It's never a dull week for Yvonne Foo, ANZ Country Head Thailand. From cruising the Sunday markets in an e-Tuktuk, to meeting with one of the world's largest sugar producers, to navigating the dynamic landscape of one of Asia's fastest growing economies - it's all in a week's work. But what goes on in between? Take a look at a week in the life of Yvonne. Read more on the ANZ Newsroom
You may remember 1975 as the year Stephen Spielberg's ‘Jaws’ premiered, but it was also the year Helen Loucaides began her career at ANZ. From starting in the branch network, to working at the contact centre, Helen has seen an incredible amount of change. What hasn't changed, however, is her love of our customers. Now retiring after 50 years at the bank – a quarter of ANZ’s history! - Helen remarks that her passion for customer service has been the most enjoyable part of all her roles.
A significant driver of employee retention is a belief by workers that they will have opportunities to grow and develop new skills. One innovative approach to addressing this issue is the concept of job swapping, where two employees with different yet comparable roles exchange responsibilities for a period of time. For ANZ’s Ian Cruttenden and Chris Oosthuizen this initiative was self-led and turned out to be a career highlight. “The swap occurred somewhat unofficially, and after the initial discussion and some conversations with our managers about the agreed details, they endorsed it. The change was driven by us” recalls Ian. “I was able to add so much more to my ‘toolkit’ as a leader by collaborating with such a different team. I was able to understand so much more about how ‘the business’ works, helping me think about the customer with every decision we made. But the biggest thing I learnt was that people love to help. A supportive team will make or break what you get out of an opportunity, and that cuts both ways.”
ANZ has been named Most Innovative Company – Large Organisation by the Australian Financial Review as part of its annual Most Innovative Company List. Our Institutional Transaction Banking (TB) team has taken user-centred design to the next level by co-creating new technologies with customers and ANZ team members – and been recognised for this approach as a leader in innovation among our peers. “As part of TB’s innovation process, customers are invited to participate in immersion sessions to research and develop new trends and initiatives,” says Hari Janakiraman, Head of Innovation and Industry for TB. “We don’t innovate in isolation and then take something to our customers,” he says. The team identifies and responds to global trends and technologies that are disrupting the financial services market and the areas in which our customers operate, to forecast future trends. “We help our customers to not just identify a problem, but also be involved in providing and creating a solution,” Hari says.
