DBS: Customer Obsession Journey, Enhanced by Agility at Scale and AI

DBS was recognised as the world's best bank, yet it wanted to deliver even higher customer experience to continue its mission to make banking joyful. So, it further leveraged being data-driven to gain deeper customer insights, and flattened the organisational structure by using cross-functional teams and agile methodology to respond faster to customer and market changes.

In 2020, DBS decided to function as a horizontal organisation, which meant building cross-functional teams that collaborated to enhance customer experiences. The bank also became tremendously data-driven and adopted agile at scale. It did so by building on the previously launched ‘Digital Wave’ strategy that leveraged technology to make banking invisible to customers and, therefore deliver the bank’s purpose of making banking joyful.

Covering the period from 2020 to 2024, the case looks at how the bank developed nine iterative elements, to become agile at scale. It was achieved by maintaining a customer-obsessive focus, leveraging the bank’s learn-and-apply approach, providing employee training, and the continuous effort to scale ‘Managing through Journeys (MtJs) across the bank—all of which eventually led to maximised customer value.

Participants will learn how DBS implemented agility at scale by mapping the customer journey end-to-end, and leveraging collected data, thus creating ‘Managing through Journeys’—a better way to work that enhanced customer experience. Students will learn:

•    How to leverage data, AI, and cross-functional teams for exceptional customer experience
•    What it takes to adopt agile at scale
•    Solutions to agile challenges
•    The leader’s role in agile implementation
•    Agile implementation best practices 

Inspection copies and teaching notes are available for university faculty. To receive an inspection copy and teaching note, please email cmpshop@smu.edu.sg with your registered faculty email ID and a link to your contact information on the faculty directory at your university as verification. An inspection copy and teaching note will then be sent to your faculty email account.

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·      The Case (SMU-25-0004)

·      Teaching Note (SMU-25-0004TN)

·      Teaching Note Supplement (SMU-25-0004)

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·      The Case (SMU-25-0004)

·      Teaching Note (SMU-25-0004)

For purchase of the case and supplementary materials via Harvard Business Publishing, please access the following links:

·      The Case (SMU-25-0004)

·      Teaching Note (SMU-25-0004)