Lightbulbs are beginning to appear in traditional business, and William Bland's latest piece at Forrester (subscription) captures the thought well.  You cannot build business strategy (for banks) in a vacuum, and simply implement that in the technology later.  Technology is an implicit part of the strategy creation.

Forrester Research: Using Technology To Improve Your Customer Experience

Integrate the online experience with other channels. Online interactions are not viewed as a separate part of the customer experience. Vanguard service associates use the company Web site as their desktop. When a retail client or plan participant phones in with a question, the associate logs into the same screen that the customer sees.Vanguard encourages customers to use its channels in the combination they choose, and the company strives to make customer interactions across channels work in a seamless manner.

He makes the point that only 24% of companies, by their own acknowledgement have one person in charge of the whole customer experience. So he concludes that "IT Plays A Critical Role In Delivering Customer
Experience" and in particular that the online experience integration is critical.

This statement summarises the multichannel confusion that results from lack of centralised customer experience management (emphasis mine):

Firms have better data about consumers, including complex cross-channel
analytics and behavior tracking, which allows them to micro-segment and
tailor individualized user experiences. But, they recognize that the
growing multiplicity of customer interaction channels exacerbates the
problem of creating a coherent set of interactions with customers.

Relevance to Bankwatch:
The banks with successful web sites tend to have their internet organisations separate from the mainstream business strategy groups. There are few that have successfully integrated, and in my view that won't happen until internet is viewed as the primary channel. Internet applications can always be re-used in the branch, but branch applications can never be re-used online! This requires a mindset and cultural shift, to properly achieve EBD. Until then, William is right that IT and Channel groups, need to take the lead, to ensure technology aligns with the business strategies.

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