Innovating the future of finance for a major retail bank

The retail banking landscape is fast changing as evolving customers' needs, competitive threats, regulatory agendas and AI advancements drive the need to innovate. With an understanding of the challenges of working at pace within a mature and complex organisation we began our partnership on a single project.

Over the years this has evolved into a bank-wide partnership that enables the leading bank to move faster and with greater confidence. As the partnership deepened, our role expanded to become an extension of its core Innovation team, shaping new commercial propositions across the business.

Today, the collaboration is embedded across the entire institution, guiding its most forward-looking initiatives – from data and sustainability to the adoption of AI. 

Initially, our work focused on individual projects driven by regulatory requirements and capability build. For example, we supported the bank’s customer engagement around PSD2 – the European Union law regulating payment services – creating clear communications that helped people to understand and adapt to new security measures with confidence.

At the same time, we supported the bank in applying its design principles more consistently across projects. We created practical tools and resources that made the principles easier to embed in day-to-day work, equipping teams to translate them into tangible outcomes.

We embraced a robust process to accelerate innovation, taking into account the complex and regulated environment. We moved rapidly from market opportunity to validated concepts. We worked creatively and went wide with the possibilities, whilst applying the rigour of validating customer desirability, business viability with technical and operational feasibility.

As these strategies evolved, our work deepened and the scope of what we were delivering extended. Our role evolved from focusing on one part of the bank to linking different areas of the organisation over time.

We became an extension of the Innovation team, exploring new ideas, testing opportunities, and designing propositions that could span multiple franchises. In fact, our remit expanded into more commercial and strategic engagements, often driven by market shifts, regulatory change, or opportunities to harness new technology and partnerships.

For instance, we guided teams through emerging industry developments, such as open banking, and designed propositions that could serve different customer groups. This work included developing services to support people at key life stages – from young savers to those planning for the future.

We also enabled business customers to operate more sustainably by facilitating a partnership that led to a new joint venture, which developed a carbon planning tool to help organisations measure, finance, and reduce their environmental impact. This period of deeper, more strategic collaboration laid the foundations for a relationship that now reaches every corner of the bank.