At the end of October, NatWest Group reported that its efficiency programme had reduced its workforce by approximately 1,000 full-time roles during the third quarter, taking reductions to around 1,400 for the year.
The Edinburgh-headquartered banking group also reported £420 million in cost savings, supported partly by investment in technology, including AI. Meanwhile, its acquisition of Evelyn Partners brought around 2,200 additional employees into the business, and new AI-focused roles are emerging as existing responsibilities change.
It's an interesting illustration of what is happening across financial services. Businesses are investing heavily in technology, reconsidering how work is delivered and making significant decisions about the people they need.
NatWest's chief executive, Paul Thwaite, has spoken about AI benefiting both customers and colleagues, and the opportunities it presents for banking.
There are good reasons for that optimism.
But as more organisations begin to demonstrate operational savings, I'm interested in what those changes mean for the people using their services, and how confidently businesses can establish that the benefits extend beyond their own operations.
Where the benefits are becoming clearer
Financial services provides some compelling examples of AI being put to practical use.
Fraud detection is an obvious one. Analysing large volumes of transactions, identifying suspicious patterns and helping specialists investigate potential fraud can improve both security and response times.
Lloyds Banking Group recently reported that its AI-enabled fraud support platform had assisted specialists with more than 10,600 customer cases over 90 days. Following testing and refinement, the system achieved over 90% overall decision accuracy, while reducing the number of systems employees needed to consult during customer calls.
The specialists remain responsible for the final decisions.
That's an encouraging example of technology improving the information available to employees while potentially making a difficult customer experience more straightforward.
Beyond fraud detection, financial institutions are using AI to support operational processes, improve access to information and develop more responsive services.
The scale of adoption is considerable. The Bank of England and Financial Conduct Authority's survey results, published in October 2026, found that 86% of responding financial services firms were using AI.
Yet the same research provides a useful qualification. Although firms identified operational efficiency, automation and productivity as their greatest current benefits, none of the benefit categories was widely rated as delivering more than moderate value at present.
Adoption is advancing quickly. The evidence of its full commercial impact is still developing.
What happens when the technology gets it wrong?
The FCA's October 2026 paper, AI in financial services: good practice and areas for improvement, makes particularly interesting reading because it examines how firms are managing the technology in practice.
Alongside examples of good implementation, the regulator highlighted several areas of concern:
- Automated customer journeys that made it harder for people to obtain the support they needed.
- Firms placing insufficiently tested confidence in AI's ability to recognise signs of customer vulnerability.
- Businesses overstating what their AI systems could consistently deliver.
- An example of employees becoming less inclined to challenge AI-generated recommendations over time.
These are important findings for any business considering the responsibilities it can safely transfer to technology.
Lloyds' fraud platform demonstrates how AI can be tested and refined, although success in one application offers no guarantee of reliability elsewhere.
When things go wrong, the consequences for customers can outweigh the operational efficiencies achieved, particularly where investment in technology has been accompanied by reductions in workforce capacity and experience.
Are we measuring the right kind of progress?
There's a broader question here that extends well beyond banking.
As consumers, we have access to an enormous range of products, services and information. More choice can be valuable, although it can also make relatively straightforward decisions unnecessarily complicated.
A business might use AI to expand its service offering, introduce additional options or automate more of its customer interactions. Internally, the results could demonstrate impressive productivity improvements.
Whether customers experience those changes as improvements is another matter. I wonder how many organisations are examining that distinction closely enough.
If a business can respond to customers more quickly, does that improve satisfaction when the response fails to resolve the problem?
If it can offer hundreds of personalised options, does that make choosing easier?
There will be different answers across industries and customer groups.
The point is that the technology itself cannot establish what customers value. That understanding has to inform the decisions about where and how it's applied.
The people making the decisions
Working across digital, technology and transformation appointments, I've seen how significantly the expectations placed on senior leaders have changed.
AI is accelerating that change, bringing new possibilities for how organisations operate, serve their customers and structure their teams. But one of the most interesting aspects of digital transformation has always been the relationship between what technology makes possible and what a business genuinely needs it to achieve.
Organisations will undoubtedly need people who understand the technology, can evaluate its potential and know how to implement it responsibly. Specialist expertise will be increasingly important.
But whether we're considering a CEO, Chief Technology Officer, Chief Digital Officer or Chief Marketing Officer, I think there's a more fundamental capability worth examining.
How well does that individual understand the customer?
For a technology leader, that understanding is every bit as important as technical expertise. The decisions they make about platforms, systems, automation and digital infrastructure ultimately influence how people experience the business. A technically successful transformation can still fall short if it makes life more complicated for the customer.
And as the boundaries between technology, operations and commercial strategy become increasingly blurred, I wonder whether we're giving enough consideration to that broader understanding when assessing senior talent.
It's easy to recognise commercial achievements in an executive's career. Revenue growth, margin improvement, successful transformation and operational efficiencies all provide valuable evidence.
I'd also want to understand how those results were achieved and what customers experienced as a consequence.
Has the individual demonstrated the ability to recognise changing customer expectations?
Have they challenged decisions that looked financially attractive but risked undermining the experience of the people the business serves?
How have they balanced short-term efficiencies against longer-term customer relationships?
These questions become particularly relevant when technology can accelerate the implementation of decisions and extend their consequences across large customer populations.
What will businesses value next?
As AI continues to develop, we'll undoubtedly see more evidence of its commercial benefits, alongside a clearer understanding of its limitations and where human involvement remains essential.
For businesses making significant investment and workforce decisions today, the challenge is knowing how to balance those opportunities with the needs of their customers, particularly when the long-term implications are still emerging.
After all, the ability to do more is only commercially valuable if we understand what people actually want more of.
Talk to Denholm
At Denholm, we work with businesses to understand the leadership capabilities their commercial ambitions demand and how best to access them.
If you're reviewing your senior leadership requirements as technology changes your business, we'd welcome the conversation.
Explore our Executive Search services, call us on 03303 359 818 or email connect@denholmassociates.com.
