Fidelity Bank Eyes Tier I, Lists 7 Strategic Goals

Fidelity Bank Plc., Nigeria’s leading tier-II bank, on Sunday announced seven strategic goals aimed at ensuring the bank continues to satisfy its growing customers, both Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and Multinational Corporations (MNCs), and eventually, attain tier I status by 2025.

Mrs. Nneka Onyeali-Ikpe, Chief Executive Officer and the Managing Director of Fidelity Bank Plc, disclosed this during a media parley held on Sunday in Ikoyi, Lagos.

The bank boss listed the following seven strategic goals:

• Innovation
• Workforce Transformation
• Digital Transformation
• Brand Refresh
• Service Excellence
• Performance Discipline and
• Accelerated Growth

Mrs. Nneka Onyeali-Ikpe explained that COVID-19 disruption has alerted businesses to the significance of innovation and compel them to innovate or die.

Therefore, the financial institution plans to integrate new ideas that will help reduce cost, increase competitiveness, improve brand recognition and value, build new partnerships and relationships, drive turnover, and increase profitability.

She said in order to create a future readily supported by a high-performing and empowered workforce, workforce transformation is imperative.

The CEO said “We are embarking on brand refresh with the aim to increase top-of-mind awareness of the Fidelity brand by external and internal stakeholders. Workforce transformation to create a future readily supported by a high performing and empowered workforce.

“This will be achieved by deepening the skills and competencies of staff across the bank, entrenching a culture of high performance, and embedding new ways of working in the bank. Similarly, our service excellence is intended to build brand loyalty through personalised and seamless customer experience delivery. This is already underway with the award-winning virtual assistant IVY.”

On digital transformation, she stressed Fidelity Bank’s commitment to driving end-to-end digitization across key business areas.

Speaking on the bank’s plan to join tier-I rank, the tier II but tier I operating bank that presently processed 60 percent of all the Bureau De Change forex transactions estimated at N1.4 trillion per year, explained that the bank will continue to streamline banking processes, support importers, exporters, small businesses, etc across the country to ensure a broad-based growth and to further deepen its presence nationwide as people’s bank.

Onyeali-Ikpe said the bank initially planned to join tier-I rank in 2023 but COVID-19 that disrupted 2020 operations forced the bank to shift that plan to 2025.

She, however, said despite the disruption, the bank grew profit after tax by 63.7 percent from N5.859 billion in the first quarter of 2020 to N9.590 billion in the first quarter of 2021.

The boss lady said the bank is on track to do a similar number in the second quarter.