What Is a Digital Workplace for Financial Services?

Why the digital workplace is now a necessity

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, institutions in all sectors of the economy have been pursuing a path toward digital transformation. Initially, this drive was simply to enable organizations to meet continuing consumer demand in an uncertain environment shaped by health and safety concerns and movement restrictions.

However, as time went on – and as remote and hybrid working practices have become more commonplace – businesses have continued to embrace digital transformation and the creation of the digital workspace as a new requisite for economic survival in the future workplace.

The financial services sector is not exempt from all of this. With customer satisfaction and the customer experience now major drivers of commercial success, financial services institutions are under pressure to deliver to their clients, investors and stakeholders in terms of convenience, full-service banking, and positive returns. This has to occur in line with existing and evolving industry standards and regulatory compliance frameworks.

At the same time, financial service organizations must support employees basic needs and go the extra mile to promote employee engagement, if they are to meet the stringent expectations of consumers and backers.

The judicious use of digital technologies can empower financial services institutions to tread a more successful path along their digital transformation journey. Through the deployment of intelligent and secure digital tools and support services, banks, credit unions, and others in the sector can integrate communications and collaboration solutions with analytics and automation to improve efficiency, responsiveness, and productivity. This will enable them to serve consumers in the manner to which they are now accustomed, and as customer behavior continues to evolve in the future workplace.

Infrastructure considerations for the digital workplace

As financial services organizations look to reduce costs while supporting workers in their high-value activities, future digital work implies that institutions will require adaptable network environments that enable each worker to connect with the people and resources they need to effectively do their jobs.

A network for future digital work must therefore incorporate digital tools and physical infrastructure that support fast, secure, and continuous data connections. This digital infrastructure may include components such as high-speed Wi-Fi, Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and integrated cloud services. 

Physical and network security will also play a major part in digital technology deployments that support digital workplace transformation in the financial services industry.

5 fundamentals of digital workplace solutions for banks

New working patterns have prompted the development of new digital solutions in the form of application and communication platforms, payment systems, and other services. This, coupled with heightened customer expectations, is putting pressure on retail banking to provide integrated “omni-channel” experiences for consumers, which incorporate personalized service.

Investment banking organizations are having to factor high-speed, high-volume trading into their digital transformation strategy, while insurance providers need to put the focus on agility and adaptability in the face of increasingly uncertain conditions.

To meet the needs of different players in the financial services sector, digital workplace solutions must provide a variety of features and benefits. They include the following.

1. Security controls

With data security and regulatory compliance high on the agenda for all financial services institutions, a digital workplace platform must provide protocols and digital tools to take these issues into account.

For example, the Claromentis intranet software platform incorporates a built-in permissions system, where users can tailor exactly who can view or access particular documents, pages, policies, or e-forms.

2. Policy Management

Financial services organizations must conform to specialized industry policies and procedures in order to operate. As such, digital workplace transformation must take place with all of these directives in mind.

The Claromentis intranet includes a policy management application which allows you to manage the entire workflow of your policies, from creation and approval through to distribution and acceptance. You can even add mandatory read widgets to your intranet home page so it’s the first thing employees see when they log in.

3. Document Management

Financial services teams need to stay up to date with the latest industry regulations and the workflow of active documents.

With this in mind, the Claromentis intranet offers a version-controlled Document Management System which displays the latest version of each and every document, such as acceptance criteria for loans, eligibility checks, and account terms & conditions.

4. Workflow Automation

Financial sector operations require a number of diverse processes – from internal purchase order requests to public-facing mortgage application forms. Manual data entry and information management exposes these workflows to the danger of human error, making automation a desirable component of any digital transformation strategy.

The Claromentis intranet solution includes workflow automation with smart features that enable users to automatically assign e-forms to specific finance team members and capture data from every e-form submission to gather insights and analyses key trends.

5. Collaboration Between Departments

A digital workplace with centralized collaboration tools enables financial service institutions to break down office silos and unite cross-departmental teams. For example, Claromentis includes a communication app for one-to-one conversations, and a corporate social networking tool for company-wide collaboration.

Putting it all together…

So, what is a digital workplace for financial services? On the basis of these observations, one answer to this question is clearly a business intranet. The secure and private network of a an intranet enables authorized stakeholders to access every app, share information and collaborate in one central platform.

Claromentis is an easy-to-use, integrated and highly customizable platform that sits at the heart of your digital workplace, giving your employees an interactive space for communication, collaborative learning, task management and knowledge sharing. 

Over the last decade, our teams have worked with banks, credit unions, and financial institutions on projects of all scopes – from out-of-the-box financial intranet software deployments to full-scale custom development projects. Our powerful software helps you handle core business functions and streamline internal processes, making Claromentis one of the most comprehensive digital workplace solutions for the financial services industry.

If you’d like to learn more about how the Claromentis intranet platform can provide a digital workplace for your financial services institution, book a demo with our experts.