By Ed Lane, VP Sales EMEA, nCino
Artificial intelligence (AI) is quickly transitioning from a “nice-to-have” technology to a key business driver for financial services organisations. Over the past few years, financial institutions (FIs) have begun to think about AI beyond the abstract and are discovering the many practical and profitable use cases for this emerging technology. A growing number of FIs have started truly understanding the importance of using AI to enhance the customer and employee experience.
As AI becomes demystified and valuable use cases emerge, FIs are becoming more attuned to the idea of adopting these technologies across a wide range of key business functions. In 2021, the time has come for FIs to evolve beyond agility and embrace intelligence by incorporating cognitive technologies into their operations. When FIs fully harness the power of AI to capture deeper customer insights, make informed, data-driven decisions, manage risk and increase efficiencies, they transform themselves into Intelligent Enterprises and bring more value to their customers and teams.
Agility is the Launchpad
Any discussion of the Intelligent Enterprise begins with an understanding of the Agile Enterprise as the necessary foundation. The idea of the Agile Enterprise centers around the industrialization of banking, the idea of turning every core banking function – from product development and customer acquisition to account opening and commercial lending – into a systematic, fast and seamless process. It necessitates a configurable and flexible system of engagement that allows multiple users – including executives, staff and customers – to collaborate in real time, with full transparency and visibility into every step of the process.
To fully leverage the Intelligent Enterprise, it is essential to first enable the Agile Enterprise. It would be incredibly difficult for an institution to effectively and efficiently make the leap into AI without first having established a strong foundation to support the myriad of back-office processes, including customer relationship management (CRM), document management, collateral analysis, covenant tracking, loan origination, portfolio analysis, regulatory compliance, customer service, the digital channel and on and on. Once an institution has established a foundation of agility through a single system of engagement, it can begin the journey toward becoming an Intelligent Enterprise.
AI is the Rocket Fuel
AI and related technologies, including machine learning, natural language processing and cognitive computing, serve as the foundation of the Intelligent Enterprise. There is a broad array of current and potential use cases within financial services for AI and related technologies, ranging from robo-advice and next-product recommendations to anti-money laundering (AML) compliance and credit card fraud protection.
Within the Intelligent Enterprise, cognitive technology can be utilized to bring a true return on investment to the institution. FIs need actionable insights to maintain competitiveness and serve their customers’ needs. The successful deployment of the Intelligent Enterprise checks one or more of these boxes to varying degrees, depending on the specific use case: increasing revenue, growing profitability, improving efficiency, reducing costs and mitigating risk. Embedding cognitive technologies into core banking processes can present FIs with measurable results, a positive ROI and benefits that continue to increase over time.
Challenges Along the Flightpath to the Intelligent Enterprise
All of this is not to say that widespread transformation to the Intelligent Enterprise will come easily. Incumbent financial services firms of all sizes come burdened with long-held processes and systems that serve as barriers to change. The industry faces a number of daunting challenges, including the burden of legacy systems, slow adoption rates, talent acquisition, competition from Big Tech and fintech upstarts, regulatory overreach and connecting the prediction with the customer.
The key is to focus on seamlessly incorporating cognitive technologies into existing processes while also maintaining a human touch with customers, i.e., to build AI solutions that engage employees and put the customer first. The most effective way to achieve this ideal is through the deployment of a single platform, a system of engagement that seamlessly integrates and analyzes data from all customer channels and across the organization. Only with the foundation of a truly holistic platform, which allows every employee to have access to the same information, can the Intelligent Enterprise really begin to take flight.
Achieving Orbital Flight Requires a System of Engagement
For FIs, the journey to the Intelligent Enterprise begins with defining the value you desire to achieve through the implementation of AI and related technologies. Too many FIs begin by building the rocket mid-mission – by creating the infrastructure without first understanding the true ROI of the endeavor. Start by choosing one use case that will return value to the organization – whether it is streamlining the financial statement data capture in commercial lending, employing next product to sell capabilities in retail customer onboarding or implementing risk-based pricing to help meet consumer fair lending compliance requirements.
Next, decide whether to buy or build the technology. For FIs that do not have the benefit of massive resources to create their own software, partnering with a vendor like nCino that has the expertise, experience and a track record of success working with AI-driven data insights may likely be the better option. Our AI application suite, nCino IQ (nIQ®), supercharges the nCino Bank Operating System® by leveraging AI, analytics and machine learning to enable FIs to become more predictive and proactive. nIQ offers an FI’s employees the opportunity to do more for the institution by, for example, saving valuable time through automatic data extraction and analysis of tax returns and financial statements. It’s no longer just about convenience, it’s about increasing profitability, safety, soundness and growth in a customer-centric banking world.
Conclusion
AI and cognitive technologies are transforming banking. They are enabling FIs to increase revenue, gain operational efficiencies and fully meet customer expectations. With this type of technology in place, FIs no longer have to spend time on cumbersome, manual tasks but can offer employees the opportunity to do more for the institution by saving valuable time. 2021 will be an exciting year as FIs continue to adopt new AI tools to transform the customer experience.
