Kleinwort Hambros

Core banking system training for UK private bank

Project Overview

Additional resource

Extra resource was required after the go-live was brought forward, so Kleinwort turned to Optimum.

Business transformation

Large business transformation project including over 250 UK-based end-users.

Banking workstreams

Components included loans, securities and derivatives, portfolio management and finance.

Project Detail

Optimum, the IT training consultancy, has provided UK private bank Kleinwort Benson with additional user training resources as it implements a major core banking system.

Kleinwort Benson, one of the most historic names in banking and investment management in the UK, is undergoing a complete business transformation process, involving new finance, operational and customer relationship systems. Optimum’s role was to support the bank’s super users to train the rest of the bank’s staff on Infracon, its new core banking system.

Because Kleinwort Benson offers its customers a very diverse range of highly bespoked banking services it wanted to keep ownership of the training in-house to utilise its staff’s detailed knowledge of its day-to-day operational processes. However, the go live deadline was brought forward by several months, followed by a change of ownership of the bank, which meant that extra resource was needed.

“Producing sound training documentation with the right level of detail, laid out in a methodical way, is a specialised skill.”

Chris Ollieuz, Infracon IT Project Consultant

The original plan was to have ten super users within the company who would take part in the system testing, write the user training material and then deliver the training to their peers.

“This is a major business transformation that will affect the vast majority of the 250 people based in our UK business,” said Dave Lee, Kleinwort Benson’ Infracon IT project manager. “Having our own staff carry out the training would mean they could deal with questions about our highly specialised transactional processes.”

The change of ownership at a late stage in the project though meant Kleinwort Benson faced a very aggressive timescale in which to introduce the new systems and without the expected help and expertise from a sister company. The bank decided it needed additional resource to reduce the burden of work on the super users, who were all continuing to do their day jobs alongside the new systems implementation project.

“The super users were under pressure so we brought in consultants from Optimum to support them in two key areas – designing and writing the training courses and materials, plus onsite backup when the classroom training was being delivered,” said Lee.

Having high quality, well-structured training documentation in particular was going to be key to achieving a successful business transformation. Kleinwort Benson intended to use the documentation not just for the system user training but to set out its operational procedures, which, in the highly regulated private banking industry, are open to extremely rigorous scrutiny and audits.

“Producing sound training documentation with the right level of detail, laid out in a methodical way, is a specialised skill,” said Chris Ollieuz, the consultant hired by Kleinwort Benson to oversee the project. “The super users knew the system very well but they didn’t necessarily know the best way to communicate the role-based knowledge that the users needed.”

Since the super users were training their peers, having professionally produced, well-structured courses and materials gave the training extra credibility and boosted the super users’ confidence.

The new banking system consisted of front, middle and back office modules. These were broken down into sub-components including client data, loans, securities and derivatives, portfolio management and finance.

The Optimum team developed training materials for each of them, producing role-based reference guides aimed at key audience groups. The documentation also needed to address the bank’s business messages as well as the functional elements.

Designing the courses and modules and writing the training material was made more difficult by the fact that Infracon was not a fully tested and working system when Optimum was brought in.

The original plan was to have ten super users within the company who would take part in the system testing, write the user training material and then deliver the training to their peers.

“This is a major business transformation that will affect the vast majority of the 250 people based in our UK business,” said Dave Lee, Kleinwort Benson’ Infracon IT project manager. “Having our own staff carry out the training would mean they could deal with questions about our highly specialised transactional processes.”

The change of ownership at a late stage in the project though meant Kleinwort Benson faced a very aggressive timescale in which to introduce the new systems and without the expected help and expertise from a sister company. The bank decided it needed additional resource to reduce the burden of work on the super users, who were all continuing to do their day jobs alongside the new systems implementation project.

“The super users were under pressure so we brought in consultants from Optimum to support them in two key areas – designing and writing the training courses and materials, plus onsite backup when the classroom training was being delivered,” said Lee.

Having high quality, well-structured training documentation in particular was going to be key to achieving a successful business transformation. Kleinwort Benson intended to use the documentation not just for the system user training but to set out its operational procedures, which, in the highly regulated private banking industry, are open to extremely rigorous scrutiny and audits.

“Producing sound training documentation with the right level of detail, laid out in a methodical way, is a specialised skill,” said Chris Ollieuz, the consultant hired by Kleinwort Benson to oversee the project. “The super users knew the system very well but they didn’t necessarily know the best way to communicate the role-based knowledge that the users needed.”

Since the super users were training their peers, having professionally produced, well-structured courses and materials gave the training extra credibility and boosted the super users’ confidence.

The new banking system consisted of front, middle and back office modules. These were broken down into sub-components including client data, loans, securities and derivatives, portfolio management and finance.

The Optimum team developed training materials for each of them, producing role-based reference guides aimed at key audience groups. The documentation also needed to address the bank’s business messages as well as the functional elements.

Designing the courses and modules and writing the training material was made more difficult by the fact that Infracon was not a fully tested and working system when Optimum was brought in.

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