Operations, the powerhouse for change and innovation

Overview
This is Efma eighth successive annual conference devoted to operational excellence and efficiency. Arguably, this topic is now even more important than ever, or at least, its importance is becoming increasingly recognised.

In a context where retail banks are still struggling with the fall-out from the economic crisis, the route back to future success and profitability lies in the development of more efficient and effective operations. Retail banking is facing an unprecedented need for change and much of this will have to be driven by the operations area.

Key issues
• What are the key challenges in terms of operational excellence?
How can banks improve the customer experience and create value added for clients and shareholders? Part of the answer lies in more predictable services, delivery guarantees, and simplified and enhanced end-to-end processes.

• How can banks transform their operations?
Lean programmes have a key role to play in driving greater performance levels. People and technology are two other key factors: for instance, some roles and responsibilities need to change, and perhaps even the organisational structure.

• How can any changes be sustained?
A culture of continuous improvement will help banks to achieve sustainability.

Hot topics
Other topics that will be discussed during the conference include:

• The growing importance of operational risk
• The operations manager of the future and the COO's new role
• The growth of centres of excellence
• Customer excellence programmes
• Developing a more agile operating model
• The proactive adjustment of core processes
• Operational readiness for delivering major IT change
• E2E process management
• Distributed intelligence in large-scale process improvement programmes
• Performance coaching