The only thing that stops a lot of people from getting into IT is a false belief that technological competence is something one cannot learn. But the truth is everyone can become a high-level IT professional with enough commitment.

1. Invest in good education

The number one decision everyone who thinks of getting into IT should make is whether or not to get a degree. An IT professional does not necessarily need one. There are easier and cheaper options available, such as IT certifications. But if you are after a long-term successful career and want to be considered for senior positions sometime in the future, it is still better to get a degree first.

Sure, four years is a long time. And not everyone is ready to embrace (or get back to) the challenges of student life. Tons of homework is hard even with reliable writing papers, and sleepless nights spent studying are not fun either. But a degree is a ticket to top-level positions and, unlike certification, it cannot expire.

2. Choose your speciality wisely

IT is an umbrella profession. No one can become a true professional without choosing what to specialise in. Even schools that offer IT education expect students to know what they are going to focus on in their careers. Sure, it is perfectly fine to change one’s speciality at some point down the road. But try to pick your initial one wisely.

At the moment, some of the most in-demand IT specialities include:

• Cybersecurity. Cybersecurity is a smart and very popular choice of specialisation at the moment. Good cybersecurity specialists are more sought-after than ever because of the global shift toward remote work.
• Data fabric. IT professionals who are competent in data management architecture are also in high demand. And they will remain so in the foreseeable future.
• Privacy-preserving computation. Top organisations are always on the quest for good privacy-enhancing specialists. It is a good alternative (or additional specialisation) to cybersecurity.
• Cloud-native. Cloud-native has been popular for a while. It is the approach that maximises speed and agility. So a skilled IT professional whose speciality is cloud-native will not be out of a job.

3. Learn the basics of everything beyond your speciality

At the same time, every professional should know at least the basics of what is happening in the IT industry beyond their speciality. It is impossible to be good at everything. But having some idea of how things work makes cooperation with other IT specialists easier. 

Employers often expect teamwork from candidates for IT positions. Knowing what the people you work with do helps mutual understanding a lot. No need to try to become a guru. But do not stop learning things once you have chosen your speciality.

This is why no IT certification can replace a full four-year college degree. It is unthinkable to cover everything there is to cover in several months. So college-educated IT professionals have the upper hand when it comes to outlook and versatility.

4. Get an in-demand IT certification

But IT certification can still open a lot of doors. And it is a nice addition to a degree, especially for people who graduated years ago and might be a little behind on what is going on in the IT labour market at the moment.

The key is to pick the right certification depending on one’s interests and career plans. Some of the most in-demand ones are certified data professionals, AWF certified cloud practitioners, certified cloud security professionals, and certified information security managers. But not all of them are a smart choice for a beginner. Keep your current skill level in mind.

5. Understand the relationship between what you do and business

Even outstanding IT professionals often lack understanding of the business side of their job. This can become a problem when they are applying for high-level positions. Sure, most employers are looking for someone exceptional at what they do. But they also want someone who knows why they are doing it (from the company’s perspective).

No one expects an IT specialist to be a business pro. So regardless of what organisation you work at now, talk to other people there and ask questions to understand at least the basics of major business processes. If nothing else, it will help during the next job interview. And it also tends to increase employee engagement.

6. Work on your soft skills

Finally, any professional, including an IT specialist, should never neglect their soft skills. There is a common misconception that people who work in IT need nothing except to be competent at what they do. This is not true. 

Sure, most IT professionals work with computers more than they do with people (and it is not even close). But they also need the same soft skills that everyone else does. Most major companies expect their IT employees to be team players, have decent communication skills, excel at time management, and handle conflict well.

Try to read on these topics and talk to Human Resource Development (HRD) professionals at your company. They can organise communication or conflict resolution training for employees. And, above everything, welcome feedback from your colleagues, even if it is not always positive.

Is all the hard work worth it?

It most definitely is, especially money-wise. A senior-level software engineer can expect to make about $200,000 a year; a computer network architect or an information systems manager can expect about $150,000. 

But there is basically no limit, especially for in-demand specialisations akin to cybersecurity. And thanks to how fast-paced and agile the IT environment is, it rarely gets boring. Anyone with enough dedication, willingness to learn, and genuine interest in how technology is changing the world can succeed in IT.

Online trading can be a profession or a hobby. Either way it helps to have sophisticated trading software that empowers you to know what's happening with the market in real time. Many traders lose money in the beginning because they haven't learned about the tools that can help them weigh risk with reward. Here's a guide for choosing the right electronic trading technology.

Purpose of Trading Platforms

Trading platforms are computer systems designed to provide traders with analysis along with tools for evaluating the market and making online transactions. As financial researcher Gartner notes on its website, "Trading platforms directly or indirectly facilitate the placement of orders for financial products with another financial entity or intermediary over a network." If you want to read reviews on trading platforms, there are products that can assist you in your research.

Evolution of Trading Platforms

The first electronic trading platforms were used by some brokers in the 1970s over private networks. In this early period, trades weren't executed in real time. The first online trading platforms aimed at retail traders appeared in the early 1990s. The internet became a global sensation by the middle of the decade as online trading became part of the frenzy of the dotcom boom.

In the 2000s, online trading was popularised by CNBC host Jim Cramer, a former hedge fund manager who mixes humor with stock picking. His emphasis has been on short-term swing trading and portfolio diversity. Day trading became trendy in the new century, but many day traders were wiped out due to not practicing risk management or having all the relevant market data at their fingertips. Since then high-frequency trading software has become part of the equation for top pro traders.

Level 1, 2 and 3 Quotes

Understanding the three different levels of market quotes is essential to gaining an edge as a trader and choosing the appropriate software. Most of the stock prices published on popular websites are Level 1 quotes from a system that delivers basic market data such as the best national bid and ask prices for any security. This level is often used by long-term traders who don't care much about daily price fluctuations.

