to facilitate knowledge sharing and decision-
making responsibilities.
› Improved use of data analytics. Almost three-quarters
(74%) of European banks surveyed agreed that they must
improve the use of data analytics to deliver on their
business priorities. For example, banks are looking to
leverage data management platforms that tie the
employee and customer mobile touchpoints into CRM and
other IT systems to track mobile moments across all
channels of interaction.
› Improved network performance and quality. A further
three-quarters of banks agreed that they must improve
their network performance and quality to meet business
priorities. The internal enterprise network is the backbone
of the technology infrastructure, enabling banks to adopt
more cloud-based solutions. The network forms the basis
for closer customer engagement and closer employee
collaboration. In fact, 70% of organizations agreed that
they must improve IT support for employee collaboration.
› Expansion of mobility solutions. Seventy percent of
European banks surveyed are looking to expand and
improve their enterprise mobility strategy to meet
business priorities. It is critical for banks to enhance their
mobile strategy. Doing so will help them conduct business
with customers and enable their employees to accomplish
work tasks.
FIGURE 2
Banks Are Investing In Cloud, Analytics, Network,
And Mobile To Meet Business Priorities
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on
behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
“How strongly do you agree or disagree with
the following statements?” To achieve our
business priorities in 2015, we must . . .
(Respondents who strongly agreed and agreed)
Create a comprehensive
strategy and implement cloud/
SaaS offerings
82%
Improve use of data analytics
to improve business decisions
and outcomes
74%
Improve our network (WAN)
performance and/or quality
74%
Expand and improve our
enterprise mobility strategy
70%
Improve the IT support for
employee collaboration
70%
Reorganize IT to better align
with business initiatives
64%

4. 3
Retail Banking Customers And
Employees Are Increasingly
Leveraging Mobile Solutions
Retail banking customers are becoming increasingly mobile,
with the Forrester Research Digital Banking Forecast, 2013
to 2018, showing that more and more customers are
expected to leverage mobile and tablet devices for many
different banking activities. Customers have already
leveraged different mobile devices to support their banking
activities (see Figure 3). Forrester’s European Consumer
Technographics
®
Financial Services Survey 2, 2014,
showed that European online adults use mobile and tablet
banking to not only check their bank balance and recent
transactions, but also to transfer money to other accounts,
look up the location of the bank branch or ATM, and pay
bills. In addition, the same survey highlighted banking
customers’ interest in more interactive technology solutions,
such as near field communication (NFC) and beacon
technology. Over a third of consumers are interested in
branch-only beacon technology that interacts with
customers’ smartphones to provide special offers and
contextually relevant experiences.
To respond to customers’ mobile needs, European workers
at financial services organizations are increasingly adopting
mobile solutions, as Forrester’s research highlights. In fact,
over half (54%) of information workers at financial services
firms in Europe agreed that their firm expects them to use
mobile-enabled services when working with clients and
customers. Forrester’s Global Business Technographics
®
Telecommunications And Mobility Workforce Survey, 2015,
revealed that more than a quarter (28%) of information
workers at European financial services firms spend 3 or
more hours per day using a smartphone for work-related
activities.
The same survey also highlights the growing use of different
devices that are being used by information workers for work
purposes, including laptops (83%), smartphones (66%), and
tablets (22%). As workers use more devices and
applications to support their work activities, technology
management leaders must continue to implement
comprehensive enterprise mobility initiatives that enable
workers to fulfill all their work activities, regardless of the
device they use.
FIGURE 3
European Mobile And Tablet Banking Activities
Base: 2,863 European online adults (18+) who are mobile bankers
*Base: 1,679 European online adults (18+) who are tablet bankers
Source: Forrester’s European Technographics Financial Services Survey, 2014
“Which devices have you used to do each of these banking activities in the past three months?”
Checking my bank account balance
Viewing or checking a recent
bank transaction
Receiving a text-message (SMS) alert
(e.g., balance alerts, security alerts, etc.)
Transferring money between my own
accounts at the same bank
Looking up the location of a
bank branch or ATM
Transferring money to others (e.g., family/
friends) via their bank account
Paying bills
Getting in touch with customer service/
an account manager
81%
73%
55%
53%
41%
8%
34%
34%
31%
16%
27%
30%
26%
34%
24%
11%
Mobile banking users
Tablet banking users*

