Building the Customer Centric Enterprise

A Steria White Paper
Building the Customer Centric
Financial Services Enterprise
è www.steria.com/uk
Prepared by: Sean Tomlinson, Head of Consulting, Financial Services Sector

Table of contents
Executive summary 3
Introduction – Good customers; poor suppliers? 4
4 Steps to a Customer Centric Enterprise 7
So what does a Customer Centric Enterprise look like? 12
Taking the model forward 14
Conclusion 14
Bibliography 15
02 | Building the Customer Centric Financial Services Enterprise è www.steria.com/uk

Steria canvassed the opinion of senior service
engagement and customer experience
personnel in the financial services sector. We
asked them what customer centricity meant
to them, what plan or programmes they
had in place to deliver a customer centric
experience and whether organisational silos
were a barrier to customer service excellence.
Their opinions are used in this paper to
examine the hypothesis that there is an
appetite for building a customer-centric
financial services organisation, but the
enterprise operating model creates a
structural barrier to bringing this to fruition
This is reflected in the response to our survey
by Anthony Thomson, Chairman and Co-
founder of Metro Bank, who comments on
existing bank staff: “There are some great
people trapped in a broken model.”
The paper discusses our findings,
identifies the problem and
outlines a solution based on
a new four-step model:
Step 1: Identify the customer
purpose for each service
Step 2: Plan the customer
journey to achieve the purpose
Step 3: Identify the services
required along the customer
journeys and build the
supporting organisation
accordingly
Step 4: Provide access to the
service offerings by whatever
channel the customer chooses.
It argues that until we translate our own
experiences as customers into a new
organisational structure realigned around
delivering against the customer purpose, true
customer centricity will not be achieved.
Executive summary
What’s going wrong with customer service? Why aren’t banks and insurers operating as true
customer-centric financial services organisations when they know great customer service is a
crucial differentiator?
Building the Customer Centric Financial Services Enterprise | 03è www.steria.com/uk
“There are some great people trapped in a broken model.”
Anthony Thomson, Chairman and Co-founder of Metro Bank

Why is it that when we act as the provider,
given we know what makes for a good
or poor experience ourselves, we are
not always able to provide an excellent
experience for the customers we serve? Is it
because we have limited tools to hand, do
we just not care, or is there something else
at play which we simply can’t influence?
As customers, we get a real buzz from
someone exceeding our expectations, yet
time and again we feel let down by our
service providers. Surely our collective
experiences as customers ourselves should
mean that we can consistently understand
and meet customer requirements.
More typically, however, if you start a
conversation about poor customer service,
everyone has an opinion and a story to tell
about an incredibly poor experience. And
financial services organisations are often
right at the heart of these conversations.
Identifying the problem
So what needs to be done to turn customer
service around? How do you become more
customer focused? How do you increase
customer numbers and customer loyalty?
First you need to identify the problem.
Whether it is general banker bashing,
concern over bonuses, or a feeling that the
integrity of financial services organisations
has been damaged by a range of mis-selling
‘scandals’, the level of customer expectation
is set low. However, even with such low
expectations, time and again the message
will come back that the service received is
poor or very poor.
Customers punish poor service. We don’t
have to look too far to see evidence of this
inside and outside the financial services
sector. The Institute of Customer Service
reports in January 2012 on its analysis of
customer satisfaction, sales and market
share in the UK. “The four retailers with the
lowest customer satisfaction all suffered a
serious decline in sales. Comet posted the
biggest sales fall (-14%) and scored lower
customer satisfaction than most retailers in
the survey (71.7)”1
In financial services, we are still counting
the cost of damage to customer trust caused
by PPI mis-selling. According to the FSA,
“Redress paid to customers who complained
about the sale of payment protection
insurance (PPI) has now reached £3bn”2
.
And in a recent study aimed at financial
services organisations, 55% of respondents
said that despite our recessionary times,
they would be more likely to switch their
bank due to bad customer service than to
get a slightly better deal.3
So if we know what makes for a great
experience as customers, but still fail to
deliver it as routine, it seems likely there is an
inbuilt structural issue getting in the way of
delivery. The hypothesis of this paper is that
the enterprise operating model is a critical
barrier to achieving customer centricity.
Introduction
Good customers, poor suppliers?
We are all customers. In day-to-day life we buy products and services that meet our needs and we
make choices about the organisations we choose to spend our money with. Sometimes we have
good experiences and sometimes they are poor – it is easy to tell which is which. But some of us
are more than just customers; we are also part of organisations that deliver products or services.
Did you know… By and large it is big
banks that take the top spot as the worst
companies when it comes to looking after
their customers.
(Moneywise.co.uk June 2011)
“American, which filed for
bankruptcy-court reorganisation
in November, has struggled
with its operation for several
years. For the past five years,
American has been among the
worst three airlines at on-time
performance, a key measure
of an airline’s operation since
it impacts mishandled bags,
bumped passengers and
even cancelled”
Wall Street Journal, 5 Jan 2012
reporting onAmericanAirlines’
performance in the annual Middle
Seat airline survey
1
Institute of Customer Service – UK Customer Satisfaction Results January 2012
2
FSA, February 2012
3
Youbiquity Finance Research Summary 2012,Avaya and BT plc

