1. Set the Foundation
First, assess your bank's existing technical capabilities. Conduct a quick audit of your current infrastructure, software systems, and available resources. Don’t overcomplicate this - just identify strengths, weaknesses, and potential resources your bank has for incorporating data-driven decision-making.
This assessment should include factors such as data collection methods, analytical tools, and the expertise of your workforce. Once you have a clear understanding of your strengths and weaknesses, make a plan for filling any major gaps.
You already have a huge asset: SIBanking Analytics is an easy-to-use tool that can help you gain insights and make informed decisions without the need for extensive technical expertise.
2. Prioritize Key Metrics
To avoid feeling overwhelmed, focus on a few key metrics that align with your bank's goals. Clearly define the objectives and goals that data analytics should help achieve. These should be straightforward, easy to track, and directly related to your strategic objectives.
Let’s say your bank wants to prioritize digital engagement. How will you measure this concept? Here are two metrics that will give you insight into how you’re doing with digital engagement. In SIBanking or Smiley Analytics, you can track these metrics and keep an eye on how they change over time:
Remote Banking Usage: Designed to view and track the usage of the bank’s customers’ remote banking products, this all-in-one report will identify trends in how your customers are using digital banking, debit cards, text messaging and more.
Digital Transaction Volume: Counts the number of online and mobile banking digital transactions, including transaction date, transaction amount and more.
Another digital metric that the bank provides is the description of digital transaction history. Banks can leverage the digital transaction history of their customers to gain insights into their banking behaviors and identify other financial institutions they may be engaging with.
By analyzing transaction data, banks can detect patterns and recurring transactions that indicate the use of services from other banks. For instance, regular transfers to another bank account, payments for loans, or credit card settlements with different banks can reveal where customers hold additional accounts.
Leaders can encourage departments to work together to improve the end-to-end process of implementing new and current products.
3. Spark Collaboration
To move any metric and achieve a goal, cross-functional collaboration is required. Here’s where your role as a leader is instrumental. You can use these metrics as goals that unify your organization and break down silos. Both digital engagement metrics involve a high level of collaboration across departments.
Let’s take the Remote Banking Usage Report as an example: This metric involves input from multiple departments, including marketing, customer onboarding, IT, and customer support. By using this metric as a shared objective, leaders can encourage departments to work together to improve the end-to-end process of implementing new and current products.

"We want to partner with you and help you understand the "Why" behind your data."
Elizabeth Glasbrenner, CEO
4. Understand the "Why" Behind the Data
Instead of delving into the technical "how" of data analysis, ask your team to explain the "why." As a leader, you should understand the reasons behind the data trends so you can make decisions based on a deeper understanding.
Often, metrics will fluctuate. Online Banking Login Frequency could fluctuate depending on several factors such as seasonality (Are customers checking their accounts for tax refunds?), marketing campaigns (Are customers logging in to take advantage of a special offer?), or economic factors (Was there an interest rate change or an event that caused general economic uncertainty?). Sometimes a fluctuation is a direct result of a strategic decision, and other times it’s related to an external factor. It’s important to know the difference, but either way, data will arm you with the ability to make a sound decision.
5. Evaluate the Outcomes of Decisions
After making decisions based on data insights, don't forget to evaluate their impact. Ask your team to provide regular updates on how these decisions affect the bank's performance. This feedback loop allows you to refine your strategies over time.
Let’s consider how a decision could affect your bank’s Remote Banking Usage metric. Maybe you decided to install a new technology to help customers save money through your digital platform online. You and your team should closely monitor whether this new technology is actually working: Does your investment translate to new digital product usage? If you aren’t seeing the number you hoped, this is important information. Admitting something isn’t working isn’t failure: It arms you with information to pivot to something that will work.
Demystify data for your staff and support their professional growth along the way.
6. Champion a Data-Driven Culture
If your staff notices that you prioritize data-driven decision-making, it will have a ripple effect on the overall culture of your organization, and you will likely start to see your staff making decisions using data in their own work.
Your role as a leader is to help demystify data for your staff and support their professional growth along the way - whether that’s working directly with staff or training your managers to support them. Make sure you are fostering an environment where data is protected but still readily accessible, data-driven discussions are encouraged, and it’s a norm for employees to rely on data in their own decisions. You can also consider investing in training and resources to empower your teams to effectively work with data.
Make sure your team understands why the metrics are significant. They should be familiar with how they tie into overall goals and objectives. This approach not only ensures that decisions are based on empirical evidence but also builds a culture where staff understand how their own work impacts important metrics.
By following these practical guidelines, you'll be well on your way to making more informed and effective decisions for your bank. When you’re confident in leading by using data to help your own bank thrive, you’ll also be making meaningful changes that improve the financial lives of your customers. That’s what it’s all about, after all.

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