Running a strategic AI change program using bank compliance as an example.
Much has changed in business technology in the last 20 years. For example, back at the turn of the millennium, the Chief Financial Officer of the bank I worked at performed his function without a computer on his desk at all.
He used a pencil.
He literally balanced the books of the entire bank every evening using pencil and paper. Of course, we cannot comprehend anyone managing that feat today; but, yet compliance technology works precisely the same way now as then. That is: we load records into systems, those systems use matching technology algorithms to produce matches, and we shuffle those matches to humans to review.
Nothing fundamental appears to have changed in Compliance technology in all that time. Sure, we now have multiple risks to consider and a multitude of systems inputting data via web services instead of only flat files or MQ interfaces, but the model and shape of the problem have mostly stayed the same. The end users are crying out to Chief Compliance Officers (‘CCO’) for innovation; for new solutions to these old and seemingly intractable problems, and how can any CCO working to bring Compliance into the heart of a company’s culture achieve this? In change management terms, this is a form of disruption, and the question is whether such disruption is good for Compliance. Is it better to be the first mover? - keen and hungry, forging ahead and working outside the lines, making the dream of the future real. Or is it better to have a second-mover advantage? - Where can you be sure the technology actually works, where there is less overpromising and under-delivering, and where can you learn from others’ mistakes?
The answer is: that it depends.
Let us analyse what to consider in a strategic technology change program, using Compliance as an example.
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