Understanding the problem
So let’s look in more detail at this enterprise
operating model. Financial services
organisations provide services to customers,
which they pay for directly or indirectly. Profit
is made from these interactions. It’s a simple
premise. Although these customers are the
start of the business model, they can be seen,
however, as just the means to an end, which
is to return profit to shareholders and offer a
financial reward (of salary, bonus, or shares)
to the employees. At their heart all financial
services organisations are retailing money or
managing risk. These products are intangible
and therefore the delivery of the promise to
the customer is paramount. But this customer
promise can be damaged in operation by the
need to manage the investment or reward
requirements of other stakeholders.
It’s all about the profit. Or is it? Everyone
understands that this is a business and without
the profit motive certain services will simply
not get offered. However, since the banking
crisis, financial services firms have been falling
over themselves to regain the higher ground
by claiming to be customer centric.
There are many examples which evidence the
willingness to put the customer at the heart
of everything and deliver on the customer
promise. In reality, however, despite this
willingness, financial institutions still appear
to structure themselves in such a way as to
immediately damage that customer promise.
Perhaps one of the highest profile failings
most recently has been at Santander, named
the UK’s worst bank for the second year
running.4
Long queues in branches, unhelpful
call centres and untrained staff were cited as
key customer service failings.
Also in financial services, the Financial
Ombudsman Service reported that it received
more than 5,000 enquiries and complaints
a day concerning financial firms. In the
2011/2012 financial year, one in five of these
enquiries went on to become a formal dispute
requiring the involvement of adjudicators and
ombudsmen– a record 264,375 new cases,
up 28% on the previous year.5
The problem is clearly widespread, but it
goes beyond just financial services. For
example, according to the Institute of
Customer Services in February 2012 “Cuts
have damaged the quality of customer
service in close to half of organisations (48%)
with only a quarter preserving service levels
through the recession.”6
“For NEST the number of
members and employers we
sign up is the ultimate measure
of success, but that measure
doesn’t determine whether
we are acting on the members
best interests. We are working
out how to do this.”
Peter Halsor, NEST
“When making difficult decisions the overriding decision is whether
it is in the members’ best interests.”
Peter Halsor, NEST
Customer Centric Offerings Organisation (Campaigns)
Aviva scoops award for putting customers at the heart Aviva (press release)
The goal of all of this work is to put our customers at the heart
of everything we do
Co-operative Banking Group (Annual Report)
Satisfaction Guaranteed First Direct (Cash back promise)
We are building a sustainable future for our business by putting
customers at the heart of everything we do
Lloyds Banking Group (Responsible Business Report)
Helpful Banking NatWest
Putting Customers First Standard Life (Sustainability Report)
“Understanding customers’ needs and building customer insight
is crucial to any business success”At Zurich we place this cus-
tomer ethos at the heart of our business too.
Zurich (Marketing Brochure)
4
Moneywise May 2011
5
Financial Ombudsman Annual Review 2011/12
6
Institute of Consumer Services – 10 Ways to Win the Battle against Customer Churn February 2012

