Standard Chartered Bank

At Standard Chartered, we are in the midst of a significant future-of-work cultural and digital transformation. One of the largest challenges for our Colleagues is knowing where to go and how to access key information required to do their daily roles. Knowing the latest processes and keeping up to date with new software implementations into the ecosystem is key. Due to our continuous improvement methodology, a strong digital adoption strategy is essential.

Large amounts of time are required to retrain a global workforce of approx. 90,000 employees. Our Colleagues lose time struggling to find information that they are looking for to support solving issues.

To add to this challenge, the global pandemic also meant that we had to engage with our workforce remotely, leading us to reimagine our workplace, and formally launch hybrid flexi-working arrangements at scale for 45,000 colleagues across eight of our largest markets (84% of colleagues have agreed with their managers to work flexibly going forward, versus 10% pre-pandemic).

Alongside this, UX/UI in some of our software processes was also leading to procedural mistakes, meaning time lost checking the quality of data and clean up, as well as Colleague frustrations, especially when engaging from remote locations.

To start to address this, Standard Chartered is undergoing an ambitious experience-focused digital transformational journey, with cloud technology at the core. We are digitising our offerings to make them work at scale and leveraging technology to democratise access and increase the speed by which our people have access to products – for growing their career, developing new skills, supporting their wellbeing, requesting services, or effectively leading and managing their teams.

Our strategy focuses on implementing a new core strategic HR technology solution (HR Management System, HR Portal, and Workflows underpinned by strong adoption technology) and augmenting with specific solutions supporting our strategic business and experience requirements (e.g., Talent Market Place, Learning Experience, and smaller bespoke applications).

With the launch of our Employee Portal (SAP Success Factors) and the introduction of Position Management into the HR landscape, we would not only change the entry points and structure of our current Hiring Journey, but also introduce a new process for Hiring Managers to learn. We needed to have a solution to guide and retrain Colleagues that they could access at any time.

At the same time, we had also been facing challenges navigating Colleague through SC Buy. A Colleague’s path through the process could differ based on multiple factors, making it hard to present all options within a page. Again, Colleagues were struggling to know where to start so that they could find the answers to their particular scenarios every time they needed to get/buy something.

It became apparent that we not only need a solution to guide Colleagues through new UI/UX processes, aiding in retraining and upskilling, but a solution that could also help Colleagues find the entry points to journeys and hold their hands through the process.

We have identified the skills employees need to take us into the future and have reimagined the learning journey to accelerate our ability to upskill/reskill our workforce. Our learning platform – diSCover – delivers learning content to match individual career goals and fill future skills gaps, while our internal talent marketplace provides on-the-job learning opportunities to build experience.

We have overhauled our approach to performance, reinforcing continuous performance management, bringing in greater aspiration into goal setting, and rewarding innovation and collaboration.

All of this has required renewed technology infrastructure. By incorporating WalkMe, the digital adoption platform across our technologies as an invisible overlay helping and engaging over 93% of employees, to aid our future of work initiatives.

By placing employee experience at the centre of our decision making, we have designed future of work initiatives that build loyalty and trust, while simultaneously future-proofing the Bank to reflect customer needs.

WalkMe has been used at varying levels across the business areas.

• We identified complex journeys and pain points via Employee Experience Research. Using discovery sessions, interviews, focus groups and pulse surveys, we were able to understand where our Colleagues struggled with complex interactions and tasks that were infrequent but required, as well as where they needed to find information and entry points to processes.
• We adopted WalkMe shuttles, tool tips, and popups to solve for our basic UX/UI issues throughout our platforms and have used this as our baseline product offering. The popups also help support our Colleagues when they have to perform time-based tasks supporting system-based notification and email communications.
• When launching a new process, Guides linked to video content, knowledge articles, and our support hubs act as a support to onboard our Colleagues to new or complex processes.
• Recently we have started to use the WalkMe ActionBot as the third step in our digital adoption strategy, supporting Colleagues through complex decision-making processes, guiding them from entry points to final outcomes in their journeys.

WalkMe and the ActionBot have also been used to link together our digital HR platforms, shuttling Colleagues when they try to use the wrong system to start the hiring process over to the new Employee Portal, triggering the ActionBot to guide and educate Colleagues on the new hiring processes.