[ymal]

Levels 2 quotes provide more comprehensive market information, which is why it's the preferred choice of day traders and swing traders. You get up to ten bid and ask prices, enriching you with insights on which direction the market is leaning at any moment in the trading session. Level 3 provides even deeper information, but it's mostly used by brokers and market makers. This level provides up to 20 best bid and ask prices.

Consider Your Trading Style

Professional traders usually develop trading styles that reflect their personalities in terms of how they approach risk management, market research, trade execution and analysis. Each trader has their own unique style, so think about what type of trader you want to be. If you just want to make occasional trades, all you need is a platform that connects with Level 1 quotes. But if you want to make trading your full-time career, you'll need Level 2 quotes.

Ask yourself if you want to immerse yourself in vast amounts of market data on a daily basis. If so, invest in trading software that delivers Level 2 quotes. The more data you analyse, the greater the edge you'll develop over traders who rely on minimal homework and good luck. Another dimension to successful trading is predetermining how you will exit a trade, depending on how the price moves.

Trading platforms commonly provide tools for making various types of market transactions such as buying or shorting stocks. Many pro traders use limit orders to set their own prices and wait for the market to hit their targets. Market orders pose more risk as they are executed at the current market price. Ideally, the software should be seamless, user-friendly and provide up-to-the-second market data.

Conclusion

While being a profitable trader comes down to entry and exit strategies, it helps to conduct your market research, transactions and analysis all on one trading platform. The key to finding the right platform is evaluating how much time you want to devote to participating and studying market activity.

Application programming interfaces (APIs) are a vital innovation able to transform treasury banking – making financial institutions more agile, innovative and highly experiential to support their clients’ needs, writes BNY Mellon’s Sindhu Vadakath, Head of Global Digital Channels and Asia Payments Product Management.

From real-time payments to account authentication and real-time payment exception handling, digital services have become a prominent part of financial institutions’ (FIs) offerings to treasury customers. Clients are increasingly looking for fast and frictionless experiences throughout the transaction life cycle – including pre-processing, during processing and post-processing. Application programming interfaces (APIs) are providing valuable real-time experiences that help address these needs.

APIs enable streamlined, efficient communication and integration between software components. By using APIs, FIs can offer greater speed and efficiency, and, by harnessing process automation, can provide instantaneous transactional data and actionable insights; as well as real-time visibility over payments, statuses and transactional balances for efficient cash management.

The increasing potential of APIs has been fueling industry innovation, disruption and connectivity, and many FIs have already integrated APIs into their operations. Now, with the ecosystem being driven towards greater levels of harmonisation – through initiatives such as the global migration to the ISO 20022 messaging standard – APIs are beginning to shape the future of banking.

Achieving business goals

APIs can connect the digital ecosystem while bringing numerous back-end and client-facing benefits. A critical advantage of APIs is the ability to integrate real-time balances and transactional data across multiple channels, including Treasury Management Systems (TMS) and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP). For example, through BNY Mellon’s Treasury Payments API, clients can integrate FIs’ solutions within their own internal systems. Clients can seamlessly perform business operations by automating payment processes, as well as streamline necessary treasury operational tasks such as reconciliation and reporting. Clients can also leverage the technology to securely access global payment capabilities through a single endpoint, enabling them to initiate payments and track the status of transactions end-to-end.

APIs can connect the digital ecosystem while bringing numerous back-end and client-facing benefits.

Through such solutions, clients can enjoy the time and resource saving benefits of real-time data sharing, especially through the pre- and post-transaction processing lifecycles. The automation and streamlining of operational processes allow clients to redirect their resources to more value-generating functions, such as forecasting analysis, customized reporting and transaction capabilities.

Return on investment

After several years of investment in APIs to deliver integration solutions, FIs are already seeing a strong return. Benefits include retaining clients through improved client satisfaction and resiliency, as well as unlocking legacy data and eliminating manual processing.

And APIs now play an important role in business continuity plans (BCPs). The importance of having an established plan to offset against the impact of unexpected events has been confirmed by the COVID-19 pandemic. In the case of a disruption or network outage, FIs are using APIs to seamlessly switch to a digital, active-active alternate channel to process their payments – traditionally, a resource-heavy process between FIs and network providers to ensure timely execution without any financial implications. By integrating APIs into their networks, FIs can smoothly transition to their back-up plans during such exigencies.

For banks such as BNY Mellon, integrating APIs with their clients’ operations is a way of offering value-driven, tailor-made solutions to support business agility and innovation for clients. As opposed to a one-size fits all approach where offering a standard product isn’t the goal, APIs provide a solution-based target where the client can be kept at the center, and their unique needs – whether that be authentication, validation services, exception handling, or real-time access to data and reporting on payments and account activity to take timely actions – can be solved through APIs and other digital capabilities.

Looking to the future

While the finance industry is learning to leverage API technology, the size and complexity of the solution required can sometimes impede the success of delivery. For example, an API might need to work for multiple parties across various jurisdictions that are each bound by regulations in their domestic markets. As a result, a number of consortiums, formed by both fintech and financial firms, are working on ways to resolve these issues.

[ymal]

In fact, FIs are responding through collaboration and partnerships – with each other, with fintechs, and with industry networks and participants, such as SWIFT. Where FIs focus on upgrading legacy systems and data architecture, they see opportunities to partner with fintechs to accelerate the process. Meanwhile, FIs can offer fintechs with real world client use cases, problem statements and the ability to deliver their innovations across a range of situations and sectors, leveraging each other’s expertise to address industry needs to stay relevant.

One of the biggest challenges for adoption is the difficulty in maintaining multiple variations of the message specifications by channels, currency and markets. However, the way to overcome this challenge is through increased standardisation, and the upcoming migration to ISO 20022 could reduce a lot of these frictions, by improving cross-border interoperability and streamlining the exchange of data for APIs. It is going to be a journey towards harmonisation that requires the industry to come together to chart the path towards the digital future.

