As employees continue to become more mobile in their personal lives, and as work and home spheres continue to intersect and even overlap, it’s only natural that employees try to fit their office into their pockets, briefcases or handbags — as they already do with their social and personal lives. This has created a real need for mobile devices to extend beyond providing just telephony and e-mail capabilities and become an extension of the desktop. The scenario is no different at Standard Chartered Bank, where the adoption of enterprise mobility is increasingly on the rise due to many of its employees working from outside the office.

“Our increasing usage of, and dependence on smartphones allows our employees to utilize a wide array of applications anywhere and at anytime,” informs Matthew Norris, CIO, Standard Chartered Bank - India.

In 2010, the Standard Chartered Bank chose to move to the iOS platform. Policymakers at the bank believe the iPhone and iPad provide the perfect platform to expand the bank’s mobile services, both internally and also to its tech-savvy customers. The bank has already provided 12,000 iPhones to employees across 70 countries, replacing some 8,000 BlackBerry devices.

The bank’s decision to move to iPhone was partly driven by the large number of iPhone apps aimed at business users on the Apple App Store, such as apps for tracking and planning plane journeys etc.

“We chose to go with iPhone not because the iPhone is trendy right now. Our decision was based on an honest assessment of the functionality and security we required, coupled with the ability and commitment to make bespoke apps to help financial consultants work better,” asserts Todd Schofield, Global Head of Enterprise Mobility at Standard Chartered Bank.

Custom-built apps

The internal app store, aptly named the Standard Chartered App Centre, offers a range of custom-built apps to the staff. These apps allow employees to streamline internal processes, securely transmit financial data, improve communication between customers and banking staff, and tap into back-end systems such as PeopleSoft and SharePoint, for the management of approvals, as well as collaboration.

The bank now has 12 proprietary apps on the internal Standard Chartered App Centre, and has plans to grow the apps portfolio. Standard Chartered Bank claims to be one of only two organizations in the world to have been given an App Store licence by Apple.

Some of the internal apps used by the bank include TradePort app, which enables trade finance relationship managers to securely perform or monitor trades on-the-go; Funds Selector app, which enables private banking relationship managers to access quantitative and qualitative reviews to understand financial products; and Branch Cam app, which tracks customers’ waiting time, service levels and consistency throughout the day.

The bank has also piloted iNeeds app, a custom iPad app, in Hong Kong. Using this app, relationship managers in the bank’s branches can create client profiles and explain the benefits of products such as savings accounts or mortgages via direct, one-on-one interactions. “We are starting to introduce our custom-designed iNeeds for iPad portal to enable our branch staff to better service our customers — with Hong Kong being our first business to go live. We are also empowering our staff with more tools through a dedicated Standard Chartered App Centre,” says Norris.

The shift to enterprise mobility is an important part of Standard Chartered Bank’s strategy as it improves productivity and enables better work-life balance for the staff.