CBA’s Matt Comyn given front-row seat to AI’s next wave

Commonwealth Bank’s Matt Comyn has seen the future with a preview at the highest level of what is coming next on generative AI after spending time at Microsoft’s Redmond headquarters this month at the invitation of the tech giant’s chief executive, Satya Nadella.

It’s early days in how the technology can be used for business, but Comyn sees the “transformational” potential of AI across many areas.

Indeed, thinking more broadly about the technology, he believes it can help solve the problem of sluggish productivity through the economy.

And as a banker, he also sees the risks.

For now, Microsoft has got the edge over its big tech rivals Google, Facebook and even Apple on AI, given Nadella’s early-stage bets on ChatGPT developer OpenAI.

The technology was unleashed just last November but its friendly chat logs have already electrified businesses around the world.

Comyn tells The Australian that, at its basic level, AI technology stands to improve efficiency across the bank, which ultimately means speeding up processes for customers. “I think we’re experimenting in a more advanced way than some others,” Comyn says.

“The team is really energised about how we play a leadership role here. What are the opportunities and the potential of it, but also what are the risks?”

Indeed, in the US he saw the darker side of tech, where it has the potential to mimic voices and images as well as spread misinformation.

CBA is already working with the government around AI implications for business and society.

“That’s the landscape that we’re in at the moment with technology advances,” Comyn says. “It’s quite an uncertain time for some people and they would be concerned. So we will need to be quite thoughtful about it.”

Commonwealth Bank CEO Matt Comyn.

Comyn was speaking to The Australian after his bank’s annual technology showcase. Ever since former chief executive David Murray signed off on a massively expensive (for the time) rebuild of CBA’s core banking business, the former government-owned bank has been able to run rings around rivals.

Through the years, CBA’s executives have rightly called out that banking and technology were moving ever closer together, but importantly kept momentum by investing heavily in this space. This has allowed CBA to lead the way in things such as ultra-fast digital loans; transferring payments through social media; high function apps; and online share trading. It has also won over businesses through smart payments technology at the shop counter.

Headlining the technology showcase was the latest upgrade of the CBA app (version 5). This moves basic CommSec share and ETF trading onto the flagship banking app. The full service CommSec app with 2 million users will continue, but there will be a day when it becomes totally integrated with the retail banking app. Elsewhere, AI is being used under the hood to personalise how customers use their savings – be that for saving for a holiday or for a home. It can use data and trends around personal payments as well as keeping ahead of usual accounts for security.

Meanwhile, business and retail customers will be able to switch between their same account under the single app.

But the show stopper for the showcase was a behind-the-scenes look at how CBA plans to really deploy AI in the first instance. The practical application here is at the call centre level, which is still a big way that customers engage with the bank.

AI has been able to “learn” CBA’s thousands and thousands of pages of policies and procedures and give staff on-the-spot answers to even the most complex customer questions, from home loans to credit cards. Suddenly, every frontline staff member is a specialist; this vastly speeds up response times and ultimately improves customer satisfaction.

The technology isn’t static, it is evolving with the billions of data points the bank has. The software is powered by Silicon Valley-based H20.ai, the tech start-up in which CBA also took a small equity stake two years ago.

“For every large company in the world, I would not underestimate how many different policies and procedures and how much time people spend on search. How much it could make a difference to actually serve up answers with the exact information,” Comyn says.

“Effectively what you’ve got is something that’s able to analyse and let’s just say ‘comprehend’ vast sources of information, coupled with one of the better writers in human history.

“The scope of applications is aimed at helping customers in lots of different ways and making those real time experiences very high-quality.”

Back to the office

Meanwhile the US investor and technology tour helped shape Comyn’s thinking around the return to the office for CBA’s near 50,000 staff. This week he drew a line under the issue and ordered staff to be in the office at least 50 per cent of the time.

Workers still have the flexibility in how they hit the number – two weeks on, two weeks off – just as long as they get there. It follows NAB recently ordering its managers to return to the office full-time.

But as the nation’s biggest bank, CBA’s approach is expected to influence how other big city employers think about staff working in the office.

Comyn says every company in the world is grappling with this since the pandemic and there’s a wide range of views – some staff like being in the office 100 per cent of the time and others don’t but remain productive.

On balance, he believes staff work more effectively during face-to-face meetings in the office while collaboration and innovation improves. His bank has been hovering around the 45 per cent mark earlier this year.

“It’s a difficult issue, and I haven’t met any CEO that feels like they’ve got that balance completely right,” he says.

“And it’s probably a harder issue to deal with because people’s preferences are quite different. If you’re working in a team and you prefer to be in the office, but your manager isn’t, the value of that relationship reduces.”

“We’ve provided that (50 per cent figure) in the interest of being clear and we don’t think that’s unreasonable,” Comyn says.