Within SC Buy, we have used the ActionBot as a launcher to triage Colleagues through a series of simple questions, which would then route them to the required page. The questions will also aid in filling in the required submission forms using auto-steps. Once submitted, a popup will also inform our Colleagues of next steps along with a survey so that we could look to continually improve this process.

As we adopt more flexible work environments, it is crucial we support our Colleagues, no matter where or when their work day occurs.

The WalkMe Digital Adoption Platform provides employees with a virtual layer of proactive help across our Business platforms, with self-service guidance at the exact point and time employees need.

Our digital adoption strategy benefits our end users in a number of ways:

• Time savings, as Colleagues are not wasting time looking for answers or guides on how to use products or business services.
  • Example: When faced with technical issues with our diSCover learning platform, Colleagues can raise support tickets with a single click of a launcher, which lands them into the myHR platform, automatically opens the appropriate record producer, chooses the appropriate categories in the drop-down, and fills out standard input on behalf of Colleagues.
  • This solution takes less than a minute as opposed to manually accessing myHR and searching for the relevant record producer to raise a support ticket.
  • This example alone has helped save the business approximately 270 hours.
• Reduces the reliance on virtual training sessions/comms, reducing the impact of retraining for new systems and processes. Colleagues can access videos and guided tours or read how-to guides that link to comprehensive knowledge articles, so they can learn when they need to, from their chosen work location.
  • Example: Using employee engagement survey data, we learned that most colleagues want greater time and location flexibility, with over 75% wanting to spend 50-60% of their time working from home. In one survey, 78.3% of colleagues agreed that their home environment enables them to work productively; 81.6% said they have access to all the IT tools they need.
  • We used this data to assess business and functional needs alongside employee preferences. As a result, we created post-pandemic models for home, hybrid, and office workers.
  • We designed a new flexi-contract to empower leaders to create teams that best serve client needs, and the flexibility of individuals. Circa 37,000 employees have moved to a flexible workplace model, better meeting their needs while keeping productivity high.
  • Our decision to implement a new HR portal at the beginning of the pandemic allowed us to quickly implement remote working options. We worked closely with our vendor partner, ServiceNow, to deliver the flexi-working application form and automated contract letter templates via our internal myHR platform. WalkMe Digital Adoption Platform was implemented on myHR to ensure users optimized their use of the new technology without creating a new support burden.
• Historically, we would deliver classroom workshops or pay external vendors to build digital content. Savings due to our curate (via diSCover) not create policy are conservatively estimated at $3 million and property savings are estimated at $111 million over 5 years, along with productivity savings through process simplification and automation.
  • For example, 98% of contract letters were automatically generated, reducing the previous manual effort. Our Talent Marketplace pilot has seen over 6,200 users sign up, with more than 280 opportunities created, and 250 colleagues assigned to opportunities have unlocked almost 14,000 of productivity hours (or $566,000 worth of discretionary effort).
• WalkMe supports engagement within our platforms. Engagement rates are high:
  • 99.9% of colleagues have interacted with Walk Me on myHR (average 45.1 times/user) and 93.9% on diSCover (19.4 times/user).
  • Our myHR portal (home of Future Workplace Now activity) has shown ease of knowledge management articles rated as 70.2% positive, and accessing them creates a case deflection rate of 80%. Overall employee rating is 4.63/5.
• Colleagues are guided to clear entry points and aided in decision making and Hiring Managers are guided through the new feature rich position management and hiring procedures via the ActionBot. Completion of forms and decision making processes are reduced to a series of simple guided questions and answers that are then pre-populated to reduce errors in data for the Resourcing teams to follow up.
• Allows for the accurate completion of procedures and forms. Colleagues interacting with SC Buy are able to complete requests, allowing them to manage suppliers, complete tasks and get things done first time.
  • Example: While submitting the flexi-working applications, we’ve guided 1796 colleagues to select the preferred flexi-working arrangement with the click of a launcher.
• There is a reduction in procedural mistakes and increase in Colleague satisfaction
  • Example: When raising Job Requisitions in Singapore, we have used SmartTip validation, which helped to prevent 250 colleagues from choosing incorrect cost centres – which would have otherwise resulted in re-work as well as potential regulatory/risk issues and hiring delays.
• Creates self-sufficient Colleagues who can engage with new business procedures with confidence across our business.
  • Example: Colleagues are encouraged to self-serve when raising support tickets on the myHR platform. 15,000 Colleagues clicked on the action buttons in the WalkMe, prompts which redirected them to self-serve via the Employee Portal.

