Chief Digital Officer at JS Bank
With a career rooted in rethinking banking, Waqas Anis, the Chief Digital Officer at JS Bank, speaks to Synergyzer about building purposeful digital solutions, driving financial inclusion through policy ideas, and why true innovation starts, not with tech, but with what makes customers feel seen.
Synergyzer: As you have worked across major banks and tech platforms. Can you share how your journey in digital finance began, and what inspired you to specialise in this evolving field?
Waqas Anis: I was always a digital enthusiast. Playing with computer-based gadgets and developing logic tables, which are a cornerstone for programming. If you notice, digital and digitisation has long been described as the ‘future’. That being the future was my inspiration. I have always wanted to innovate, create, and be part of something in touch with the future, rather than mundane processing. It turned out that it was the right place for me to land when I began my career in banking.
Synergyzer: With a small percentage of Pakistan’s population currently banked. What practical strategies would you recommend to expand financial inclusion rapidly across the country?
Waqas Anis: Financial inclusion is primarily a government responsibility. And by government, I do not just mean the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), as their mandate is not state-level policy making. But the government or the state needs to take this seriously for the sake of economic development. They need to launch serious efforts.
In my opinion, this has to be the carrot-and-stick approach. For instance, all students across the country must have a banking account or wallet by law. Admission fees for any certificate exam must be accepted online only, submitted by the students themselves. Another strategy could be to incentivise merchants and businesses via tax relief. For example, B2B payments are made using banking channels. Another could be to make payment receipts mandatory for vehicles transfer and registraions. Policymakers must realise that a primary prerequisite to economic development is financial inclusion.
Synergyzer: What’s one digital product or service you launched at JS Bank that you’re particularly proud of, and why does it stand out to you?
Waqas Anis: This is a very tough question. As there have been so many we have launched, and each of them, true to its purpose in terms of value to customers and the effect it has had on their lives. But to answer with a specific one. I would say addressing the long-standing requirement of JS Bank to enable branches to open accounts completely digitally and paperless. We call this specific service Blink on Branch or BOB.
It has truly been a transformative and has helped us achieve various goals. This is one way the organisation has committed to care for the environment – via going completely paperless in the account opening journey. Accounts are now opened very quickly, with near-zero discrepancies, and are entirely secure in terms of data management. I see its advantages at the bank every day, and it makes us very proud.
Synergyzer: With trust in online payment systems becoming increasingly important and AI on the rise. How do you see AI transforming the user experience in digital banking and e-commerce in Pakistan?
Waqas Anis: Pakistan is and will always be at the forefront of anything innovative. We tend to leapfrog to other regions when it comes to tech adoption. AI is no different. AI will start from the front end–user experiences, offers quicker transactions in digital banking, and will rapidly move towards the back-end processing.
Its ability to literally read the customer’s mind will be a valuable asset for banks to utilise and thereby generate exponential growth in digital usage via swifter, more accurate, and more relevant services. Imagine an experience where a customer is offered the exact product or service he or she needs today, but did not need yesterday. That is what AI is for, with all the wheels churning in the back.
Synergyzer: For young people exploring saving or investing options, what kind of digital products or platforms should banks be developing to meet their expectations?
Waqas Anis: Saving and investments are key areas for young people to explore. And these happen to be the exact services where banks have largely been unable to digitise. Offering these to young customers will have the two-pronged advantage of enhancing their stakes in banking and increasing the low business volume we have in terms of lending and investment. As a nation, we absolutely need to grasp the concept and build a culture of investment, much more than spending or saving, and there is no better target audience for that than the youth.
Synergyzer: How did your team at JS Bank come up with ideas that truly clicked with customers? Was it data, gut feeling, or a mix of both?
Waqas Anis: Behind every idea we build on at JS Bank Digital is the need of the customer. What is it that would make the customer joyous, what would make their day, would it create that ‘wow’ effect? We worked on ‘what’ without thinking of ‘how’. What people need to understand is that the ‘how’ must come much later into creative thinking and its underlying processes. ‘How’ is always the enemy of ‘what’. Of course, you need to have an eye on the tech capability, on regulatory compliance, on the data you have or can gather. But everything here is built around customer centricity with complete empowerment.
