RBS receives the Celent Model Bank 2017 Award
On the 4th of April, the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) won the Celent Model Bank 2017 award for employee productivity, for its implementation of Workplace by Facebook. Naresh Vyas, Head of Solutions at RBS and Matt James, Head of UK Scouting at RBS received the award.
RBS Business Challenge
RBS is a UK-based banking and financial services company, operating in a rapidly changing sector. A fifth of RBS customers now solely use mobile and digital to interact with the bank. As customers change the way they bank with RBS, the bank found it needed to change the way it serves people. RBS concluded it needed to make a cultural change, and transform the way it was operating. It needed to encourage collaboration and allow employees to communicate faster and more efficiently, which would hopefully translate to a flatter organization, and more satisfied customers.
Changing the Way RBS Works
RBS was one of the first organizations to pilot Workplace, and the first bank to do so. Naresh Vyas, Head of Solutions at RBS explained: Our objective was to improve the way we communicate and collaborate with each other, source information and expertise from across the bank, and get new ideas to market. RBS selected Workplace because of how familiar and easy it is to use. Employees can use the same features they do on Facebook, which allows them to share information, post photos, create groups and events – but safely, securely and confidentially enough to work.
Transforming the RBS culture
Workplace enabled a deep change to the RBS culture by:
- Celebrating success: RBS’ Learning & Development Team designed a Service Excellent e-learning module (Driving for Success) which was delivered across the bank. The team used Workplace to encourage colleagues to complete it and share successes using Workplace. Within just 2 months, more than 22,000 had completed the module. Workplace is also used to share messages about fellow colleagues who have gone above and beyond to help customers.
- Sharing Ideas: the staff frequently share best practices to help clients. For example, an employee shared a tip on how to help a client who wants to withdraw cash but doesn’t have a bank card. The employee recommended to use GetCash, an RBS feature that lets customers withdraw money from an ATM without using their card.
Why RBS Won the Award
Celent said: RBS’ use of Workplace by Facebook is a compelling example of the strategic use of technology to support cultural change within a large organization as well as a mechanism to accelerate the pace of innovation. Some of the tangible results that helped RBS win the award were:
- Supported by key senior executives, Workplace improved transparency, reduced organizational barriers and enabled more effective collaboration.
- Workplace maximized staff engagement. It is one of the first widely used SaaS platforms within RBS and one of a small number of applications that can be accessed from personal devices. In early 2017, Workplace hosted over 1,300 active groups administering 1,500 posts, with an average of 10,000 responses per day.
- Workplace minimized the training and reduced the IT support.
- Three of the top five most active groups involve customer-facing activities, suggesting that colleagues are leveraging Workplace to become more effective at serving customers.
Read more stories from organizations using Workplace on our website.
Source unless otherwise specified: “Royal Bank of Scotland: Workplace by Facebook” report by Celent, April 2017.