As FIs continue to invest in new technologies and further leverage the benefits of APIs, they move closer to not only achieving their strategic business goals, but also enabling their clients’ own digital transformation goals. Banks and other FIs have the responsibility to continue to explore agile, innovative and integrated API solutions, ensuring that clients can benefit from the host of opportunities APIs will bring as they shape the future of the industry.

The views expressed herein are those of the author only and may not reflect the views of BNY Mellon. This does not constitute Treasury Services advice, or any other business or legal advice, and it should not be relied upon as such.

Pablo Castillo, Cyber Threat Research Analyst at Constella Intelligence, offers Finance Monthly his insight into the cyber threats facing the financial services sector in 2021.

Unsurprisingly, financial services firms and their troves of sensitive data were a big target for threat actors in 2020. The rapid shift to remote work, coupled with insufficient budgets and a lack of training and awareness to mitigate attacks, led to an increased risk for many sectors. Despite the need for cybersecurity and the cost savings it can bring over the long haul (breaches are expensive, especially for financial organisations), businesses prioritised other functions and operations which more directly affected their bottom lines this past year.

Hacker groups took full advantage of these uncertain times. According to VMware Carbon Black, in the first half of 2020, banks faced a 238% surge in attacks. Further, Keeper Security recently revealed that 70% of financial services organizations reported experiencing a cyber-attack in the past year, with a majority of the 370 UK IT respondents suggesting that COVID-related conditions contributed to the increase in severity of attacks.

US Financial Services Subcommittee Chairman Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) explicitly stated back in June 2020, “criminal actors [are] redoubling their efforts to target families, financial institutions, and even governments.” Below, I’ll highlight some of the notable threats these criminal actors pose, specifically as it relates to financial institutions.

Phishing

Last September, it was reported that one in four Americans received a COVID-19-related phishing email. That number has only risen as we’ve made our way through 2021. The marked increase in phishing scams this past year even led to the American Bankers Association launching the #BanksNeverAskThat campaign. Further, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) issued a notice in December alerting financial institutions about the potential for fraud, ransomware attacks, or similar types of criminal activity related to COVID-19 vaccines and their distribution – such as phishing schemes luring victims with fraudulent information about vaccines.

Last September, it was reported that one in four Americans received a COVID-19-related phishing email. That number has only risen as we’ve made our way through 2021.

Ransomware

Per FinCEN, “cybercriminals, including ransomware operators, will continue to exploit the COVID-19 pandemic alongside legitimate efforts to develop, distribute, and administer vaccines.” FinCEN warned financial institutions to stay alert to ransomware targeting vaccine delivery operations, as well as the supply chains required to manufacture the vaccines. There are a myriad of examples of ransomware affecting the fintech industry this past year, and it’s a significant threat to all businesses and individuals across the globe.

Business Email Compromise (BEC)

Another top threat, especially amid COVID-19, is BEC. Among Kroll’s cases impacting the FinServ sector, email compromises were the most observed threat. A July 2020 FinCEN advisory outlined the various ways threat actors are exploiting the pandemic and singled out BEC schemes. Threat actors look to convince banks and lenders, for instance, to redirect payments to new accounts, “while claiming the modification is due to pandemic-related changes in business operations.” Often, these sorts of schemes are preventable, but it comes down to training and awareness to combat social engineering.

Disinformation

According to Accenture’s 2020 Future Cyber Threats report, “disinformation and misinformation is not only a threat to efforts to manage COVID-19, it also impacts the financial sector.”

NASDAQ and Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), to name a few, have warned of increases in market manipulation as a result of the pandemic. “Often, market manipulation involves elements of disinformation or misinformation directed at influencing unsuspecting investors to aid criminal actors’ objectives,” the report states. There are a plethora of examples, including a UK bank (pre-COVID, it should be noted) having to reassure its customers of its financial health after its share price dropped 9% due to false rumors spreading on WhatsApp that the bank was shutting down, calling for customers to empty their accounts.

“Disinformation and misinformation is not only a threat to efforts to manage COVID-19, it also impacts the financial sector.”

Mobile Banking Exploitation

The pandemic has accelerated the adoption of digital payments – the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) put out a PSA stating that mobile banking usage has surged as much as 50%. Threat actors look to exploit these platforms, namely via app-based banking trojans and fraudulent apps, but the simple solution to combat these types of threats is to remain vigilant for suspicious activity and verify an app is legitimate before downloading.

Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS)

We are seeing a significant increase in DDoS attacks on institutions in banking and across a wide range of sectors, from healthcare to energy. DDoS attacks can, among other things, freeze the operations of financial institution customers. Not long ago, New Zealand’s Stock Exchange Market (NZX) faced a barrage of DDoS attacks, disrupting trading for four consecutive days.

Underground Markets

This past year, my organization also noticed a significant rise in the number of threads, items offered for sale, and hacking information related to COVID-19 on deep and dark web forums. This includes the sale of banking information and tools to exploit physical devices (e.g, ATMs for carding).

Financial organisations can stave off money laundering, account takeover, and identity theft attacks, but it requires a two-pronged approach. Organisations must proactively monitor, detect and uncover identity information found in open sources on the surface, social, deep and dark web. Understanding your digital footprint, as well as your adversaries, is important. However, human error also plays a major role in mitigating cyber threats. Simply training employees on cybersecurity awareness can make a world of a difference. Everyone should understand the signs of a scam and remain vigilant. As we move past the pandemic and transition back to “normal” life, we must not let our guard down – especially when it comes to COVID-19 or cyber safety.

[ymal]

Pablo Castillo is a Cyber Threat Research Analyst at Constella Intelligence – a digital risk protection company that works in partnership with some of the world’s largest organisations to safeguard what matters most and defeat digital risk.

Finance Monthly hears from Wayne Parslow, Executive Vice President for EMEA at Validity, as he explores what the financial services sector stands to gain from better handling of its data.

Financial firms face an increasingly complex minefield of regulations when it comes to handling data. The sector has so many acronyms that it’s often difficult for a layperson to wrap their head around them. Unfortunately, finance companies don’t fare that much better, and can be overwhelmed by seemingly infinite customer data management requirements.