5. 4
Mobility Initiatives Focus On
Improving Customer Communication
And Employee Productivity
Retail banks in Europe understand the importance of
improving their mobility strategy for customers and
employees. Sixty-four percent of European retail banks
surveyed said it was extremely or very important for them to
improve their mobility strategy to help customers conduct
business with them. A further 62% also said it was important
to improve their mobility strategy for employees, to help
them conduct work tasks. When exploring further, Forrester
found that European retailer banks were investing in
mobility solutions to boost customer communications and
improve employee productivity.
BANKS ARE LEVERAGING MOBILITY TO IMPROVE
CUSTOMER COMMUNICATION AND EXPERIENCE
Retail banks recognize that they must continue to refine and
improve their enterprise mobility strategy to ensure that they
are able to meet the growing demands of increasingly
mobile-savvy customers. To meet these expectations, IT
and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
are prioritizing mobility initiatives for customers that (see
Figure 4):
› Improve customer support. The top customer-facing
mobility priority for organizations centers on offering
online chat/support for online banking customers — 68%
of retail banks in Europe surveyed highlighted this as an
extremely or very important initiative.
› Provide interactive customer experiences. Sixty-two
percent of retail banks surveyed in Europe also identified
as a top priority the adoption of more visual/haptic-
focused presentation and interactive tools for customers
to engage with them while in a branch. Over half of retail
banks in Europe are also planning to leverage beacon
sensors so they can tailor the in-branch experience to
individual customers’ unique contexts.
› Offer mobile payment capabilities. As customers’ use
of mobile devices for banking activities continues to grow,
the demand to be able to leverage mobile devices for
payments will also increase. Fifty-eight percent of retail
banks surveyed believe it is very or extremely important to
build or enhance mobile payment capabilities. Mobile
payment solutions will enable bank brands to add value
beyond just faster and more convenient payment
solutions.
› Are seamless across all channels. To better serve the
customer across all touchpoints of the customer journey,
IT and business decision-makers recognize the
importance of their mobility initiatives to create a
comprehensive multichannel strategy (56%). Allowing
seamless engagement between all customer touchpoints,
whether it be the website, branch, or mobile device, is
very important to improving the customer’s experience.
This requires a holistic approach to integrating mobile into
other back-office applications. Such integration would
allow retail banking customers to access account
information and all their transactions regardless of the
channel they use.
FIGURE 4
Mobility Initiatives Focus On Improving Customer
Support And Experience
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on
behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
“Over the next 12 months, how important will each
of the following mobility initiatives be?”
Extremely important Very important
Offer online chat/support for our
online banking customers
28% 40%
Adopt more visual/haptic-focused
presentation and interactive tools
14% 48%
Build, support, or enhance our
mobile payments capabilities
24% 34%
Leverage proximity/beacon sensors
to tailor in-branch experiences to
individual customers
22% 36%
Create a comprehensive
multichannel strategy to better
serve our customers
14% 42%
Display more digital signage
within the branch
12% 44%

6. 5
RETAIL BANKS LOOK TO IMPROVE EMPLOYEE
PRODUCTIVITY THROUGH MOBILITY INITIATIVES
Arming workers with the right tools and services in order for
them to be able to deliver the right customer service and
experience is crucial. Mobility initiatives for employees at
retail banks focus on (see Figure 5):
› Leveraging more cloud-based services to better
support mobile access. Almost three-quarters (72%) of
those surveyed plan to deploy cloud-based services to
better support mobile access. Cloud-based tools
empower employees to access business-critical
information at the customer’s moment of need, as well as
the ability to manage their own mobile applications.
› Improving security of information/data available to
employees through mobile. Sixty-two percent of survey
respondents prioritize the improvement of security of
information and data on mobile devices. As more and
more business processes and customer engagements
are conducted through mobile channels, it is more
important than ever, particularly in heavily regulated
industries like banking, that firms secure applications,
content, and devices across a broad ecosystem of
operating systems and devices.
› Building more smartphone and tablet applications.
Retail banks are looking to deploy additional mobile
applications, on both smartphones and tablets, for
employees. As consumer mobile applications and
services continue to develop and mature rapidly, retail
banking IT and business decision-makers must
inevitability match the same level of sophistication with
their own applications. Leveraging multiplatform
application development tools will enable banks to
develop mobile applications to boost staff productivity by
enabling closer interaction among employees and
between employees and customers and partners.
› Adopting or expanding bring-your-own (BYO) device
programs. More than half of retail banks in Europe are
also looking to implement a comprehensive device
management solution that includes employee-owned
smartphones and tablets. In fact, 48% of retail banks have
implemented or are expanding BYO programs for
employees, including for PCs, smartphones, and tablets.
An additional 28% of retail banks are planning to
implement BYO programs in the next 12 months or more.
BYO deployments where applications are shared across
borders need a clear enterprise mobile management
(EMM) solution that brings together management of
security, mobile devices, mobile applications, application
wrapping, containerization, file synchronization, and file
sharing.
FIGURE 5
Workforce Mobility Priorities Focus On
Leveraging Cloud And Improving Security
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on
behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
“Over the next 12 months, how important will each of
the following mobility initiatives be?”
Extremely important Very important
Leverage more cloud-based
services to better support
mobile access
20% 52%
Improve security of information/
data available to employees
through mobility solutions
18% 44%
Build more mobile (smartphone
and tablet) applications
for employees
14% 46%
Implement a comprehensive device
management solution that includes
employee-owned smartphones
and tablets (BYOD)
24% 34%

