Digital Transformation in Banking: Where Are Swedish Banks on the Transformation Curve?

Key Stats at a Glance

• 25% (4 out of 10) have a fully agile operating model in place.
• 73% state they have a clear digital transformation strategy.
• 67% state they’ve yet to make significant progress implementing their transformation strategy.
• 73% say customer-centricity is driving decisions in their organization.

Top Priorities for Digital Business Transformation in Swedish Banks:

• 23%: Growing revenue with new products and/or service offerings
• 17%: Growing revenue from existing products
• 17%: Improving the customer experience
• 17%: Enabling greater agility
• 10%: New customer acquisition
• 10%: Reducing costs through improved efficiency
• 7%: Challenging the threat posed by new market entrants (e.g., Google, Apple, Amazon)

COVID-19 Impact

• 47% listed the pandemic as their biggest barrier to digital transformation.
• 70% said the pandemic highlighted weaknesses in their organizations’ customer experience.
• 47% said the pandemic was the most important driver of their digital transformation strategy.

Regulatory Challenges

• 47% cited challenges surrounding regulation as their top transformation hurdle.

Lack of Operational Agility

• 37% say a lack of operational agility is their biggest transformation barrier.
• However, only 37% rank developing agile capabilities as an operational priority.

Swedish Banks Looking to New and Better Ways to Engage Customers

Over half of bank leaders are prioritizing the development of new products and services, alongside omnichannel servicing, greater community engagement, and new non-traditional products.

• 50% are prioritizing new services and products to enhance customer experience.
• 37% regard omnichannel as one of the most critical traits to deliver a digitally innovative bank, with roughly half of banks seeking to change the way their teams are structured to achieve this goal.
• 33% are prioritizing creating personalized customer journeys to spearhead their customer experience transformation.

Talent a Priority for Swedish Banks

Developing talent is a key focus, but core modernization is also a priority in operational transformation.

• 43% ranked existing talent development as their main priority, but over half believe their firms are more likely to prioritize investment in technology than in the talent and skills needed to utilize that technology.
• 40% are prioritizing developing a modern cloud-based core banking system, with over a third claiming that having an adaptive cloud-based architecture is the most critical trait to driving digital innovation.
• 33% rank new talent development as priority number one, with 50% believing they are ahead of their competitors in this respect.

How Do Swedish Banks Rate Themselves Against the Competition?

• 60% think they’re ahead of their competitors when it comes to innovating core offerings to capture customers.
• 43% think they’re behind when it comes to enhancing customer servicing.

ESG Credentials

• 60% say they are feeling significant pressure to improve their ESG credentials.
• 57% say their ESG strategy is giving them a competitive advantage.
• 50% say ESG is a key driver of their digital transformation plans.

Sweden Ahead of the Global Diversity Curve

• 40% of leaders say their organization has made diversity, equity, and inclusion commitments – ahead of the global average.

For more information, contact:

• peter.ekdahl@publicissapient.com
• isabelle.andreasson@publicissapient.com

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