The 2007-08 global financial crisis is a great opportunity for transforming the banking landscape in South Africa, says Accenture Financial Services senior executive Nesan Govender.
While the impact has been mainly in North America and Europe, South African financial institutions will have to transform themselves to meet the new challenges as the repercussions are being felt across financial markets and banking systems throughout the world.
Govender says South Africa’s banks are facing considerable headwinds from different directions: from affects on asset prices, liquidity and funding, to increased credit risk and regulatory changes, to economic recession that will lead to lower revenue growth.
From the Accenture perspective these challenges constitute a new opportunity for banks to fundamentally transform their business operating models in ways that position them for high performance in the changed landscape.
Banks need to trim fat without affecting the muscle, rethink their risk management and learn how to use information as a competitive advantage, according to Govender. They also need to strategize for the multi-polar world in which international expansion is a two-way street and competition can come from anywhere. These immediate priorities, he adds, can be met by following the overall approach to high performance in banking outlined by Accenture’s ongoing High Performance Business research. This approach recommends that banks simplify their internal processes and IT to enable them to offer the differentiated services a competitive market demands.
Accenture’s focus on industrializing banking processes for clients is a key element of enabling high performance, Govender says. Industrialization accelerates deployment of solutions to Accenture’s banking clients and improves their ability to execute. “This means Accenture can readily take its banking clients through large-scale transformations covering strategic systems, integrations and transformational outsourcing,” he adds.
Describing his own role in Accenture’s Johannesburg office as equivalent to a chief operations officer, Govender says he enjoys the intensity of personal interaction that goes with his position at Accenture. In this capacity he maintains close contact with what is happening on the ground within Accenture, which enables him to match appropriate internal skills with what banking clients need.
The outward-oriented aspect of Govender’s work involves intense interaction with clients. “I work with clients to identify solutions to support them in achieving their revenue and cost-efficiency objectives,” he says. He finds the strategic advisor role highly stimulating, while implementation offers the chance to turn strategy into real outcomes that add value.
Govender appreciates Accenture for giving him the opportunity “to grow tremendously as a person in both breadth and depth.” When he completed his computer science degree at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg in 1995 he was immediately drawn to Accenture “because of the global nature of the company and its focus on technology.” However, the primary attraction was the prospect of working closely with a team of young, bright professionals, and in this respect his expectations have been more than met.
After joining Accenture as an analyst in 1996, opportunities soon opened out for Govender. He was promoted in 1998 to a consultant in change management and two years later he moved into financial services, initially as a manager and then in 2000 as a senior manager. His steady climb continued, and by 2007 he had attained his present status.
Govender values the opportunity to grow in his leadership role in the banking arena, and he plans to focus more of his efforts on management consulting.