Human-centred artificial intelligence in the banking sector

Changes in technology have shaped how corporate and retail businesses have evolved, alongside the customers’ preferences. The advent of smart digital devices and social media has shaped how consumers interact and transact with their financial institutions over the past two decades. With the rapid evolution of new technologies and customers’ growing preference for digital engagement with financial institutions, organisations need to adopt and align with emerging technologies that support speed, accuracy, efficiency and security in a user-friendly manner. Today, consumers want hyper-personalised interactions that are more frequent and proactive. Moreover, financial institutions have a growing need to cater to consumers’ new demands. Financial institutions, such as banks, continuously adapt to the latest technologies to keep pace with evolving customer behaviours, needs and experiences. One such emerging technology is artificial intelligence (AI). Many organisations realise the potential of AI. A human-centred AI system, however, must be capable of understanding human characteristics and making decisions like humans. This paper aims to help banks understand the importance of deriving and processing customer emotions from the unstructured data captured from various omnichannels to develop full-fledged human-centred AI-enabled products and services, with emphasis on practising a co-development mindset between the important stakeholders (banks, IT vendors and focus groups). In addition, the paper proposes a framework for banks to adopt and stay competent on the digital transformation journey.