Efficient but ineffective?
The enterprise operating model in financial
services is currently designed for the efficient
management of resources in delivering
services. These are usually delineated by
grouped skill sets and are often focused
around groupings of these skills within
product lines. The ‘powers that be’ have
worked out constituent parts of the product
delivery process then taken as much
cost out of them as possible. However
proficient management of resources is
from the company perspective, it clearly
doesn’t always deliver a rewarding
customer experience. In short they may
be efficient, but are they effective?
The following reinforces this point:
“With the exception of American Express,
which frequently earns accolades from
its customer experience, the companies
we see allocating the greatest amount of
resources are widely recognised for providing
disappointing customer experiences….
We are seeing a large number of
companies simply handing out new titles
to operations staff without committing to
customer experience management.”7
For some organisations, achieving
effectiveness (in terms of customer
purpose) and efficiency is a strategic
imperative that requires a defined policy.
Rod Butcher, Group Head of Customer
Experience and Insight at Aviva, concurs,
saying: “Aviva has embedded the customer
principles into its formal risk policy and this
has been incredibly effective in ensuring the
voice of the customer is heard at executive
level. The FSA regulated principles of
‘Treating the Customer Fairly’ have been
the start point and modified to suit the
global brand aspirations of Aviva. They
have become entrenched in the policy
making process. For example, if a particular
area is seeing high levels of early product
cancellation, the team has a remit to
investigate and use the risk documents as
a way of demonstrating that the product
may have been developed to suit company
need rather than customer need. This
level of oversight is necessary to maintain
the balance between achieving corporate
ambition and customer requirement.”
Figure 1 - Customer Journey cuts across silos
Financial Services
Organisations
BRANCH
CONTACT
CENTRE
WEB MOBILE
DEPOSITS/
SAVINGS
MORTGAGES CARDS INVESTMENTS
IDENTIFICATION
AND VERIFICATION
CALL
HANDLING
ACCOUNT
OPENING
CARDS
PRODUCTION
Silos by channel
Silos by product
Silos by function
7
Walden, Beyond Philosophy 2011
?Customer
purpose achieved
Are these units collaborating to deliver a service across
the customer journey?
Or getting in the way of achieving the customer purpose?
Financial Services
Organisations
Financial Services
Organisations

4
CUSTOMER ACCESS TO SERVICES
CROSS CHANNEL ,
NOT MULTI CHANNEL
Step 1: Identify the “customer purpose” for each customer service offered. To ensure your success
you need to have a very clear idea of who your customer is and what the customer requires.
Step 2: Plan the process for the customer (the customer journey) around the customer needs
in support of the customer purpose.
Step 3: Identify the services required along each customer journey to deliver the most effective
customer purpose and build the organisation around the effective delivery of these services.
Step 4: Provide access to the service offerings by whatever channel the customer chooses and
allow them to swap channels mid-journey if that is what they require.
So that’s easy then. But what does this mean in practice?
4 Steps to a Customer Centric Enterprise
So what should the financial services sector be aiming to achieve? There are four key steps that
can assist in truly putting the customer at the heart of everything a financial services enterprise
does.This is a new model that aims to fix the ‘broken’ enterprise operating model, as follows:
Figure 2 - Customer Centric Enterprise Model
CUSTOMER -
SEGMENTED
IN LINE WITH
YOUR PRODUCT/
SERVICE
OFFERINGS
1 1
CUSTOMER
PURPOSE
2
STEPS IN THE CUSTOMER JOURNEY
(FOCUSED ON ACHIEVING CUSTOMER
PURPOSE)
SERVICES COLLABORATING ALONG
THE CUSTOMER JOURNEY TO DELIVER
THE CUSTOMER PURPOSE
3

