Financial Services

Companies in the financial services industry are under constant pressure

The global economy has become extremely volatile, and it seems like we are jumping from one global crisis to another. The financial industry has regained some of its strength after the global economic crisis in 2008, thus ending the long-standing focus on survival through cost reductions and restructuring. Focus is now a systematic search for growth.

Market conditions and customer behaviour are changing more rapidly than ever – driven by increased digitalisation, new market entrants and an onslaught of new regulations. In order to thrive, financial institutions need to become more customer-focused, tech-enabled and operationally agile, so that they can remain dominant in a rapidly evolving ecosystem.

FSImpact - highlighting the topic of “execution in the financial sector”

It’s all about execution and people

At Implement Consulting Group, we focus on empowering people and organisations to achieve more. It is not enough to point to a solution, deliver a strategy and a plan for how to get there. A successful change initiative requires efficient use of the talent and knowledge that the company collectively possesses and must be orchestrated in a way that creates energy and ownership in the organisation.

Our conclusion from 25 years of work on strategic transformations is unambiguous. All successful execution is based on people. Our client base includes major commercial banks, general insurance companies, mortgage institutions, life and pension companies and organisations providing infrastructure to the financial industry in the Nordic marketplace.

Implement is built around a belief in deep professional competences combined with broad implementation skills. With approx. 800 consultants across the Nordics, we have many years of experience from working in the financial industry. We strive to solve problems and overcome challenges together with our clients instead of sticking to specific methods or products.

Our offerings

We can assist you in a broad range of topics, including:

Business transformation

• Increase profitability: The volatile financial industry forces you to rethink your business model regularly to continue to create value. Implement can assist you in translating strategic goals into programmes and subsequently ensure impact through effective execution. Our value propositions include business transformation, post-merger integration, cost-cutting and turnarounds.
• Increase operating efficiency: More than ever, financial institutions must be smarter and faster to thrive in a competitive and low-interest environment. Implement can assist you in improving operational performance. Our value proposition includes end-to-end process transformation, robotics and AI automation and operations and performance management.

Growth, customer experience and innovation

• Improve customer satisfaction: Customer expectations have risen sharply in recent years. Customers expect a highly personalised, convenient and fast service experience in every touchpoint. Implement can help you reimagine and optimise your key customer journeys to deliver a better outcome for your customers. Our value proposition includes customer journey mapping and service model redesign.
• Increase sales: Competition in financial services is accelerating. Leading companies in the industry are using superior commercial execution to outperform their peers and drive growth. Implement can help you build and sustain best-in-class commercial capabilities to gain significant competitive advantages. Our value proposition includes go-to-market strategy, sales acceleration, pricing and profit optimisation and branding differentiation.
• Innovation and fintech: To stay successful, financial services companies need to embrace agile and customer-centric development approaches and increasingly engage with fintech providers to be able to deliver leading (digital) products and services. Implement can help you develop new products and services and help you engage with fintechs. Our value proposition includes user-focused research, design sprints and innovation hackathons.

Control and compliance

• Safeguard customers and protect brand reputation: Over the last decade, financial services companies have seen a massive increase in new regulations that aim to protect investors and ensure that markets are fair, efficient and transparent. They also seek to reduce systemic risk and financial crime (e.g. MiFID II/MiFIR, PSD2, CRD IV, AML, GDPR etc.). To help FSI companies successfully adopt these regulations, Implement has partnered with The Financial Compliance Group, a leading Nordic compliance company, to deliver integrated compliance and change services to our clients. Our value proposition includes compliance maturity assessments, implementation of new regulations and people development and training.

Digitalisation and IT

• Drive successful digitalisation: The pace of digitalisation in FSI is likely to increase in the coming decade. In order to thrive, financial services companies need to modernise their IT infrastructure, increase the efficiency of the IT organisation and adopt a digital mindset across all levels of the organisation. Implement can help you develop successful digital and IT strategies. Our value proposition includes digital and IT strategy, IT operating models, IT systems transformations and agile transformation.
• Become data-driven: Many financial institutions have realised that big data analytics and artificial intelligence will be a major driver of growth and innovation in the sector. At the same time, these institutions are challenged by a siloed and inconsistent approach to data management. Implement can help you become data-driven and create impact by optimising the entire data value chain. Our value proposition includes data and analytics strategy, data management, business intelligence, data science and artificial intelligence.

Organisational design and leadership

• Create high-performance organisations and teams: The ever-increasing change agenda in financial services puts a heavy strain on the organisations and leaders in the sector. Implement can help financial institutions develop agile and resilient organisations and teams that are fit for the future. All change starts and ends with people. Our value proposition includes organisational design, leadership development and large-scale upskilling through development of learning academies.