As we all know, COVID-19 has been the biggest accelerator of digital transformation in Financial Services. The pandemic instigated radical changes in employee and customer behavior, requiring organizations to do business differently.

Change was uncomfortable at times. The pandemic hastened the decline of cash and sped up changes in the way people do their banking; the coronavirus was a catalyst in digital channel adoption. As brick-and-mortar operations shuttered and employees struggled to stay connected and work efficiently from home while trying to juggle professional and personal responsibilities. Performing everyday tasks was a challenge, as brands had to reconfigure their workforces and operations to keep their people safe and cope with supply chain interruptions.  Making time to drive innovation or deliver services that meet the needs of digitally savvy customers felt impossible.

But, over time, we adapted. And as the world slowly emerges from the pandemic, it seems clear we won’t be going back to the way it was.

Workers require new ways of working to increase collaboration and efficiencies so they can overcome complexities associated with the New Normal working environment. COVID-19 accelerated budding trends in banking behaviour changes, pushing consumers increasingly to online and mobile channels. There has been a surge for both customer and clients to access banks on digital platforms. Meanwhile, regulators require banks to guarantee business continuity in this environment marked by uncertainty and coronavirus-themed cyberattacks. Banks must guard against an increased likelihood of IT failures affecting technical infrastructures by adapting to unusual operating procedures, new risks from working remotely and increased risk of phishing campaigns.

In times of great change disruption, an advanced digital platform provides stability by strengthening operational resilience and facilitating business continuity. By linking all key components of a business, a platform allows all stakeholders to work together effectively anytime, anywhere.

This is where the Dassault Systèmes 3DEXPERIENCE platform sets itself apart from other collaboration tools or systems. At a time when many banks have increased their technological reliance and capabilities, it acts as an enabler – connecting people, ideas, processes, data and business systems – and strengthens operational resilience. Even in times of complexity, companies can accelerate business transformation and improve experiences for employees and customers. Some benefits include:

• Powering Dassault Systèmes solutions for the Financial Services industry, like intelligent product governance and customer analytics
• Enabling data-driven decision making by capturing powerful insights from structured and unstructured data

Streamlining PLM by connecting the entire product management life cycle in a single collaborative environment

• Facilitating customer feedback to be incorporated into the design process
• Ensuring the right products are delivered at the right time, to the right customer
• Supporting banks with branch optimization and branch-based retail banking to remain relevant to customers
• Helping map end-to-end critical components that provide important services (tech, data, processes, third-party suppliers, people and property) and stress testing for severe but plausible scenarios.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought on an unexpected live test of operational resilience. Brands had to adapt to digital channel adoption on the fly to satisfy customers who demanded greater flexibility and security and regulators who were no less rigorous. There will be no going back, but we can look forward to our New Normal.

To find out how Dassault Systèmes’ 3DEXPERIENCE platform can accelerate business transformation and digitalize your business to strengthen operational resilience, improve operations and free up time for customer centric innovation, visit https://ifwe.3ds.com/business-services.