Whether it’s ensuring appropriate customer data storage under GDPR or securing payments processes under PSD2 and PCI-DSS, there’s a host of regulatory pressures for managing the financial customer relationship chain.

Regulatory bodies are certainly not toothless when it comes to enforcing punitive measures, either. At the end of 2020, the ICO issued fines to both OSL Financial Consultancy Limited and Pownall Marketing Limited for misusing personal data.

Data Management Difficulties

Ensuring data held by finance firms is accurate, up to date and, equally importantly, used appropriately is a shared goal for both the regulator and financial institutions. However, with the pressures put on financial firms by the pandemic, there’s a good chance that data management best practice has taken a back seat in favour of ensuring business continuity.

This is a misstep, as the two key fundamentals of data – data quality and data governance – should be tied into the basic operations of a financial services firm. With strong data foundations, financial services firms will be in a far stronger position to navigate the upcoming uncertainty of a post-pandemic world.

Ensuring data held by finance firms is accurate, up to date and, equally importantly, used appropriately is a shared goal for both the regulator and financial institutions.

Having data quality and governance work in concert to support one another does not simply ensure regulatory compliance, though. The value of data for driving successful business outcomes has already been proven, and businesses which employ a data-driven strategy are growing 30% year-on-year. Higher data quality also delivers stronger customer relationships and greater engagement.

Curating Quality

Data quality is not a once and done operation. For financial services in particular, it’s a complex, continuous network of processes and actions that must be continuously maintained as new data is collected, augmented and edited by the organisation.

First and foremost, a finance firm must take stock of the current state of its data. Given the rapid changes that have occurred over the past year, it’s essential to reassess data for accuracy, completeness, duplicates and inconsistencies. Firstly, data needs to be housed correctly so that it can be profiled accurately. Profiling their data enables financial organisations to ensure it is right for the business’s current needs, can be easily analysed and reported on, as well as being able to more easily check whether it is up to date.

Deduplication

A common barrier to data quality are duplicates. Many regulations require data to be up to date, and for customer data to be removed under certain circumstances (i.e. when a contract is terminated). Whilst a firm might believe it has done its due diligence under these circumstances, leaving duplicate data behind poses a significant compliance threat and risks inappropriate or even illegal communication. To have a consistent, complete view of its customer data, a financial firm must be proactive with the management of deduplication. It’s a simple yet effective process that can make a huge impact, but requires an investment in the appropriate tools.

Leaving duplicate data behind poses a significant compliance threat and risks inappropriate or even illegal communication.

Security and Enhancing Data

The end user is typically identified as the weakest link in the security chain, and many breaches reported to the ICO stem from simple user error, whereby an employee downloads a confidential document to a laptop which is then lost or stolen, for example.

With the move to remote working last year, many businesses wisely took the step to upskill their now remote workforces with additional security best practice training to help mitigate the additional cybersecurity risks.

Organisations can take additional steps to ensure errors that create vulnerabilities, such as the laptop example above. Employees will often adopt methods that help them get their jobs done most efficiently, even if these deviate from security best practice. Standardising data is a crucial step to enabling it to move through the organisation in the correct, and secure, way – regardless of location.

For example, if finance needs to produce reports based on the outgoings of a few different international teams, putting best practice standards in place as basic as how titles and regions are entered means this can be completed more efficiently, easily and securely across the board.

Alongside profiling, deduplication and process standardisation, verification needs to be a top priority, and should take place as data is collected. Using external sources, both prospect and existing client data should be verified (provided, of course, that consent has been given for these external sources to be used in this way). Enriching data in this way ensures finance firms get a better ROI from marketing and sales.

Adopting a Data Mindset

Data is constantly changing, and a continuous monitoring regime is the only way to keep track as it waxes and wanes. A simple way to keep up with the health of your data as it changes is to set up dashboards and alerts that track data quality automatically.

[ymal]

That said, it’s not just about technology. There’s no getting away from it – a comprehensive cross-functional approach is needed to implement a successful data governance programme. For finance firms, team members must be subject matter experts who understand the complex industry standards and regulations and know what to do if they don’t. Many finance organisations will already have an executive level representative responsible for company-wide data management, such as Chief Data Officer (CDO).

A core aspect of a CDO’s responsibilities should be simplifying processes with the help of the right technologies. However, it’s unlikely there’s a single tool that will do everything a financial organisation needs, and every governance strategy should be bespoke for the organisation that will follow it. Companies should be aiming for a “data quality by design” mindset, where the checks and processes that ensure top-quality data is maintained become second nature.

Jake Madders, Co-director of Hyve Managed Hosting, weighs the pros and cons of the two distinct types of crypto exchange hosting.

Cryptocurrency has boomed in recent years, helped by people like Elon Musk joining the conversation and increasing the trust in its value, helping it to reach the mainstream. As the number of investors placing their money in cryptocurrency continues to grow, finding a reliable trading platform has never been more important. Hence, the need for crypto exchanges.

The ongoing growth of interest in cryptocurrency and the demand for technological development and maintenance has generated the need for different exchanges. According to a recent study conducted by crypto market data provider cryptocompare.com, cryptocurrency exchanges have increased their market share by 13% since October 2020. Bitcoin gained 13% of the market share from October 2020 to January 2021, going from 61% (USD$347 billion) to 74% (USD$ 1.41 trillion). The study pointed to crypto exchanges increasing their transparency by providing data as well as improved security as reasons for this growth.

Whilst the world of digital currencies continues to bloom, the issue around crypto exchange hosting becomes a challenge. Choosing between cloud vs on-premise hosting might not be an easy decision to make as it depends on the investors' needs. Nevertheless, with exchanges sites having to be active 24/7 in order to offer optimal performance, the cloud could be the ideal option.

