ING Group: Critical Issues & Solutions - Essay Sample

Introduction

ING Group is a multinational financial and banking services company located in Amsterdam. The main businesses of ING Group include direct, investment, retail, commercial banking, insurance services and asset management. Through a case study approach, this paper analyses the critical issues facing ING Group and possible recommendations on how to improve and implement solutions.

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The Central Issues

Organizations globally and across different sectors aim at emulating the dynamism, customer centricity, and speed of digital players. ING wanted to change its business culture to one where it adopted the "agile' business model to copy companies such as Google. This new approach sought after by ING promises improved time for marketing, increasing the engagement of employees, and increasing productivity levels. The current issues include understanding why ING Group needed to make changes and the ways it evaluates the impacts of its efforts (Philadelpho, Svedjedal, & Tanfour, 2018).

Critical Facts of the Case

ING Group is considering ways of improving the agile ways of working in the company. ING Group had experienced disruptive changes in 2014, where it had to undergo restructuring. ING was looking for ways of meeting the increased rivalry from fintechs and increasing delivery on its mission. Other considerations included the ways ING Group could improve the execution of the agile way of working and the fastest way it could extend to other business units. The agile way of working could assist the bank in changing into an agile and flexible organization to maintain the pace with innovators and fintechs towards leveraging digital opportunities (Philadelpho, Svedjedal, & Tanfour, 2018).

Systematic Analysis

ING Group needs agility operations to help with the anticipation or responding to changes in the market. The agility methods favour individuals and interactions over tools and processes and responding to changes. Agile will help ING Group in improving efficiency and productivity levels. It also reduces bureaucracy, fostering internal collaboration, and connecting development with customers and businesses. These agile methods, for ING Group, short value interactions which enable teams to have quick reactions. Agile ways of working are essential for ING Group towards the restoration of the sense of customer-centricity. ING Group leveraged to adapt the offerings to the changing needs of the consumers and placing them together in Omni-channel customer experience. In the past, ING utilized various information technology systems for its mobile applications, call center, branches, and website. Through placing the application programmers alongside product development and marketing, the agile way of working removed these challenges (Philadelpho, Svedjedal, & Tanfour, 2018).

Recommended Decision

ING Group should work on prioritization. Presently, the company is struggling with working in a data-driven way since most of the dealings rely on gut feeling.

Effectiveness of Recommended Decision

Improving on prioritization and making the company a data-driven organization will go a long way in enhancing the company's profitability levels. Feedback loops with clients such as comments in social media platforms and user tracking produced a lot of information. Still, there is room for improvement in efficiently using and evaluating information to create new consumer insights and developing into a data-driven product development organization.

Execution

In implementing the recommended decision, the management will provide the required resources and tools for educating and training the workers on social media strategies. The tools and resources are important in carrying out the required training in the different workshops. Additionally, the top leaders in the company will work towards ensuring there are time schedules in place for the timely delivery of the projects (Philadelpho, Svedjedal, & Tanfour, 2018).

Scenario Planning

One of the problems which can be faced in the execution phase is the lack of enough resources and a non-responsive team. ING Group could lack enough resources, or there could be a conflict of interest among the top leadership positions, which could hamper the chances of success in the implementation of the program. There is a need for clearly defined goals where everyone understands his or her role in the implementation of the program (Philadelpho, Svedjedal, & Tanfour, 2018).

References

Philadelpho, E. F., Svedjedal, S., & Tanfour, M., (2018). ING: AN AGILE ORGANIZATION IN A DISRUPTIVE ENVIRONMENT. Retrieved from https://www.scribd.com/document/407091783/ING