An example of all these impact and benefits can be seen in the SC Buy ActionBot deployment:

After our launch, we had 4118 Action Bot interactions in Q4 2021. For Colleagues, there has also been a reduction in interactions and process steps; ActionBot was used to simplify processes to create SPMs and set up SRMs, sending them out automatically.

Originally, there were 50 steps in this process, and we managed to automate 34, meaning a 65% reduction in process tasks for the Colleague. For each Colleague, we can save approximately 5-10 minutes each time they start this process, with the added bonus of much more accurate data entry, meaning no time wasted cross checking and re-entering information.

In a survey of 223 of our Colleagues, 63% reported time savings in ER creation and an improved user experience, with a further 28% that they found the ActionBot helpful.

Our digital adoption strategy is centered on the four main pillars: Process, data, technology, and organisational change.

By delivering what are perceived as simple solutions to our Colleagues, the team have been able to see increased workplace productivity, streamlining inefficiencies and making agile modifications to push for continuous improvements, which is a key driver for the values of the Business.

As the experience improves, the benefit can be seen in increased productivity as Colleagues are able to focus their time on more impactful tasks.

Our Communications, Change and Enablement teams, who are pivotal to driving adoption, have also been impacted by our digital strategy. Alongside the shift towards a hybrid workforce that has come into play over the past year, this has meant that we have had to re-evaluate how we engage with our Colleagues:

• Changing our thinking from classroom based learning and in person launches to virtual onboarding sessions, video content, bite sized learning, and knowledge support.
• Being supported by WalkMe to guide Colleagues on new complex journeys, so that they can self-serve vital information to help them navigate the business and new processes.
• Allowing them to feel confident and reduce the need to reach out to support or their peers for help.

For the Leadership team, this confidence in delivery means they can encourage innovation and growth. By empowering Colleagues with an agile growth mindset, we are in turn also creating a more resilient workforce who will contribute more, leading to greater innovation in the workplace.

Our digital adoption strategy has meant that we are able to onboard and integrate complex enterprise systems into our current ecosystem with greater confidence, understanding experience challenges and reviewing these in detail with key stakeholders. This has required an ongoing cultural change and has meant the team have constantly challenged the status quo, experimenting, pushing boundaries, and learning quickly from failures.

We have pushed and constantly improved our collaboration methods, increasing agility and productivity to leverage the technology to the fullest, optimising performance.

Our digital transformation is intrinsically linked to our culture and values. Our core values are:

• Do the right thing
• Better together
• Never settle

Through our digital strategy, we have constantly looked to streamline processes, eliminating challenges that our Colleagues may encounter in their day-to-day work.

We take the business value of ‘Never Settling’ to drive our continuous improvement mindset, as we look to simplify complex processes with our digital solutions. We also consistently listen to our Colleagues, so that we can react to change as it happens in an agile manner using a “fail fast and learn quickly” mindset to constantly challenge our current state.

We are also ‘better together,’ as our Colleagues are the end users of our new and emerging technologies. Our digital strategy and implementation makes sure that Colleagues are able to engage with learning and feel like they have a sense of belonging. It is key that Colleagues do not feel isolated when engaging with new processes or technology, or getting stuck or unsure who to reach out to embark on a new process. Being able to engage quickly with our digital solutions means that our Colleagues are engaged and have a sense of belonging in a remote or onsite workplace.

We are also aligned to our value to ‘do the right thing’ as we drive change, be that technological or organisational. Our digital strategy is supporting this by making sure that change can be adopted and is understood by all of our Colleagues in the Business.

Throughout this process, bringing the stakeholders on the journey has been key. The introduction of services and new platforms into the Business has allowed us to develop better relationships, supporting and gaining greater understanding of their experiences to broker change and development.

When introducing new or feature rich processes to the business, such as the new Hiring Journey, it has given our stakeholders the confidence to know that we can take Colleagues who are effectively brand new users and help them to become entirely self-sufficient.

Colleagues are not only able to learn basic functions, but also to take on new processes, engaging with the complete journeys as intended. Processes are perceived to be simpler by our end users, saving time – which in turn drives the adoption of platforms and services, creating advocates rather than detractors.