Cloud vs on-premise benefits

When it comes to crypto exchanges, performance has always been a key factor. However, there’s a bigger picture that individuals need to look at. With the industry always evolving and technology developing constantly, flexibility is crucial in order for crypto exchanges to adapt. Moving an exchange to another location can be a long and costly process but on the cloud, this process can be done in a matter of hours and at a much lower cost. Speed on the cloud is clearly a valuable benefit, allowing crypto exchanges to set up the infrastructure on a cloud system much faster than on-site hosting.

When it comes to crypto exchanges, performance has always been a key factor.

Customisation is essential in order to meet the requirements of the ever-changing marketplace. The cloud offers the option to scale and implement storage, security and developer tools when required to meet the demands of the market and investors quickly and efficiently. Another benefit that is important to keep in mind when choosing the right hosting is latency. Users using a cloud hosting provider can opt for a data centre near their end-users which will reduce the latency, allowing an exchange to provide instant information directly from the market or from a transaction.

There’s also the environmental aspect of the cloud, which is a benefit that is often overlooked. As the adoption of cryptocurrencies continues to expand, a sustainable and eco-friendly hosting choice feels like something important to consider.

Choosing on-premise hosting 

Whilst the cloud seems to tick all the boxes as the perfect space for crypto exchanges, many of these platforms still use on-premise hosting. A key aspect offered by on-premise is the option to have full control and responsibility. For some, this might sound like a great advantage and the reason why on-premise can be the right choice. Still, there are other points to consider. Having full responsibility means being accountable for managing and maintaining the software which can require a fair amount of knowledge and also time. Some users might not have the right level of expertise to manage their cryptocurrencies and might require a specialist to do it for them resulting in an extra cost. On-premise hosting also means that servers could be more vulnerable, whereas data centres are secure environments with 24/7 security and cooling and fire protection measures.

Security, the deciding factor

It is not surprising that, over the last few years, cybercriminals have developed an interest in cryptocurrency. With hundreds of billions of dollars being traded daily on crypto exchange platforms, they are the perfect target for hackers. Cryptocurrencies are not easy to hack, but crypto exchanges are. This is one of the reasons why cryptocurrency owners have worried about choosing the cloud over on-premise hosting. Nonetheless, the cloud has become a safer environment for crypto exchanges. Risks have been minimised thanks to security being increased and improved on the cloud, helping mitigate issues concerning the protection of cryptocurrencies.

[ymal]

When deciding between cloud and on-premise hosting, there are numerous factors to examine. On top of that, individuals need to keep in mind their investment plan and take into consideration what the future of the market could look like. With technology evolving and cryptocurrencies gaining popularity, finding the right crypto exchange hosting option will continue to be a challenging yet very important decision.

The ultra-low interest rate environment and fee compression in areas like payments continue. Competition from challengers and fintechs is intensifying. Customer digital adoption has grown, and the bar of expectation continues to rise.

The impediments to change that traditional banks face are not going away - high cost-bases, inflexible and complex legacy technology estates, and operating models that lack customer-focus and agility.

Banks face the imperatives of increasing and diversifying revenues, optimising costs and increasing business agility. In this article, Simon Hull, Head of Financial Services at BJSS, looks at the revenue challenge and why smart use of digital technology is the key to success.

Revenue drivers

Banks are looking to win new customers, retain and maximise business from existing customers and diversify the traditional deposit and lending business with fee-based products and services. Some of the key elements banks are focusing on in this respect are customer experience, customer intelligence, and product and service range.

Customer experience is a battleground and competition is intense. Last year's Ipsos Mori poll has Monzo and Starling coming out ahead on many customer service metrics. Digital channels are becoming primary. Customers are attracted to slick and intuitive digital experiences and expect increasingly personalised service as banks learn more about them.

However, the empathetic human touch is still essential, as is the consistency of service across in-person, phone and digital channels. Customers want the choice of channels to use for different tasks, and preferences differ across demographics. The brand experience is just as significant, with social and environmental responsibility top of the list. The combination of service and brand will drive loyalty and recommendations.

Customers want the choice of channels to use for different tasks, and preferences differ across demographics.

Customer intelligence is about gaining a deep, holistic and continuous understanding of the customer - their needs, behaviours, preferences and influences. With this, a truly customer-centric operating model can be created - one where product and service development, marketing, distribution, and customer service are aligned and evolve alongside the customer. This enables a broadening of the relationship to maximise customer wallet share by tailoring to their needs to build multi-product relationships.

Banks need to assess their current product and service range, consider discontinuing low volume or low profitability products, and ensure the rest are available on their digital channels. In parallel, banks must move to an agile product and service development model to enable rapid innovation based on customer intelligence. This will help sustain and protect revenues as needs change and diversify into fee-based products, as many major banks are doing in areas such as financial advice, wealth management, insurance, point-of-sale financing and subscription models.

Digital technology solutions

Digital technologies, used in the right way, hold the key to delivering these three revenue drivers.

Investing in user-centric design is critical for banks to understand customer needs, jobs to be done and interaction preferences. Web and mobile digital technologies power responsive and real-time banking apps, compelling user journeys and more frequent interactions and alerts. They are also a critical source of customer data which can be used to refine interactions and develop new products and services iteratively. Banks should move their full product and service range onto their digital channels, and also focus on customer education and self-service. The same technology can be used to digitally enable branch and call-centre staff, creating more informed and rich customer interactions.

Data and AI is really the heart of digital customer-facing banking. Capturing and combining datasets involves both making the vast troves of data stuck in siloed legacy systems available, capturing real-time customer data from digital platforms and also bringing in additional third-party sources. AI can be used to join the dots and identify patterns to better understand and predict needs, which can drive timely interactions and personalised products and services. It also enables a better understanding of personal situation and risk, prerequisites for new services such as wealth management and insurance. Broadening the model of the customer extends the opportunity to establish multi-product relationships. This generates more interactions and data, so a cycle of continual analysis and innovation is formed.

[ymal]

AI capabilities can also be combined with RPA to enable Intelligent Automation of many customer service tasks such as standard enquiries that can be handled by conversational AI. Highly responsive, accurate and information-rich conversational interfaces improve the customer experience. This in turn, enables staff to provide a better customer service by focussing on personal service and higher value or more complex needs.

