The DBS case is being taught in HBS’ Master of Business Administration (MBA) programme and its executive education courses by Professor Ranjay Gulati, Paul R. Lawrence MBA Class of 1942 Professor of Business Administration. Gulati was ranked as one of the top ten most cited scholars in Economics and Business over a decade by ISI-Incite. He is also the author of six bestselling books on strategy, organisational effectiveness, and leadership in organisations 1.
Gulati said, “Businesses need to transform themselves in order to compete in today’s fast-changing markets. I was interested in studying how DBS transformed itself successfully, and to find out what they did and how they executed it. Through my numerous conversations with the bank’s executives, what came across very strongly were the digital and purpose-focused elements of the transformation and how these permeated every level of the organisation. The willingness from the leadership to resource the change enabled a building up of the workforce’s innovation ‘muscles’ to create a startup culture – quite a feat for an organisation of 33,000 people.”
DBS CEO Piyush Gupta said “Behaving like a startup meant shifting the bank’s mindset from that of a mature multinational to one that is more nimble, more agile; one which is constantly learning, experimenting and innovating on the fly. To effect this change at scale, we had to teach our people how to use the tools of innovation and provide them with opportunities to apply these tools in an environment where it is safe to take risks. This effective culture shift created through a programme of ‘culture by design’ has been instrumental to our success so far, and will be key as we navigate the disruptions in our industry going ahead.”
The HBS case study was put together over a span of 15 months through a series of interviews between Gulati and DBS’ leadership team. Learn more about the DBS case study at Harvard Business Publishing’s repository here.
Gupta was also interviewed on an episode of Gulati’s newest podcast series “Deep Purpose” in December 2022. The conversation complements the case study and nicely sums up the development stages of the bank, digital transformation, building a technology company, being customer-centric and Gupta’s leadership style. Both the recording and transcript are accessible here.
In 2022, DBS was named “World’s Best Bank” by US-based financial publication Global Finance. This makes it the seventh best bank in the world award it has won in the past five years. DBS was also the only Singapore-headquartered company to be recognised as one of the Top 100 Best Workplaces for Innovators by US-based Fast Company.
Other institutions which have written case studies on DBS include INSEAD, the International Institute for Management Development (IMD), IESE, Singapore Management University and Nanyang Technological University.
1 Ranjay Gulati’s websitehttps://ranjaygulati.com/ and profile page on HBS’ website https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=77265
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About DBSDBS is a leading financial services group in Asia across 19 markets. DBS is known for its global leadership, being recognised as the “World’s Best Bank” thrice by Global Finance since 2018. DBS was also recognised as the “World’s Best Bank” by Euromoney in 2021 for the second time in three years and “Global Bank of the Year” by The Banker in 2021. The bank is at the forefront of leveraging digital technology to shape the future of banking with its recognition as the “World’s Best Digital Bank” by Euromoney in 2021 and the world's “Most Innovative in Digital Banking” by The Banker in the same year. Apart from these accolades, DBS has been accorded the “Safest Bank in Asia” award by Global Finance for 14 consecutive years from 2009 to 2022. Additionally, DBS Bank was ranked among the top 3 on Forbes' list of the World's Best Banks in India for three consecutive years, from 2020 to 2022.
DBS Bank has been present in India for 28 years, opening its first office in Mumbai in 1994. DBS Bank India Limited is the first among the large foreign banks in India to start operating as a wholly-owned, locally incorporated subsidiary of a leading global bank. DBS provides a range of banking services for large, medium, and small enterprises and individual consumers in India. In 2016, DBS launched India's first mobile-only bank, digibank, which now has ~1 million savings accounts. In November 2020, Lakshmi Vilas Bank was merged with DBS Bank India Limited. The bank now has a network of ~530 branches in 19 Indian states.
DBS provides a full range of consumer, SME, and corporate banking services. As a bank born and bred in Asia, DBS understands the intricacies of business in the region's most dynamic markets. DBS is committed to building lasting relationships with customers and positively impacting communities. It established an SGD 50 million foundation to strengthen its corporate social responsibility efforts across Asia by supporting social enterprises: businesses with a double bottom line of profit and social and/or environmental impact. In 2020, DBS introduced the "Towards Zero Food Waste" initiative as part of a global sustainability practice to encourage a shift in behaviours and mindsets to reduce food waste. In 2022, DBS committed an additional SGD 100 million to deepen the ability to create an impact beyond banking, catalysing the bank's various philanthropic and crisis relief measures.
With its extensive network of operations in Asia and emphasis on engaging and empowering its staff, DBS presents exciting career opportunities. The bank acknowledges the passion, commitment, and can-do spirit of our 30,000+ staff representing over 40 nationalities. For more information, please visit: visit: www.dbs.com/India.
About Harvard Business School Founded in 1908 as part of Harvard University, Harvard Business School is located on a 40-acre campus in Boston. Its faculty of more than 200 offers full-time programmes leading to the MBA and doctoral degrees, as well as more than 70 open enrolment Executive Education programs and 55 custom programmes, and Harvard Business School Online, the School’s digital learning platform. For more than a century, HBS faculty have drawn on their research, their experience in working with organisations worldwide, and their passion for teaching to educate leaders who make a difference in the world, shaping the practice of business and entrepreneurship around the globe.
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