Step 1: Identify the customer purpose
In order to start this process you need to be
really clear about the products and services
you offer and how they are perceived by
the current and target customer base.
Your different customer segments will
almost certainly have different outcomes or
purposes in mind for the same service.
So the message here is to first really
understand who makes up your customer
base. You must ensure there is a clear
alignment between the following three
subsets:
• The actual customer base (which your
customer service operation is serving)
• The target customer base (which your
marketing and sales teams
are addressing)
• The desired customer base (which your
business strategy is pursuing).
Where this alignment is not clear, this
should be resolved as soon as possible.
Does this mean we can’t continue if there is
no alignment? No, but a clear prioritisation
of effort is required to ensure that you stay
focused on getting the best return on your
investment.
Once you have clarity on the customers
and the services you are offering it is then
possible to identify the customer purpose
for each permutation. This should be a
simple statement of what success looks like
for that customer. It should also be framed
in terms describing what the customer can
now do based on having achieved their
customer purpose. Understanding what
the customer can now do is incredibly
important. Why? It helps us to determine
the end point of the service offering.
So let us clarify this to better understand
what we mean by the customer purpose.
Where, for example, a customer is looking
to open a new online instant access savings
account, the service doesn’t end when the
customer has completed and submitted all
the forms. Instead the end point is when the
customer is able to achieve their purpose,
which is to deposit money that is earning
interest and to withdraw funds easily
through all available channels.
So if the account provides access to use
card withdrawals or make payments online,
the purpose has not been achieved until
a) the customer has made a deposit into the
account, b) it is attracting interest,
c) the card has been fully activated with
the ability to withdraw funds from it,
and d) the customer can make payments
online. There should be a target timeline for
achievement described within the customer
purpose. Clear expectations should be set,
not hidden within the small print. This will
ensure the customer understands exactly
when they will be able to achieve their
purpose and that their provider is working
to achieve these timelines.
Imagine the frustration if, having handed
over cash in branch to open an instant
access account, the customer has an urgent
need to make a payment using that cash
but is unable to. Why? Because despite
recognising that the account is open (after
all that process has been completed), the
provider hasn’t completed arrangements to
allow for funds to be withdrawn and the
three-day service level target was hidden in
the small print, if explained at all.
“There is a clear distinction between being Customer Friendly and Customer Centric. If our
customer service agents focus solely on what customers say they want, rather than what they
need (to fulfil their purpose), this will ultimately lead to customer disappointment when some
apparent wants can’t reasonably be satisfied’.”
Peter Norris, RBS
“We can already offer great
service to our new customers,
the next step is to recognise
returning customers and offer
them even better service.”
Peter Kovari,Travelex

Step 2: Plan the customer journey
Customer journey mapping is no longer a
new discipline, but it has tended to be used
in Web and mobile developments to assist
in improving the customer experience at
each touch point. Whilst valid, this tends to
focus minds on the technology capabilities
rather than the customer purpose, which
should, unless clear expectations have been
set up front, be channel agnostic.
This is exemplified at Metro Bank, which
is, according to Anthony Thomson,
“completely channel agnostic”. He explains:
“We consider the customer experience, not
the channel. It is not for us to define what
the customer wants, but to give it to them
in the right way.”
Once you have defined a set of customer
purposes, developing the customer journey
by putting yourself in your customers’ shoes
can be a powerful experience for executives
to go through. Focusing always on achieving
the customer service, an experienced
facilitator can help executives to appreciate
the pain of customers who have been failed
by the organisation in the past.
Too often strategy mandates the customer
journey teams to find ways to make the
journey more efficient without experiencing
the reality of this efficiency for themselves.
Once they do, the focus on efficiency can
very soon turn into a focus on effectiveness,
or in other words achieving the customer
purpose. And after all, what could be more
efficient than a process that is absolutely
effective in doing exactly what it is
supposed to do?
Step 3: Build the services-based
organisation
For ease of management, financial services
companies have often developed organisation
structures that are based around core
competencies. This facilitates training and the
easy identification of career paths. Resources
can be applied to demand management
models to drive efficiency of operation and
reduce costs.
Another route has been to provide profit and
loss (PL) responsibility at the channel level.
As new channels have been adopted and
then entrenched, from branch to telephony to
online, the channels have often become the
budget owners.
Whether functionally aligned or channel
based (and often both) the customer journeys
typically flow across many of these silos. In
one example in an Investment Management
team the delivery of a contractual agreement
to supply fund management services to a
pension fund requires action or authorisation
from 17 different departments. The scope for
error and delay in this instance is enormous.
A number of those executives canvassed
by Steria conceded that organisational silos
were a problem, with one commenting: “Yes
we are siloed. We have a desire to break
this down but there are no concrete actions
as yet. The channels are in some respects
competing so, for example, if there was an
idea for the online channel to implement a
programme that could help support the store
channel or vice versa, they wouldn’t prioritise
this. The lack of an overarching strategy
to focus on customers means each PL is
effectively operating alone.”
There is another way. Build the organisation
structure with the customer at the centre.
As Peter Norris, Director of Group Lean and
Service Management at RBS, explains: “Start
with the customer in respect of the service
they need. Understand the customer journey
and moments of truth – and ignore the current
organisation while doing that thinking.”
So it’s not a case of making it easy for the
management of resources (however laudable
the objective), but of ensuring that all the
services required to deliver the customer
journeys are aligned in the most effective way
with the customer purpose.
The first step on this approach is to define
the services required for each of the customer
journeys, including all channel variations. After
defining the services required to support just a
few customer journeys, you will find that many
services can be reused across journeys.
“We are attempting to break siloes with a combination of Net Promoter Score (NPS) as
our key measure; Customer Journey Mapping as a key cross functional approach and
systems thinking. These things can only be achieved by working together and indeed
we do not go into an area to start to develop an approach unless we have top level
sponsorship and a cross functional team to work with.”
Rod Butcher,Aviva