Cloud is a crucial enabler of much of the above in several ways. The inherent agility of cloud-based services enables rapid innovation and the delivery of new services and features through microservices. Elastic scalability enables the platform to adapt to usage expansion and maintain responsiveness under high load. Native out-of-the-box data and analytics capabilities will accelerate the AI journey. The fast provisioning of new environments supports an agile product development methodology.

For traditional banks, legacy modernisation must feature in the digital change programme. Legacy systems can negatively impact the speed and cost of change. Modernisation must be prioritised, and iterative strategies applied such as facading systems behind APIs, breaking out elements of monoliths as standalone reusable services and cloud migration. Legacy systems contain critical data that is needed to build a holistic customer view. Modernisation of the change function to a customer-centric agile model is a broad enabler for all revenue-generating activity.

Conclusion

The industry is at an inflection point, and banks face a considerable challenge to drive revenue opportunities. The key to success is precision of focus on business goals and aligning the right digital technology combinations to deliver on the customer experience, customer intelligence and rapid product and service innovation goals. Banks are at different stages on this journey, and of course, revenue must also come with profitability. Hence, costs are another challenge that must be faced in a similar way.

eLearning has rapidly found its way towards becoming a significant part of many organisations. There are many individuals and organisations that are now delivering elearning content to their paying audience. This is where an authoring tool comes in the picture.

An authoring tool is a digital solution that helps you create digital content. The content here could be of any type, from text-based to graphics, from web content to videos. It is important for you to choose an authoring tool that aligns well with your organisational goals as it can dramatically impact the experience of the learners or your audience. 

The chances of an authoring tool being more problematic rather than being a solution are quite high. Thus, whether you are planning to replace your existing eLearning authoring tools or to invest in a new one for the first time ever, make sure you keep the following pointers in your mind. 

Usability

First and foremost comes the usability of the authoring tool. When your authoring tool is easy to use, it can turn out to be an extremely cost-effective investment. Not only in terms of money, but in terms of time as well. 

This is because with the help of an easy-to-use authoring tool, the dependency of your subject matter experts on your tech-savvy developers will dramatically decrease. They won’t have to wait for the availability of developers any longer. This will reduce the time of content creation and gradually increase the number of courses that are being published by the experts. 

Scalability

The scaling up of the workforce is one of the major advantages of an authoring tool and, thus, scalability features are one thing that you should always check for in your software. This tool is specifically beneficial for the companies that are scattered across various locations. 

With an authoring tool that is scalable, you can easily create content on an urgent basis. Since this software is cloud-based, you can utilise the knowledge, skills and expertise of your subject matter experts that are situated in various locations across the globe.

[ymal]

Design Flexibility

If we could give one tip for creating any eLearning course, it would be to make sure you are doing your branding right. After all, it is all about that one brand. Thus, when you are creating your course, you would want to take care of certain brand elements such as your logo placement, the colours that you will be using, the fonts that work well for your subject, and more. 

To make sure that you can streamline your branding, there are now authoring tools that allow you to work on a particular theme or template. With these templates, you can fix logo position, background colors, text blocks, etc. and lock them in place. This way, even if you have multiple people working on developing the course for you, you will always have a fixed standard that they will automatically follow, at least in terms of design.

Device Capability

One feature that you should look for in your authoring tool is its capability of working on different devices. When you offer content that can be written once and then executed on a variety of other devices such as tablets, mobile phones, and laptops, that creates value. This is because this shows that you are keeping the convenience and ease of your audience in mind. This will help increase your audience exponentially.

When learners don’t have any restrictions on devices or location and can execute their sessions as and when they feel like, it can be a real game changer. 

Conclusion

eLearning authoring tools are now becoming a huge part of corporates. Gone are the days when people preferred using off-the-shelf content. They now want to execute and receive content that has been tailored as per the relevance. It is best to look for certain features in your authoring tool before you make the purchase to ensure it proves to be effective. 

Alpa Bhakta, CEO of Butterfield Mortgages Limited, explores how large and small banks have responded to the disruption caused by the pandemic and how it is likely to shape the future of the sector.

No business or sector is immune to the impact COVID-19 has been having on society. Not only are there the immediate health implications to deal with; the introduction of lockdown measures and social distancing has completely transformed the way businesses, investors and consumers interact with one another.

There is a general acceptance that, regardless of how or when the COVID-19 pandemic is effectively contained, the changes brought about by the virus will be permanent. From flexible working patterns to the adoption of digital processes that reduce the need for physical interactions, businesses are slowly transitioning to what is now being termed as the “new normal”.

Of all the sectors adapting to the new normal, one could argue the financial services sector faces some of the biggest obstacles. Historically, large financial institutions have naturally relied on traditional practices and have been slow to embrace change. This is partly due to their size and the natural time it takes to reorganise teams, install new systems and pass the necessary due diligence checks.

Adapting to lockdown: how did banks perform?

The sudden rise of COVID-19 cases caught many of these organisations by surprise. When lockdown measures were announced by the UK Government back in March 2020, these companies were faced with the following challenges.

The first was overcoming the logistical hurdles involved in managing a company when the vast majority of employees were working from home. Unlike small, specialised businesses who were able to adapt to this new environment, big banks had to ensure the necessary systems and protocols were in place in order to continue operating whilst managing risks appropriately.

The second challenge was reviewing the current products and services on offer and deciding which needed to be temporarily withdrawn from the market. If we look at mortgages, the majority of high street banks decided to stop offering high LTV products. Others refused to process new applications, with stringent application checks put in place.

Unlike small, specialised businesses who were able to adapt to this new environment, big banks had to ensure the necessary systems and protocols were in place in order to continue operating whilst managing risks appropriately.

The decision to pull certain mortgage products from the market makes sense, particularly at a time when it was not known when social distancing would be eased. However, this also had a significant impact on homebuyers.