7. 6
Retail Banks Are Investing In Mobile
Apps To Empower Employees To
Deliver Better Customer Experience
Our survey also revealed that as organizations look to
bolster their mobility solutions to foster closer collaboration
and boost employee productivity, over 50% of European
retail banks have already implemented or are
expanding/upgrading many different productivity
applications and tools for workers, empowering these banks
to deliver better customer service (see Figure 6). A further
50% have already invested in business intelligence or data
dashboard applications and are in the process of
implementing sales support tools.
Retail banks are concentrating their mobility initiatives on a
number of different roles across the business, with a
specific focus on improving the productivity of workers who
are customer facing. For instance, 50% or more of retail
banks in Europe said they are focusing their mobility
initiatives on remote or money advisors and customer
relationship managers. Retail banks are also focusing some
of their mobility investments on back-office roles, such as
compliance officers (40%) and call center agents (22%).
The primary use cases that retail banks identified for
investment in mobility solutions focus on leveraging
sophisticated data analytics to drive (see Figure 7):
› Better cross-sell and upsell opportunities. More than
half of retail banks are adopting mobility solutions to
maximize revenue though increased cross-sell/upsell
opportunities by allowing quick access to information on
related products and services.
› Faster access to market and customer data. Over half
of retail banks have invested in mobility to allow for faster
and easier access to analysis of market and investment
data, enabling advisors to make informed decisions for
their customers using the latest data available. A further
44% also offer mobility solutions to allow better access to
transactional, customer, and market data through access
to back-end systems. This allows customer-facing roles to
address a query in the moment of need, regardless of the
channel being used.
› Enhanced cross-role collaboration. Forty percent
highlighted that the primary use for mobility solutions for
employees was the real-time uploading and sharing of
information. This requires sophisticated, enterprisewide
collaboration tools, so that workers can access the latest
customer information from anywhere at any time.
All of these use cases must be underpinned by the need to
optimize applications to perform well across the additional
demands (for example, on network latency, bandwidth,
packet loss, and jitter) placed on IT infrastructure by cloud-
based mobility innovation. Retail banking workers require
real-time access to information and analytics to ensure the
best decisions are being made for their customers, which
requires a reliable enterprise network.
FIGURE 6
Retail Banks Have Already Implemented Or Are
Expanding Their Investments In Productivity
Applications
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on
behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
“What types of tools/services does your firm make
available or plan to make available to employees?”
Expanding/upgrading/implemented
Planning to implement in the next 12 months or more
Productivity apps 52%
40%
Business intelligence or
data dashboard apps
50%
32%
Sales support tools and
applications
50%
36%
HR or personnel apps
including training
48%
34%
Web/videoconferencing
apps
48%
38%
A bring-your-own-device
(PC, smartphone, tablet)
program
48%
28%
Customer apps 42%
44%
Collaboration/file sync
and share apps
40%
32%

8. 7
Retail Banks: Boost Your Mobility
Maturity Or Get Left Behind
To assess the maturity and sophistication of mobility
solutions within retail banks surveyed, Forrester asked
respondents to assess their organization’s mobility
capabilities across four dimensions: mobility strategy,
mobility alignment, information, and application access.
Respondents were asked if their organization has a well-
defined mobility strategy, how well-aligned it is across
different business units, how well users can access back-
office applications on their mobile device, and how they
measure the effectiveness of retail banking mobility
solutions. Analyzing the results, Forrester was able to
segment respondents into five categories (see Figure 8):
› Mobility laggards. Thirty-two percent of respondents’
organizations fall into this group. These organizations fail
to meet mobility needs of both customers and employees,
as they lack proficiency in each of the four dimensions:
strategy, alignment, information access, and application
access.
› Mobility opportunists. Only 10% of respondents are
classified as mobility opportunists. They have the back-
office integration to allow strong information and
FIGURE 7
Use Cases For Employee Mobility Solutions
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on
behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
“What are the primary use cases for your investments
in mobility solutions for employees?”
Improved cross/upsell
opportunities by making
additional products and
services available
52%
Faster and easier access
to analysis of market
and investment data
52%
Access to transactional,
customer, and market data
through access to back-end
systems in the moment of
need, across all channels
44%
Real-time uploading/
sharing of information/
customer data
40%
FIGURE 8
Retail Banks Fall Into Five Levels Of Mobility Maturity
Base: 50 IT and business decision-makers at retail banks across Europe
Source: A commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting on behalf of HP and Microsoft, June 2015
Informationandapplication
access
Strategy/alignment
Mobility
laggards
32%
Mobility
adopters 34%
Mobility
experts
16%
Mobility strategists
8%
Mobility opportunists
10%