Once you have clarity on all the services it
is then possible to rebuild the organisation
structure around these services, combining
them to deliver the customer purpose in the
most effective way.
The aim of this approach is to change the
unit of work from a process or a process step
into a delivered service. It is outcome focused
and the key measure of success should be the
achievement of the customer purpose, not a
step on the journey.
In building this service model against the
customer journeys the whole organisation will
understand how it supports the achievement
of the customer purpose. Everyone will
see how each moving part can support or
undermine the implicit customer promise of
the brand.
The primary objective of this service-oriented
approach is not to create centres of excellence,
which themselves could become silos, but to
create centres of service focused on delivering
the customer purpose.
Handoffs and interfaces should be minimised
to ensure delays and errors are removed.
This will dramatically reduce the cost of
process failure, which typically exhibits itself
by customers having to reengage with the
company, time and again to achieve their
purpose. Alternatively, they simply take their
business elsewhere.
Step 4: Provide cross channel access
When customers engage to achieve their
customer purpose the channel is merely a
means to an end, not an end in itself. There
have been many channel initiatives where
all the benefits are seen from the company
point of view, rather than the customers.
For example there was a trend at the turn of
the century to make web sites ‘sticky’ – to
provide a reason for the customer to return
again and again. What this forgot entirely
was the customer purpose in returning.
If the customer purpose is to research a
product or service that may or may not
lead to a purchase, then surely the focus
of the design should be to ensure that
the customer finds the information they
need as quickly and easily as possible. The
design should also ensure they have a clear
understanding of exactly what they will be
getting and that their expectations are set
relating to important considerations (such
as the service only being provided via the
web channel). If the customer achieves this
purpose and decides that the product or
service is exactly what they need, or decides
that it isn’t but the experience of finding this
out was good, they will return to make the
purchase or to research further.
Stickiness is achieved by giving the user of
the site what they want, not by artificial
gimmicks. Unless your purpose is to drive
traffic for an advertising-led business model
or you have a clear marketing strategy to
drive brand awareness (anything other than
a clear focus on achieving the core customer
purpose is wasted effort.
This is really about ensuring that the primary
mechanism and usage of the channel
should be first and foremost about helping
the customer to achieve their purpose.
Other corporate goals should be secondary
because by distracting from the customer
purpose the overall efficiency of the process
is compromised.
“It is about the whole
customer journey, not just
one issue such as the call
centre. Focus on what the
customer wants, even if that
means making it easy for
customers to leave if that is
what they want.”
So if the channel is a means to an end, from
the customer’s perspective, unless they
have had very clear expectations set about
which channels they can use, all channels
should be available and the customer
journeys should accommodate each of these
channels. It should also be possible, where
appropriate, for the customer to switch
channels at any point.
“Where there is customer demand we would like to move from a transactional
to a relationship mode, but we mustn’t damage the elements of the
transactional model which customers value the most, e.g. speed of service.”
Peter Kovari,Travelex

