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In remarks that opened day-one of the conference, TowerGroup president and CEO, Mark Sievewright, identified “Customer Focus and Service” as the first of five top challenges currently facing financial institutions.

Major institutions have a renewed recognition of the importance of maintaining and growing current customer relationships, he said.

And with this understanding has come renewed commitment both to CRM and to driving customer centricity through every aspect of an organization.

“There is a clear move among financial institutions to make the customer experience superior and unique,” said Sievewright. “Across ever sector of the industry that touches the retail customer, we see a new culture I would typify as ‘protect and grow.’ Protect existing customers and generate growth through expansion and cross-sell within those relationships.”

Sievewright noted that the well-documented shortfalls of CRM implementation in the 1990s should have sent a clear message to the industry. “CRM is not a technology,” he said. “Though a critical enabling tool, technology alone cannot move any firm to where it needs to be relative to customer focus. Effective CRM requires a challenging combination of people, widespread cultural change and changes to business processes, supported by the successful and strategic application of technology.”

Top Institutions Focus on Customer Initiatives

All four of TowerGroup’s outside presenters yesterday identified customer centricity as core to their companies’ strategic direction.

Tim Arnoult, technology and operations executive at Bank of America—whose “CRM is Not Dead” presentation struck a dominant chord of the day—provided conference attendees with an overview of the ongoing CRM initiative he has led at his organization. Returning to the point that technology does not create true customer focus on its own, he emphasized the critical need to view people, processes and technology as the three essential legs on the CRM stool.

James P. Gorman, EVP / president of Merrill Lynch’s Global Private Client (GPC) Group, spoke to attendees about “Total Merrill” and “Beyond Banking”—and the initiatives his firm is taking to provide its army of financial advisors with the next generation CRM tools they need to view and act on a client’s total relationship with the institution.

Peter Cullen, chief privacy officer of RBC Financial Group, noted that privacy is as much an issue of customer trust in a company’s brand as it is a regulatory issue. Underscoring the centrality of customer perceptions, Cullen reminded attendees that access to customer information is the lifeblood of the retail financial services business. Because every touchpoint with a customer is a potential chance for that fragile trust to be broken, a focus on customer preference and choice must be driven across the entire organization.

Ameet Patel, technology and operations executive for JPMorgan Chase and global head of LabMorgan Technology Solutions, rounded out the day by noting that customer care is currently a huge point of focus at his firm. Across the industry, he sees renewed weight on retention strategies and on aligning business goals with what customers want, with a focus on the customer as the center of the “ecosystem.”