Recommendation for strategic levels
Introduction
The core strategy of Barclays is to establish their “strength as a transatlantic consumer, corporate, and investment bank anchored in the two financial centers of the world, London and New York (Barclays Bank PLC 2015a par. 1)”. In the quest for achieving this strategy, Barclays has made changes in its current balance sheet, strengthened its capital base, and reduced costs. These changes have as well aimed at making Barclays a better bank in improving the returns of its shareholders (Barclays Bank PLC 2015b). However, for the bank to reach its full potential, it has to make some of the changes in these strategies, which will have an impact on the organization’s mission and vision, business operations, structure, and business system, which is the core goal of this part of the report.
Recommendation
One of the major recommendation for the Barclays Bank is to change its operations in the North America in quest of attaining sustainability and remain socially responsible to the society that it operates. This follows the urge of changing its operations when it was described as being staid; thus being forced to rejuvenate its operations (Salz 2013). In conjunction with this fact, the bank has established a culture of ambitious growth, setting high revenue targets, as well as adopting financial incentives, hence undermining the support functions (Salz 2013). As a result, the bank has established a hostile culture to the compliance. This will change both the organizational structure and culture of Barclays Bank, which will facilitate the achievement of its vision and mission statement in the urge of satisfying its customers. As such, there is a demanding need for the cultural changes that will help in addressing this issue. Therefore, the bank need to change its culture in relation to the urge of attaining sustainability and remaining socially responsible.
Following the increased number of complaints, Barclays Banks in North America need to improve their customer services. The first half of 2016 marked a period when Barclays was the most complained bank on its financial services. According to Latterfty (2016), the Barclays Bank complaints rose by 3 percent concerning its financial services. This highlights a demanding urge of improving its customer care services to ensure that potential and existing investors of the bank will be served to their satisfaction. The accomplishment of this recommendation calls for the advancement of technologies and innovation used in the customer services of the bank to enhance the experience of the shareholders. Latterfty (2016) proclaim that one of the moves that can lead to the improved customer service is the introduction of voice security technology, which will make banking more secure and safe.
In several instances, Barclays Bank have been fined several times by the US Doj among other bodies because of failing to abide with the banking policies or by failing to act ethically. One of this instance occurred in 2010 when it was fined $298 million by NY DA’s and US Doj office as well as the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) because of handling $500m in the transfer of money from the US-sanctioned countries from 1995 to 2006 (Salz 2013). Besides, in 2012 it was fined $200 million and $160 million by CFTC and US Doj respectively for the attempts of manipulating LIBOR (Salz 2013). Citing such instances, there is a need for the Barclays Bank to review its policies and ethical considerations guiding its practices. As such, this recommendation calls for the change of these policies and adherence to the external regulators to avoid such fines and improve in its operations. By adhering to these changes, Barclays will also achieve sustainability and perform its duties in a socially responsible manner.
Impact of the proposed recommendation
The implementation of the proposed recommendations will have a direct impact on the operation of Barclays as well as its customers. The move by Barclays Bank to act in a socially responsible and ethically way should be made to enhance the participation of the stakeholders. Being responsible of its actions, Barclays Bank should adjust its operations and policies guiding its actions to enhance the experience of the society it serves. This change should improve the attention given to the ethical practices of the bank in quest of benefiting its society and improving the experience of its customers and stakeholders. Conversely, Barclays should expose its social and ethical ambitions by revisiting the policies guiding its practices to attain CSR. This move will not only improve its operations but also cut down the expenses incurred in fines; thus improving its profit.
Besides, opting to revisit its culture calls for a direct improvement to its operations and processes by implementing processes that will help the bank attain sustainability and make CSR related innovations (Carroll and Shabana, 2010). In addition, the proposed recommendations on the enhancement of the customer service will also help Barclays achieve sustainable and CSR developments (Shen, et al., 2016). Responding to these changes, the bank will be supporting its organizational culture, which is to satisfy its customers who are their key concern. Conversely, making technological-related innovations will have a positive impact on the operations of the banks (Gianiodis, Ettlie, and Urbina, 2014). This will not only help in achieving the vision of the bank but also in facilitating its operations as well as upholding its culture. The operation of Barclays Bank has innovation at its core with the aim of improving the financial needs of its customers.
Impact on business system
A business system refers to the procedure used by a business to deliver its good and services to the customers. As such, the proposed recommendations of the strategic levels of Barclays has a direct impact on the service delivery of its customers. First, improving the customer services by making technological improvements will facilitate the e-banking practices of Barclays. The security mechanisms applied to enhance the safety of such operations will also boost the security used to promote the online payments used across its retail banks (Gianiodis, Ettlie, and Urbina, 2014). This is in line with the urge of high-security mechanisms required to facilitate the virtual payment that customers require to make across the world electronically or using the automated machines.
Implementing the recommendations targeting the revision of the ethical and business operation policies will change the way customers are handled as well as the practices that Barclays deals with. The fines imposed to the Barclays Bank are because of misconduct especially with external transactions (Salz 2013). Revisiting the rules and regulations guiding the banking industry means that Barclays will change the processes and services offered to the external organizations in the attempt of avoiding practices that constitute to unethical practices. Besides, seeking to change the organizational structure and culture to change in its operations will facilitate the attainability of CSR and sustainability (Brown and Knudsen, 2015). These practices will facilitate the operations and practices that the bank gets involved with to improve the services offered to the customers and other stakeholders. This will wholly translate the business operations, policies, and practices that will have a positive impact to the performance of Barclays Bank.
Implementation plan
In the quest of impacting the operations of Barclays Bank in a positive way using the proposed changes, it is important to determine the appropriate implementation plan that will be used to effectively adopt these changes. To effectively avoid customer complaints and improve the customer services, Barclays should carry an in-depth research of the causative reasons for customer dissatisfaction. Under such research, the reasons for the increased complaints from the customers will be best understood; thus facilitating the development of control mechanisms. Improving on technology is one of the effective approaches to solving this problem. Technology improvement means that communication between the customer service and the customers will be improved, which in turn will enlighten the organization on the problems facing their customers and the best ways that customers believe can be used to solve these problems (Gianiodis, Ettlie, and Urbina, 2014). Besides, the attempts of achieving sustainability and CSR, Barclays need to change its policies and lay focus on their stakeholders (Salz 2013). To achieve these changes, the bank should follow the following plan.
To make these changes, the bank should first carry an in-depth research of the existing problems facing the bank in relation to the customer services. This should be accomplished in line with the evaluation of social and ethical practices of the bank. Such evaluation should be made to reveal the trends used by the bank to improve the experience of its customers and stakeholders. The research should reveal the practices of the bank and their impact to the operation and performance of the bank. Once the problems and barriers have been identified, the bank should develop effective control practices that will be used to address the identified barriers. The bank at this instance should identify developments that will help in attaining sustainability within the societies that it operates. The plan at this point should identify the practices that will assist Barclays to remain socially responsible yet improving its practices and establish a competitive advantage. The implementation plan should follow the median timeline as shown in Table 1 below.
Table 1
Implementation Plan
| Activity | Timeframe |
| Research of the existing problems | 6 months |
| Analysis of the problems | 2 months |
| Development of the suitable solutions | 3 months |
| Implementation of the plan | 3 months |
| Monitoring of the identified solutions | 3 months |
| Maintenance | Monthly assessment after implementation |
Bibliography
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Latterfty, C., 2016. Barclays Attracts Most Complaints Among Big Five High Street Banks. [Online] http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-3826878/Barclays-Bank-crowned-complained-financial-services-firm.html [Accessed 10 November 2016]
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