At this point in the argument for customer
centricity the response is typically “I’d love
to do that but our systems don’t support
it”. Or it might be “I can see it would
cost a fortune to do that, so where’s the
business case?” Both are valid responses
but both work from the assumption that
the processes and organisation structure
must always remain the same while the
systems change. If the customer journeys
can be managed in a way that the
customers achieve either their purpose or
a significant staging point on the journey,
then the transfer between channels and
often much more can be easily achieved. By
building customer journeys with many steps,
handoffs and interfaces in the first place,
the structure of the organisation can work
against the achievement of the customer
purpose and create artificial barriers to cross
channel access.
The biggest single barrier to multi-channel
capability in most organisations is not the
change to systems required (significant
though this may be) but the ability to
influence the delivery of the customer
purpose across the whole customer journey.
That’s because many elements, whether
staff, locations or systems, lie outside remit
or the budgetary responsibility of any one
decision making body.
“Whether spoken or unspoken
the barriers to change are
more often political. They
are more about influence
or perceived influence, than
about a real business need.”
If you make access to services simple and
easy to use, in the way which customers
want to access them, the services are
much more likely to be used. If the services
which form part of the enterprises value
proposition are used and the experience is
good, the brand proposition (or customer
promise) is reinforced. Customers are then
more likely to recommend your business
to others or use it again themselves.
Conversely, if the services are complex and
difficult to use, you risk losing customers
and any new business opportunity coming
from their recommendation. Many of
our respondents cited the Apple model’s
simplicity as an exemplar for product and
service delivery.
A number of mechanisms are available for
achieving seamless cross-channel access,
such as loosely coupling the experience
layer to the existing target architecture to
deliver a cross-channel architecture with
a world class customer experience. These
will be discussed in future papers looking
at different aspects of the customer-centric
financial services enterprise.
“We need to look outside of Financial Services for good models of
Customer Centric organisations, for example, eBay or John Lewis.”
Peter Halsor, NEST

Peter Halsor, Director of Customer Experience
at NEST, describes the most important
success factors for a customer centricity/
experience programme as “having both
qualitative and emotional measures in place
to gauge not only whether a customer
achieved their goal, but also the emotional
journey they went through to achieve
the goal.”
He adds that customer centricity begins with
knowledge. “A customer centric organisation
is one that is driven by user centred design
and a research/fact based approach.”
In financial services American Express is
among those that stand out.8
How has it
achieved this? Most people talk about its
customer-centric products and services
with, for example enhanced benefits and
rewards and ease of redeeming rewards
points. Alongside American Express, our
respondents cited First Direct, Metro Bank
and USAA as exemplars of great customer
service in financial services, with one
commenting that it would be interesting
to see how Virgin brings its brand to
retail banking.
While new to the financial services scene,
Metro Bank has caused a stir with its
customer first philosophy and, importantly,
simplicity. Customers know what they’re
getting and there is no hard sell. Anthony
Thomson says: “All our decisions are based
around building the customer experience,
not on the Return on Investment. When
we were defining customer experiences,
we kept testing ideas to ensure that we
weren’t falling into the trap of being
company centric – every time we suggested
something we would test it again and again
to ensure it was supporting the customer
experience.”
Another theme amongst those deemed
exemplary customer-focused organisations,
both within and outside the industry, is that
they don’t spread themselves too thinly.
Take Apple, for example. It knows what
it does; and does it brilliantly. First Direct
does likewise. Conversely, Santander who
have been heavily criticised for customer
service recently have been accused of
over extending themselves with frantic
acquisitions.9
A key challenge within the context of
customer centricity is how to achieve a
reliable measure of success. It’s not easy.
As Peter Halsor, NEST commented
“Whilst it’s often possible to identify
whether a customer achieved their goal
the real challenge comes in quantifying the
emotional measures, for example how did
the customer feel about the process he
went through?”
Peter Kovari, Global Head of IT Architecture
at Travelex, has a focus on customer and
channels and notes: “We want to get to the
point where we are an intrinsic part of the
customer journey, literally as they plan to
travel, whether they choose to do this online
in advance or simply wait until they get to
the airport.”
A number of our respondents felt that
performance measures such as Net
Promoter Score (NPS) were important, but
their shortcomings recognised. Aviva’s Rod
Butcher comments: “We don’t measure the
achievement of the customer purpose, but
instead have focused almost exclusively
on NPS as a metaphor for all customer
behaviour. We recognise this has its
limitations, but in attempting to change
mindsets a consistent focus on a single
aim of increasing NPS since 2007 has
been very effective.”
For Paul Schofield, Customer Advocacy
Manager at The Co-Operative Banking
Group, it is the customer journey that
currently prescribes the company’s customer
centricity. “The business has got sight of
the entire customer journey and is working
on the ones that customers value most.
However, we don’t have a view yet on the
customer purpose for all these journeys. We
will use a Service Level Guarantee mechanism
to measure the customer outcomes.”
So what does a Customer Centric
Enterprise look like?
Organisations that deliver an enhanced customer experience are thriving. It is no coincidence that
industry leaders such as Apple,American Express,Amazon and US retailer Zappos are also leaders
in customer service.
Did you know… American Express
Ranks Highest in Credit Card Customer
Satisfaction for a Fifth Consecutive Year
J.D. Power and Associates reports Aug 20118
8
JD Power and Associates- Credit Card Satisfaction Survey August 2011
9
Moneywise June 2011