A survey of 1,300 homeowners and prospective homebuyers by Butterfield Mortgages Limited (BML) in late May revealed that over half of homebuyers had been denied a mortgage this year. This is despite having agreements in principle. Of those we surveyed, three in ten, or 31%, said they had lost their deposit due to delays in securing a mortgage as a result of the coronavirus.

These statistics are startling and bring me to the third and final challenge banks are indeed continuing to face. That is effectively engaging and supporting their clients so that these customers are in a position to confidently manage their finances and make significant investment decisions.

Responding to the changing needs of the market

Banks cannot afford to overlook the importance of effective customer engagement. After all, it is in these uncertain times that people are eagerly looking for advice and support. And based on separate research conducted by BML in the summer, it is apparent that some are not satisfied with their banks handling of the pandemic.

Indeed, some 19% of homeowners have lost faith in their banks this year because of the lack of financial support available during the pandemic. This is a concerning statistic and could signal the beginning of a bigger confidence crisis if not effectively addressed. What’s more, just under a third (31%) of customers said they were frustrated by their banks’ dependence on chatbots and automated services.

This is an interesting finding. At a time when people are more inclined to use digital services, it shows that banks cannot simply rely on a chatbot to meet demands for financial advice. In other words, banks need to see technology as an instrument that can be creatively leveraged to engage with their clients and networks. It is not a solution in of itself; rather a tool that will only be effective if part of a larger communication strategy.

[ymal]

Customer engagement is key

Over six months since lockdown measures were first introduced, it looks as though the country could be facing a new wave of social distancing regulations. This is without doubt a frustrating development. The UK Government has been actively trying to encourage spending and investment activity through targeted policies, and banks have been slowly putting products back on the market.

Regardless of what lies on the horizon, banks need to ensure they are doing everything possible to engage with their clients. This means creatively adapting to the new normal and not letting the other challenges they face overshadow their customer engagement. Failing this, they could risk losing customers in the long-term.

Robert Douglas, Europe Planning Director at Workday Adaptive Planning, explains how effective digitalisaiton has been a lifeline for finance teams in the wake of the pandemic.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, chief financial officers (CFOs) around the world were thrust into uncharted territory. All previous plans went off the table, and businesses’ ability to make rapid and data-driven decisions in the face of uncertainty have been put to the test ever since. Agility took on a new meaning in the age of COVID.

In a recent survey, hundreds of CFOs around the world were asked to share what their priorities have been in the immediate response to the pandemic and how they will change over the next year. Predictably, cost containment and workforce planning has been front of mind for many in the short term. However, looking a year ahead, the implementation of digital transformation will be a growing priority.

As finance looks at how it can improve the way in which it can assist executives throughout the organisation with quick and confident decision-making, the implementation and use of sophisticated digital technologies will indeed play a key role. While finance has been slower than others at embracing digitalisation, COVID-19 has made the importance of it abundantly clear and is acting as a catalyst for much needed change.

The case for digital transformation

More than half (54%) of CFOs currently report that their organisation has implemented some aspect of digital transformation. This includes moving IT infrastructure to the cloud, automating nonstrategic tasks, establishing a ‘single source of truth’ through data optimisation, and using predictive analytics powered by artificial intelligence.

The benefits of making these changes are clear, with around three quarters of CFOs overseeing a digitally transformed finance team being confident in both their teams’ capacity to carry out all critical finance functions (79%) and the accuracy of their two-year P&L forecast (73%). Only around 40% of CFOs from less digitalised organisations say the same.

While finance has been slower than others at embracing digitalisation, COVID-19 has made the importance of it abundantly clear and is acting as a catalyst for much needed change.

Digital transformation also gives finance teams the agility needed to operate in the current climate. The strengthening of data accuracy and automation of much of the analysis means that teams can more easily lay out multiple future scenarios for the business and help executives devise strategies for how to adapt to them as early as possible. While not everything can be predicted or planned for, the time it takes to readjust to surprises is shortened. As important, it underscores the great divide between organisations that have embraced digital transformation and those that have not.

Why the lag?

In terms of what has slowed down digital transformation for many CFOs, the prioritisation of crisis management in the face of COVID-19 is just one piece of the puzzle—many would have been stalling anyway.

When asked what is hindering digital transformation in their businesses, the two leading roadblocks are lack of skills and internal resistance to change. While overcoming both of those obstacles might be challenging, the good news is that CFOs have it in their power to do so.

CFOs need to work closely with HR to determine how to acquire the necessary skills to use modern financial planning software and strike the optimal balance between recruiting new staff and reskilling current employees. At the same time, it is crucial for finance leaders to set a positive example, by experimenting with new technologies and empowering employees to proactively highlight areas of inefficiency or untapped value that can be improved by establishing news ways of working or investing in new solutions.

[ymal]

The time is now

Transforming the finance function is not an easy task, but now more than ever it is necessary to both bolster productivity within finance and prepare the organisation for unforeseen challenges. Thankfully, almost all finance teams that have not digitally transformed their ways of working over the past year plan on doing so over the next. This will benefit their businesses and make the economy overall more robust in its response to crises.

There are various benefits of using CRM software. It gives more insight and provides more flexibility and agility to business owners than ever. The business owners must read about and understand about this software to gain a proper understanding of the benefits of using them in businesses. The inbuilt analytics and dashboards in CRM software help you centralise your data and get an accurate view of your business. The Microsoft dynamic 365 business central is one example of an integrated enterprise resource planning (EPR) and customer relationship management (CRM) by Microsoft.

CRM software helps you make smart decisions and take actions that drive your business to greater heights by improving your productivity and performance, and also enables you to build a stronger relationship with your customers. There are various benefits of using this application.

Some of the significant benefits of using this software are as follows:

Innovative solutions for the growth of your business

The essential advantage is the AI that analyses your data and gives you custom insight, reducing the need to sift through complex data and extrapolate useful information. The predictive forecasting gives you accurate projections while streamlining the planning. The AI also helps build a stronger relationship using conversation intelligence and identifying customer needs and market trends. The built-in coaching helps you identify risks beforehand, making you more proactive.

