Achieve payments modernization and fraud security through strong partnerships
As companies of all sizes aim for digital transformation, particularly in modernizing payments for improved customer convenience and business efficiency, they must also navigate the risks of change and the threat of costly cyber fraud. This balance between innovation and security is crucial in today's rapidly evolving business landscape.
Recently, The Scotiabank Women Initiative hosted an insight-packed webinar on business payments modernization, fraud and cyber awareness, as part of its C-suite Series events, including a real-life case study by industry leader Great Gulf Group that detailed best practices from their payments transformation journey.
Successful transformation by engaging key partners:
“We’re here to share insights critical to women in leadership and leaders in general, including actionable steps you can take today towards payments modernization,” explained Damian Jones, Scotiabank Vice President, Payments and Cash Management. “And we’re in for a treat, because our client Great Gulf Group has been an industry pioneer in pushing boundaries and innovating in digital payments.”
Indeed, webinar guests were impressed as Nasreen Somani, Treasurer at Great Gulf Group, recounted her efforts over the past five years to help the award-winning, North American real estate developer move its payment processes from cheques only to vastly faster, more efficient and more secure electronic transactions.
Somani emphasized that the key to their successful multi-year project hinged on understanding deeply ‘why’ the business wanted to transform and what they aimed to achieve: “At Great Gulf, we do great things, and that meant elevating our treasury to reduce operating costs, mitigate risks and prevent fraud, optimize process efficiency and enhance the employee and customer experience.”
Acknowledging that this massive opportunity was also overwhelming in size and scope, she described how: “My first step was to thoroughly understand our current state of operations to identify areas for improvement. Then, I categorized this list as ‘productivity improvements’, that is things we can improve with what we currently have, and ‘differentiation improvements,’ which require investments in new tools and systems that will evolve our products, services and even business model.”
Pointing out how she focused on the productivity improvement factors of automation, centralization, standardization and efficiency, Somani noted that, “You won’t get far if you step on the ‘accelerator’ right away. It’s really important to begin the transformation with productivity improvements, and then slowly layer in differentiation improvements from there.”
Marvelling at Great Gulf’s accomplishments, Melissa McKinley, Scotiabank’s Director and Team Lead for Payments and Cash Management, queried Somani on how she successfully influenced typically change-resistant internal and external stakeholders to support this payments transformation project.
“Although transformation requires strategy and good execution, to help an organization bring its established processes into a new era, you really must focus on ‘leadership’ and ‘change management,” explained Somani. “Leadership means generating momentum, involving teams, culture change and instilling new ways of working in your people. Change management means keeping your stakeholders engaged by communicating relentlessly, seeking feedback, and gaining their trust by achieving early wins with those productivity improvements I mentioned. Those results helped me pull the whole organization along and create allies in the process.”
While Somani credited her success on having a ‘strong business sponsor’ and ‘getting into the details’ to understand needs, issues and risks,” she also highlighted the importance of having strong relationships with your partner banks, and engaging them early in the process: “Scotiabank helped us tremendously by sharing best practices in process transformation, including helping us see what was on the horizon in the market, including new products and services.”
Payments transformation to stem fraud risk:
With escalating levels of fraud and cybercrime now hitting hard upon small, medium and large companies, Somani noted that Great Gulf’s transformation program also focused on fraud and risk mitigation best practices and embedding solid governance into existing, revised and new processes.
In fact, Steve Thompson, Scotiabank’s Director of Client Protection, praised Great Gulf for doing their research and taking the time to learn about both the opportunities and risks involved in digital transformations. He described the importance of ‘awareness and education’ as you adopt these new technologies, in light of current trends in cybercrime threatening both individuals and companies.
“First, with Artificial Intelligence, we see a massive increase in phishing attacks upon customers, by which they are fooled to click a fake link or follow instructions from someone they think they can trust because of technology that can recreate someone’s voice or image,” detailed Thompson. “Second, we see more companies facing risks from their supply chain, so you need to perform your due diligence to ensure your vendors and partners are protecting themselves against cyber risk, so that problems they face won’t shut down your business as well.”
Thompson asserted that, like payments transformation, there are simple, initial steps a business of any size can take to start strengthening their processes, particularly basic cyber security awareness education and training for employees to help avoid human error and avoid thousands of dollars in fraud loss down the road. He added that Scotiabank has invested heavily in its own cyber processes, technology and people and also created invaluable, free online resources like the Scotiabank cybersecurity and fraud hub’ to help businesses build their own cyber security plans and find help if they suffer a cyber incident.
Also, just as Somani recommended that businesses engage with their bank early when planning payments transformation, Thompson urged everyone to contact their bank right away if they experience fraud, phishing or a cyber security breach: “Time is critical, so the quicker you contact us, the better chance we have to try and help our clients in the recovery process or to prevent potential fraud.”
To wrap up the information-rich event, Scotiabank’s Jones concluded that, “Nasreen from Great Gulf has shown how you can achieve significant payments transformation by being bold, being deliberate, and taking chances, but also being proactive to protect against the risks. It takes an upfront commitment, which can deliver considerable medium- and long-term benefit, especially if you involve partners who are ready and able to help.”