“Everyone lines up to deliver the required
customer experience. They value what customers
say about them and act on it. There are lots of
customer recommendations: they plan, innovate
and act for long term growth and success, not
short term targets.”
What a Customer Centric Enterprise looks like -
Paul Schofield,The Co-Operative Banking Group

The four-step model outlined in this paper
was viewed by those taking part in our
survey as accurate and appropriate at a
general level. It establishes a way to fix
what Metro Bank’s Anthony Thomson
describes as “the broken model” in
financial services.
Respondents see the four-step model as
a building block that will evolve further
with enhancements more specific to their
industry or organisation. For example, The
Co-Operative Banking Group, Paul Schofield
comments that he would “Extend the model
to include colleagues and organisational
culture (human capital). It is important
to get that bit right as our people will
ultimately drive the customer experience.”
For Peter Kovari at Travelex, adapting
the model might have a regional bias. He
says: “In terms of adding to it we could
describe the differing customer purpose and
journey as they relate to different countries.
Regulations and custom dictate that the
expectations of customers are different
around the world. For example, in Japan
customers would naturally get their currency
from the postman, which is a model that
does not work in most countries. We are
looking to optimise the model we use to
introduce new services in new countries
and trying to reduce the number of systems
necessary to cater for the local differences,
using a reference model that works across
the regions. ”
Aviva’s Rod Butcher says: “The model
describes a desired to-be state. The amount
of change requirement needs a starting
point, however, so the change and direction
of travel can be accurately plotted. At
Aviva we are using a model that starts with
the customer and then moves back in to
the company and forward to the financial
outcomes. Each of the elements needs
consideration.”
NEST’s Peter Halsor reinforces the need for
the model to evolve our time “NEST will
soon be moving from a zero customer base
to hundreds of thousands, so evolving the
model is crucial.”
Getting the structure right
There will, of course, always be challenges
in implementing any new business model
and a recurrent theme amongst our
respondents is the organisational structures
and specifically silos. One respondent
noted: “The corporate mindset looks to
lock customers in when there is a retention
problem rather than looking at the source
of the problem ‘for example’ why customers
are looking to leave.” While another
commented: “Traditional profit and loss
account structures create silos and barriers
to customer centricity.”
In one organisation a customer programme
has set an objective to break down silos,
but according to our respondent, “It is hard,
for example, there seems to be a lack of
basic understanding across the company of
how individuals’ jobs will have an impact on
customer satisfaction. In an internal survey
of 2,000 people 17% of them couldn’t
articulate in any way how their role might
have an impact on customer feedback.”
Taking the model forward
There is clearly no magic bullet when it comes to building a customer-centric financial services
enterprise. Nonetheless, it is important to make a start with a focus on the customer purpose.
From there everything else becomes much clearer.
“We have accepted that we
are in perpetual beta and
continually learning.”
Peter Halsor, NEST
Conclusion
Looking to the future, it is clear that there
is an ambition to build the customer-centric
financial services enterprise. It is easy to see
why: financial services are, by their nature,
intangible; not something physical that can
be picked up, handled, eaten or worn. As
such, service becomes a vital differentiator.
The model outlined here provides a starter
for 10 in how to develop a customer centric
enterprise. There is energy and enthusiasm
in meeting these customer requirements,
but also a recognition that the challenge
is not just structural but cultural. There
needs to be real will power and drive from
the top of organisations to harness the
benefits which the approach can bring.
Some are sceptical that this can happen,
but the respondents to this paper have
demonstrated that the kernel of customer
centricity exists – and it needs room
to grow.
Only once the structure and systems of the
organisation have been realigned around
delivering against the customer purpose will
we be able to project our knowledge and
experience as customers ourselves on to
the business of delivering world class
customer service.