9. 8
application access on mobile devices but lack the strategy
and business alignment needed to fully benefit from this
integration.
› Mobility strategists. This group of respondents
demonstrates excellent strategy and alignment but lacks
execution in information access and app access
enablement. Eight percent of the respondents in our study
fall into this segment.
› Mobility adopters. Thirty-four percent of respondents are
classified in this category. These organizations have
begun their journey to mobility experts and demonstrate
some degree of competence across all four domains.
These organizations did not demonstrate the full mobility
capabilities required to offer industry-leading mobility
solutions for customers and employees.
› Mobility experts. Sixteen percent of European retail
banks fell into this category. These organizations
demonstrated significant competence across dimensions
to maximize business value from investments in mobility
solutions. Mobility experts are customer-obsessed and
boost productivity of workers with tools and services that
allow them to deliver excellent customer experiences.
EXPERTS HAVE FULLY EMBRACED MOBILITY
SOLUTIONS TO DELIVER SUPERIOR CUSTOMER
EXPERIENCES
Eight out of the 50 retail banks surveyed were classified as
mobility experts, as they exceled in their mobility strategy,
organizational alignment, and information and application
access for mobility services. These retail banks have fully
embraced mobility solutions to take more of the market
share and fend off new, agile, and digital-savvy competitors.
These firms demonstrated:
› A commitment to improving their customer
experience initiatives. All eight of the retail banking
mobility experts highlighted that improving their customer
experience and differentiation from competitors is a high
or critical business priority.
› A focus on mobility solutions. All mobility experts
agreed that they must establish a vision of how mobility
solutions can help meet customer needs and improve
workforce productivity.
› An ability to provide joined-up multichannel
experiences. All mobility experts rated their ability to
integrate and track customer data between different
customer touchpoints (e.g., branch, call center, online,
ATM, etc.) as either good or excellent.

10. 9
Conclusions: Enhance Your Mobility
Maturity
The Forrester Technology Adoption Profile survey revealed
that for retail banks to stand out from their competitors, they
must offer differentiated mobility services to enhance
customer service and engagement, as well as boost
employee productively. To do both requires banks to
enhance their mobility maturity. This requires:
› Creating cross-functional teams focused on mobility
opportunities. The delivery of great customer experience
is a businesswide task that relies upon unprecedented
real-time collaboration between teams and departments.
IT and business decision-makers should take the lead
and build a cross-functional team, focusing on how to
seize the mobility opportunities within the bank and how
to improve customer and employee processes by
enhancing mobility experiences.
› Leveraging analytics to deliver seamless
multichannel experiences. Most organizations are
focused on the design, features, and functions of their
mobile applications. Competitive advantage for
organizations will shift from experience design to
leveraging data smartly — for example, incorporating
analytics that tie the employee and customer mobile
touchpoints into CRM and other IT systems to track
mobile moments across all channels of interaction.
› Developing partnerships and collaborating with
vendors of mobile solutions that have experience in
retail banking. To keep up with the pace of change in
mobility trends for employees and customers adds huge
pressure on the in-house resources and skills necessary
to succeed. IT and business decision-makers should
consider partnering and collaborating with vendors that
understand the global implication of country-specific
regulations and can meet needs for compliance locally. A
third of retail banks in our study also identified a lack of
skills and training to fully implement a thorough mobility
strategy. Third-party partners can help retail banks
address gaps in resources, skills, and knowledge required
to be true mobility experts.
Methodology
This Technology Adoption Profile was commissioned by HP and Microsoft. To create this profile, Forrester leveraged its
Global Business Technographics
®
Telecommunications And Mobility Workforce Survey, 2015 and the European Consumer
Technographics®
Financial Services Survey 2, 2014. Forrester Consulting supplemented this data with custom survey
questions asked of 50 IT and business decision-makers to explore the business priorities, technology initiatives, and mobility
maturity in support of customers and employees. All respondents were manager or director level and above. All respondents
clearly understood the mobile strategy at their organization. The auxiliary custom survey was conducted in June 2015. For
more information on Forrester’s data panel and Tech Industry Consulting services, visit www.forrester.com.
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