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As a PMO for a Global Private Bank, I have had the opportunity to take an in-depth look at how the bank operated and the challenges it encountered. What is striking is that most global banks, if not all, face, or have faced at one point, the same issues (e.g., reporting, resource management, issues and risks tracking, etc.) A particularly interesting challenge resides in the global aspect of collaboration which breaks down into a multitude of added difficulties teams and organisations must consider and mitigate. This is not specific to a PMO role, nor is it to banks, yet as common as it is the efforts made to overcome these challenges are often lacking.

As it would be impossible to detail all the challenges a global bank could meet in a single article, I have decided to focus on how the global characteristics of a bank exacerbate two of them: (mis)communication and planning.

Miscommunication can often go unnoticed and be difficult to address. However, its consequences grow exponentially and can be disastrous for the business. It can be due to linguistic or cultural reasons, oftentimes combined. English may be the business language of a bank, but with offices across the world, it is not necessarily the preferred day-to-day language for all teams. In a global bank, the level of fluency of the employees will inevitably vary from region to region and individual to individual. Similarly, cultural expectations and understanding will be different too (even between native speakers of the same language from different countries). For example, the idea of a flat hierarchy and bottom-up innovation, which is common in Scandinavia, would lead to resistance and be perceived negatively in other regions. These differences can create friction and frustration on both sides of a discussion. Ultimately, miscommunication results in a lack of efficiency, potentially costly mistakes, poor reporting, lack of transparency, loss of knowledge, and negative feelings. In case of a communication breakdown, relationships between teams can deteriorate extremely fast until it leads to mutual avoidance and an absence of collaboration.

There are a few things one can keep in mind to improve their communication skills while interacting with foreign teams. English’s status as a lingua franca has been established, but one should never expect perfect fluency from others. Avoiding cultural references (e.g., humour, figure of speech...) and ambiguous wording tends to bring better results even if it may feel cold to a native speaker. Providing clear examples of a request or offering to walk the teams through a process is also more likely to lead to a satisfactory result than assuming an email or vocal instruction was clear. Miscommunication cannot be avoided entirely but being mindful of one’s interlocutor’s cultural and linguistic background allows to minimise its impact. Therefore, it is essential to learn about others, their expectations and experiences with an open mind.

Planning, scheduling, and working with remote teams in a global bank can be tricky. When teams are spread across the world several difficulties linked to that physical distance arise. First, it is extremely difficult for the teams to meet face to face (time, cost, justification). While the pandemic has proven that banks can operate with most of their employees working remotely, face-to-face interactions tend to be more efficient for team building, problem-solving, and knowledge sharing. Technical issues while working remotely hamper efficient teamwork as we have all unfortunately experienced (poor internet connection, microphone quality, unresponsive applications, etc.). Second, time zones make collaboration and deadlines more stressful and difficult for non-central teams. Deadlines in centralised banks are often set and managed by one central team, based on their time zone, which can penalise other regions by giving them less time to prepare. Collaborating is also made difficult by the limited bandwidth available, collaboration between the US and Europe or Europe and Asia can only happen for a limited number of hours every day. The larger the time difference the more complicated organising a meeting is, as we should not forget that project teams usually attend their daily stand-ups and other catch-up meetings in the morning. When less than half of the workday is available for collaboration, meetings cannot be as spontaneous, problems can stretch, email chains get longer, and some tension can build up unnecessarily. In the case of a US-Asia collaboration, the teams will have to re-adjust their work hours to schedule a meeting, if one team constantly starts early or finishes late it can breed resentment and said team may decide to avoid collaboration and interactions even if detrimental to their activities. Finally, there is an additional factor which stresses the collaboration, with different regions and countries, different bank holidays and favourite block leave periods are to be expected. When all teams work on a common schedule managed by a centralised team it is easy for these to be overlooked and for the teams in other regions to face impossible deadlines or a lack of support due to a reduced workforce.

Working with teams across the world can be a headache, but we have tools to make it easier. Whether it is having a common bank calendar listing the public holidays for all regions, working hours set up in personal calendars, or availability options displayed when scheduling meetings, technology is an asset. The experience can also be improved by limiting the number of centralised processes and teams, by enabling each region to operate more independently, hence limiting bottlenecks around time-sensitive activities and overall dependency on a single team. For the elements which cannot be decentralised, each deadline should be set consciously and carefully, considering the responsibilities and availability of all the teams and regions involved. It is easy to overlook this aspect when setting deadlines at a bank level, as we operate mainly in our own time zones, which is why open communication and feedback from all parties involved need to be encouraged and valued. To avoid planning and collaboration failures banks should put the emphasis on purposeful and efficient communication. It is worth mentioning that failures in that case are not one-sided, all parties have the responsibility to highlight risks or issues and to listen to others’ feedback.

If tools and communication strategies can improve global collaboration, the most important element is empathy. By taking the time to put ourselves in the shoes of our interlocutors we can act in a more caring and positive manner. For example, while scheduling a meeting with an overseas team it is important to verify the local time. Does it fit in their work hours? Is it a bank holiday in their country? Are they content with the existing arrangement? Finally, for all communications and collaborations, the essential is to remember the human aspect as distance and virtualisation dehumanise our day-to-day if we are not careful.