Connecting employees to create value in investment banks
From the McKinsey Quarterly, by Vijay D’Silva and Osman N. Nalbantoglu
Record profits. Ever-larger deals. Relentless expansion into new geographies. In many ways we live in a golden age of investment banking and securities trading.
Yet many institutions find the going tough as clients demand - and increasingly expect - integrated services, including (among other things) advice, the raising of capital, and risk-management solutions. In this environment, banks often struggle to leverage the potential of their talented and highly compensated professionals. Many banks blame their size and complexity, the pace of work, and, above all, “silo thinking” for this problem. Opportunities to build on the success of a particular product in one territory are therefore often overlooked elsewhere, while sales teams serving specific clients largely ignore the possibility of cross-selling products from other groups.
Fortunately, help is at hand in the form of network-mapping tools that identify and encourage value-creating connections across organizations. Companies in a variety of sectors, from biotechnology to construction, have been using these well-established techniques to track and replicate high-performing networks, to help employees emulate the collaborative behavior of other colleagues, and to serve customers more effectively. But investment banks have only recently started to learn the power of that approach.
Banks should carefully tailor their use of such ideas to the industry’s context and circumstances. Collaboration is as hard as it is desirable in all knowledge-intensive businesses - and investment banking is a knowledge industry par excellence. Yet the rewards for looking beyond the organizational chart to unlock value can be considerable.
Read the rest of the article ...
Record profits. Ever-larger deals. Relentless expansion into new geographies. In many ways we live in a golden age of investment banking and securities trading.
Yet many institutions find the going tough as clients demand - and increasingly expect - integrated services, including (among other things) advice, the raising of capital, and risk-management solutions. In this environment, banks often struggle to leverage the potential of their talented and highly compensated professionals. Many banks blame their size and complexity, the pace of work, and, above all, “silo thinking” for this problem. Opportunities to build on the success of a particular product in one territory are therefore often overlooked elsewhere, while sales teams serving specific clients largely ignore the possibility of cross-selling products from other groups.
Fortunately, help is at hand in the form of network-mapping tools that identify and encourage value-creating connections across organizations. Companies in a variety of sectors, from biotechnology to construction, have been using these well-established techniques to track and replicate high-performing networks, to help employees emulate the collaborative behavior of other colleagues, and to serve customers more effectively. But investment banks have only recently started to learn the power of that approach.
Banks should carefully tailor their use of such ideas to the industry’s context and circumstances. Collaboration is as hard as it is desirable in all knowledge-intensive businesses - and investment banking is a knowledge industry par excellence. Yet the rewards for looking beyond the organizational chart to unlock value can be considerable.
Read the rest of the article ...
Labels: collaboration, knowledge, networks
posted by mick yates @ 8:34 PM permalink
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