People-led change: why employee engagement is key to transformation

Bringing people on the journey

To bring people along on the transformation journey, engagement is critical. Ops team members need to feel valued and have skin in the game if they are going to work toward the same goal. Brinsley’s approach to building that engagement was multi-pronged.

First, he emphasized how critical it was to interface with people on the ground to understand their day-to-day processes and their pain points. Second, it was important to underscore their value to the business and the vital individual role they play in delivering exceptional customer service – even if their role is hidden from the customers’ view.

Brinsley likened this to the work that goes on behind the scenes to fly a plane. If the person who operates the boarding staircase doesn’t show up for work, then nobody can get on the plane. Likewise, if ops team members don’t come to work, processes get disrupted and the customer is going to feel it through slower service.

Third, he believed it was essential to invite ops teams in on the big transformation conversations. Brinsley explained how he roadshowed the data underpinning the change they were trying to achieve. In this specific case, it was about understanding the cost per minute of the underlying ops work and the collective goal of reducing that cost, which Brinsley coined “attacking the minutes”.

Finally, the easiest way to keep everyone focused on the transformation journey was to ensure they had a direct stake in success, in this case through their bonus structure. Brinsley made this practical by linking rewards to the bank hitting its targets, including managing costs effectively. If performance slipped, the bonus pool diluted and the impact was felt personally. It created clear accountability for outcomes.

Cross-skilling workers

While automation was one way of reducing the cost per minute of doing the work, team members also recognized it could be supported by better load balancing and moving resources across functions. Brinsley helped achieve this by creating a centralized ops department to avoid any HR issues that would delay switching staff between functions, ensuring resources could be shared seamlessly in real time.

This also had the effect of reducing fears around automation because workers realized they could future-proof themselves by learning new skillsets and broadening their career prospects, improving job satisfaction and employee wellbeing (as emphasized by declining sick leave rates).

Lessons for ops leaders

One of the biggest takeaways from my discussion with Brinsley was how important it is for leaders to engage their teams in the big conversations and ensure they are part of the solution to any change program.

For Brinsley, trusting his team members was fundamental. If you put that trust in them and you can properly articulate what you are doing and why, then the majority of the time they will deliver for you.

Ultimately, bringing employees along on the journey by empowering them to innovate on process automation, and incentivizing them to stay on track meant everyone was aligned. That is the key to delivering true transformation. When teams understand the why, feel trusted, and are empowered to shape the solution, change accelerates.

If you want to hear more about Brinsley’s story and how his leadership approach has accelerated transformation at Nedbank, you can watch the full Ops Game Changers podcast below. All Ops Game Changers episodes are available here and on your favorite podcast platforms.