This is giving stakeholders the confidence to introduce improvements into the business, knowing that whilst traditional training and launch methods are required, there is less reliance upon them in the long term. This cultural change in mindset means that we can reduce the reliance on support and concerns over increased support requirements, as Colleagues fully engage with our digital solutions, becoming more self-sufficient.

In turn, this has meant that our stakeholders are increasingly turning to WalkMe as a solution to drive the adoption of processes and digital platforms within our ecosystem. This can be evidenced by the continued use of WalkMe, not just in HR, but across multiple functions in the Bank.

WalkMe is now recognised as an enabler of digital adoption as we move forward on our transformation journey, helping to support and drive continuous improvement and change across the business.

Stakeholders can now see the power of WalkMe to empower Colleagues to navigate decision-making processes, onboard existing or new joiners onto the platform and reduce the reliance on support. The shift towards hybrid working has made this implementation even more important, as we need to bring all of our Colleagues on the journey together, at an equal speed when learning new processes and adopting new ways of working.

ActionBots for SC Buy and our Employee Portal are starting to make a real change for the business. They are now moving us towards using WalkMe to help Colleagues identify journeys and entry points, aiding decision-making processes. This is allowing our Colleagues to be more self-sufficient and less reliant upon support.

We have taken the learnings from the Ariba ActionBot and have gone on to implement the ActionBot to support the launch of our Employee Portal and the new hiring processes.

• This has given stakeholders the confidence to take a new feature rich process, such as Position Management, and give Hiring Managers the access to maintain and manage their own headcount.
• This is a huge transformational step forwards for the Business and, without the ActionBot to simplify complex decision-making processes for the Hiring Managers, this functionality may not have been developed for release.

Our decision to implement a new HR portal at the beginning of the pandemic allowed us to quickly implement remote working options. We worked closely with our vendor partner, ServiceNow, to deliver the flexi-working application form and automated contract letter templates via our internal myHR platform.

• The WalkMe Digital Adoption Platform was implemented on myHR to ensure users optimized their use of the new technology without creating a new support burden.
• Our longer-term workplace strategy supports a shift to activity-based working, offering increased collaboration between colleagues where space is highly flexible. As work processes are redesigned around meeting client needs, we are reconfiguring physical spaces. A decrease in overall office space is balanced by an increased use of decentralized or satellite sites. Collaborative spaces will be accessible and used for engagement, education, and wellbeing.
• Bring Your Own Device and Virtual Desktop Infrastructure initiatives support workforce mobility. This bi-modal access to both ‘online’ and ‘offline’ applications/data is key where connectivity quality may vary as colleagues move between locations.

Our future vision is to continue to develop and drive a digital mindset within the business with the intent to help Colleagues ultimately get where they need to be.

Areas of focus to help achieve this will be to leverage deeper integration utilising APIs, in addition to using the ActionBot in conjunction with our new communications platform.

Working directly from the desktop. Colleagues will be able to instantly access multiple channels and business areas, allowing us to direct Colleagues to the right content or platform for the first time. Used in conjunction with WalkMe Analytics, as a business we will have greater access to engagement data, understanding experience pain points, which will allow us to react quickly and adapt to change.

By transforming our workplace culture and placing the Employee Experience at the centre of our future of work initiatives, Standard Chartered is effectively future proofing its business and building employee loyalty.

We are moving towards solving one of the key barriers in our Digital Adoption Strategy, of knowing where to find and locate information, reducing complexity and saving time for already busy Colleagues; ultimately driving cost saving, as Colleagues are more efficient, less time is wasted adopting new or complex processes, and satisfaction levels increased – while frustrations are reduced and daily interactions are optimised.

Standard Chartered are a leading international banking group with more than 86,000 employees and a presence in 59 countries and territories in Europe and Americas, Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Our purpose is to drive commerce and prosperity through our unique diversity, and our heritage and values are expressed in our brand promise, here for good. We’re listed on the London and Hong Kong Stock Exchanges.

We have had a presence in Europe and the Americas for over 160 years, employing more than 5,000 people in 14 different countries. We take pride in our ability to bridge the physical distance between our clients in the region, who are looking to expand into and across our network, and vice versa.

The Europe and Americas region is a centre of expertise for the Bank’s major product groups, allowing us to provide a wide range of services, platforms and capabilities to meet the growing needs of our clients across Asia, Africa and the Middle East.