Back to face-to-face events – what a treat!
At short notice, I stood in for a colleague who was due to be fronting our Exhibition Space at the recent Global RegTech event. It was the Worksmart teams first face to face event in the City after more than 20 months, and that wasn’t an opportunity that we were going to waste.
I was interested to see how the event itself would play out. Would people engage? Would people even turn up? It was a hybrid event after all, and as we have all got a bit used to watching conferences in our pyjamas, I wondered whether the exhibitors and speakers would be spending the day speaking to each other. The Global RegTech team had predicted a strong turn out and I for one was ready to talk!
What a fantastic day we had. From the moment we arrived, there were a steady stream of people arriving from around 8.15am and by the time I entered the first session at 9.00, there was a good atmosphere developing, with lots of interaction between delegates, speakers and the Global RegTech team.
I was really struck by the first session which was chaired by Peter Hahn of the London Institute of Banking & Finance, and had representation from the Bank of England, in the form of Angus Muir and several industry players. The session considered the issues at the top of the agenda for Compliance teams, and it was interesting to see that Culture, Diversity & Inclusivity and how firms might approach this/are approaching this, was front and centre. A topic close to our heart was discussed and that was how firms underestimate how RegTech can support positive culture within firms.
We regularly share the sort of comments we get from firms during our project implementations for RegTech and I think the time is right for Senior Leaders to consider more carefully the role that RegTech can and does play supporting positive cultures within firms.
A number of interesting stats were shared during the talk and the one that caught my attention was that Peter Hahn noted that he had read a recent survey that showed a review of the validity and accuracy of excel for data reporting was poor and in a detailed assessment, one study showed that 94% of spreadsheets used for managing and tracking data have errors in them, so excel might be useful, but not appropriate.
In 2021, we still have some of the larger Financial Organisations approach us as they need to replace their excel spreadsheet that manages Training & Competence, or SM&CR Regime or Complaints Management for hundreds if not thousands of transactions per year.
When will firms wake up to the fact that this type of approach is driving risk within their organisation with poor processes bogging down the business and invariably its employee’s. I find it interesting that organisations say RegTech = £££ deduction from the firm’s bottom line, when in fact my experience is exactly the opposite! But only when you implement RegTech to ensure that you DON’T tick boxes, and when you really want regulatory conformance, but equally matched with operational efficiencies and gains.
If you think about the comments, you will have seen above which reflect the experiences our clients have portrayed on deploying products from our range, you can see that the underlying message across the piece is that RegTech is a positive cultural influencer let alone being a no-brainer for all the reasons mentioned earlier.
Don’t forget your RegTech (or lack of it) tells your regulator(s) something about your firm, so how might you make sure that in your case it is in the affirmative?
The team here at Worksmart were building RegTech back in the 1990’s before RegTech was even a thing! So, please reach out to us and start the conversation about how our products can add value to your organisation.
Compatible with firm’s in house systems and processes and designed with FCA regulations in mind, you can feel at ease knowing that our solutions will make regulatory compliance easier and save you time in a multitude of areas.
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Call us on +44 1908 613 613 or email info@worksmart.co.uk and see how our solutions can help you.