Improved systematisation between sales and marketing

The seamless tools in CRM applications help to improve coordination between sales and marketing, also providing you with promising leads. The ability to convert records by scanning business cards reduces manual efforts. Combining automation with technology gives both the users and the customers a pleasant experience. Most of such software integrates seamlessly with tools from Microsoft like Excel and Outlook. Survey insights, combined with your customer data, help you see the customer point of view.

[ymal]

The digital selling interface

CRM interfaces allow you to focus on being productive using the integrated multichannel tools and by leveraging the AI for emphatic conversations. The interfaces have everything that one needs from a soft phone dialer to email templates. All this translates to less diverted attention and more productive efforts towards business.

Cloud insights

The system analyses the critical performance indicators of your organisation through artificial intelligence and presents this information to you. It helps you avoid shortcomings like inventory shortages for better service to your clients and better business. Essential information like available funding, sales and inventory are always available and up to date. All of this helps to reduce the costs of operation owing to the low maintenance costs of the infrastructure. The development tools help you expand the capabilities of the system quickly.

CRM software can be used on all devices, and it provides you with the same experience, whether on handheld devices or computers. On this interface, you have access to your customer information that helps you create sales and purchase orders. There are different levels of software for different business demand. Some of the best software for every business type are nimble, agile CRM, nutshell, streak, and Bitrix24. They will make your business more effective. Delegation of service tasks to readily available platforms facilitates greater comfort for businesses.

Leonardo Brummas Carvalho, CEO of Wealth Management at ITI Capital, explains why the social responsibility of finance is coming to the fore.

The COVID-19 crisis has not just posed a huge threat to human life on a global scale, it has caused mass devastation for thousands of businesses and all but crippled the economy. As a society, the extent of disruption caused by this pandemic has not been seen since the world was shook by war in the 1940s, and the financial impact has completely overshadowed the recession in 2008.

However, the comparisons to 2008 stop there. Over a decade ago, banks and financial services organisations were embracing high risk decisions as a matter of routine, where all the risk eventually fell in the hands of the consumers and working people, millions of whom were left unemployed and facing financial turmoil. The banks, on the other hand, walked away comparatively unharmed, having been bailed out by taxpayers.

As a result, the already questionable reputation of bankers, financial services and investment specialists plummeted further. Even today, business owners, consumers and mortgage owners do not feel that traditional financial service providers have their best interests at heart.

But, due to COVID-19, many consumers have no choice but to turn to banking services: taking out important investments to keep businesses afloat, to manage personal finances and to meet credit debt payments.

Thus, financial institutions have not just the opportunity, but the responsibility to win back the trust of the general public with deep pockets and generous investment – helping to boost the economy and support independent businesses and struggling individuals at a time when they need it most.

[ymal]

Whilst it must be acknowledged that central and consumer banks in the UK have already introduced unprecedented emergency measures, such as mortgage and credit holidays, and cut interest rates on loans to 0%, they still could do more to fulfil the social responsibility they are now liable for and redeem themselves in the eyes of the public for actions in the early and mid-2000s.

Banks in general play a fundamental role in society, as they act as an intermediary in regulating credit and loans to the public – throughout history, banks have operated by awarding loans almost exclusively to large corporations and high net worth individuals who can guarantee repayment.

Today, the opposite can also be true and many institutions have the option to help communities, vulnerable individuals and propose social impact investments.

Now, in these challenging times, SMEs and workers are more vulnerable than ever, and would be deemed high-risk assets by numbers on a computer screen. Thus, bankers and financial experts must prioritise vulnerable communities, and not just look at the interests of their holders and senior managers, but also customers, employees and more broadly, the entire society.

The good news is that, over the last decade, digital platforms, fintech and cloud and software capabilities have evolved to the point where traditional financial service providers can overhaul operations, and cater to not just the high-paying clients, but to millions of consumers at the same time.

Unfortunately, many big banks are still running slow legacy IT systems, and therefore new technology and app services remain a priority for consumer banks.

Banks in general play a fundamental role in society, as they act as an intermediary in regulating credit and loans to the public.

On the other hand, fintech companies and financial start-ups have spent years dedicating themselves to transparency and high-quality services. At ITI Capital, we have identified the disparity that exists in advisory and investment services provided to high-net worth individuals, compared to the general public. Thus, we have dedicated ourselves to democratising the financial market, ensuring normal, hard-working people on all sorts of different wage brackets, are catered to with professional financial services.

This has all been facilitated by cutting edge technology such as artificial intelligence, which allows us to provide a huge amount of consumers with top-tier, fully regulated financial services which would otherwise only be reserved for high-paying clients.

If the entire financial sector had this mindset in the UK, consumers would be trusting again and businesses and individuals could be comfortable optimistic towards the near future.

So will the attitude from the major banks change from now until the end of COVID-19, whenever that may be?

Of course, government legislation and schemes have, in the short-term, enforced significant social change. The furlough scheme in the UK, for example, has provided millions of workers with financial support at a time when they would have otherwise been laid off by their employers. In the short-term we should hope that shortfalls in government schemes to combat COVID-19 are covered by the financial institutions, providing preferential interest loans to companies who can’t front the cash to pay salaries.

However, as previously mentioned, fintech start-ups and market disruptors are on the rise, and it appears as though the financial sector is naturally transitioning to processes facilitated by automation and artificial intelligence. Thus, within the next decade, we could expect to see fintechs, such as Monzo and Starling, become the new normal for consumer banking. Alternatively, we might see traditional banks embrace the new wave of technology, and self-democratise the financial sector by offering affordable and remote online services.

Regardless, if traditional banks are looking to excel in the new normal, or if fintech start-ups are looking to flourish, they should each prioritise one thing: serving vulnerable communities and society as a whole during the remainder of the COVID-19 crisis and beyond.