Too complicated - a no-brainer

We are now also reading in the press what we already knew before - bank "products" have been made so complicated and have versioned into so many nearly-but-not-quite-the-same offerings - that the staff cannot handle them any longer.

This sad fact is not unique to the banking sector - many other sectors suffer from the same results of too many head office departments having to show their level of activity and ingenuity to be allowed to keep their budgets. The tragedy is that very few organizations are equipped to control the volume of overall flow of propositions to customers and make the communication simple enough for front line customer services to understand and remember.

In addition to causing irritation among customers and frustration among face losing staff this disease is also costing a lot of money. One estimate I saw from Boston Consulting was stating that unnecessary complications cause up to 25% of total costs.

There is a social subscription to make radical changes here. But it takes strong leadership.