Bibliography
Contributors
Rod Butcher, Aviva - Group Head of Customer Experience and Insight
Martin Coppack, Financial Services Authority (FSA) - Technical Specialist: Consumer Engagement
Peter Halsor, National Employment Savings Trust (NEST) - Director of Customer Experience
Jed Hodgson, Financial Services Authority (FSA) - Manager of Consumer Affairs team
Peter Kovari, Travelex - Global Head of IT Architecture
Peter Norris, Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) - Director of Group Lean and Service Management
Paul Schofield, Co-Operative Banking Group (CBG) - Customer Advocacy Manager
Anthony Thomson, Metro Bank - Chairman and Co-Founder
References
Institute of Customer Service - UK Customer Satisfaction Results, January 2012
FSA website, Consumer Information PPI February 2012
Youbiquity Finance Research Summary 2012, Avaya and BT plc
Moneywise May 2011 and June 2011
Financial Ombudsman Annual Review 2011/12
Institute of Consumer Services - 10 Ways to Win the Battle against Customer Churn, February 2012
Walden, Beyond Philosophy 2011
JD Power and Associates - Credit Card Satisfaction Survey August 2011

About Steria: www.steria.com/uk
Steria delivers IT enabled business services which help organisations in the public and private sectors operate more efficiently and profitably.
By combining an in depth understanding of our clients’ businesses with expertise in IT and business process outsourcing, we take on our
clients’ challenges and develop innovative solutions to address them. Through our highly collaborative consulting style, we work with our
clients to transform their business, enabling them to focus on what they do best. Our 20,000 people, working across 16 countries, support
the systems, services and processes that make today’s world turn, touching the lives of millions around the globe each day.
Founded in 1969, Steria has offices in Europe, India, North Africa and SE Asia and a 2011 revenue of €1.75 billion. 21 percent* of Steria’s
capital is owned by its employees. Headquartered in Paris, Steria is listed on the Euronext Paris market.
*Including the Employees Shares Trust in the UK
Financial Services Sector
Steria has more than 40 years’ experience in the financial services sector. We are the European business and IT transformation partner for
many of the world’s leading banks and insurers and have developed an in-depth understanding of how efficient business processes and
effective IT can be used to build competitive advantage.
Customer Centric Domain of Excellence
Steria’s virtual Business Communities are essential to the fulfilment of Steria’s strategic business objectives on innovation, knowledge
sharing and growth. Our Business Communities are defined by Domains of Excellence (DoEs) which address our customers’ burning issues.
Customer Centric Management (CCM) is a key DoE within Financial Services.
Our DoE consultants across Europe share knowledge and collaborate to maintain our business leadership through the design
and development of innovative solutions.
Our CCM clients include Barclays, BforBank, Commerzbank, Co-Operative Banking Group, Topdanmark, Volkswagen Financial Services.
Contact us
Sean Tomlinson, Head of Consulting, Financial Services Sector
mobile: +44 (0)7850 795 839
tel: +44 (0)1442 884539
sean.tomlinson@steria.co.uk
Steria Ltd
Three Cherry Trees Lane,
Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire,
HP2 7AH
For further information about our services visit www.steria.com/uk

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