Effective team management is critical for performance and service quality in the financial sector. With the rapid pace of digital transformation, stringent regulatory requirements, and increasing pressure for a customer-centric approach, teams in this sector face unique challenges. Adaptability, skill development, and alignment with the organization’s strategic goals are essential for maintaining robust and resilient operations. These demands require a management approach that extends beyond traditional processes, integrating leadership practices that foster agility and continuous improvement. This article explores best practices and key steps for transforming team management in the financial sector.

The importance of effective team management in the financial sector

In banking and insurance, effective team management is crucial for maintaining consistent, regulatory-compliant operations while driving innovation to meet evolving market demands. Well-structured team management enables quick adaptation to change, greater operational efficiency, and a work environment that fosters continuous development.

Challenges of team management in the financial sector

Team management in the financial sector comes with its own set of challenges. With the constant pace of technological advancement, teams must adapt to rapid changes, requiring ongoing adjustments to new tools and digital processes. Additionally, the sector’s stringent regulatory environment adds further pressure, demanding compliance across all operations and processes.

Another key challenge is retaining and developing talent, especially in roles that demand a combination of technical expertise and essential soft skills. In this industry, stress from risk management, data security, and regulatory compliance can significantly impact employee motivation and productivity. Balancing innovation with regulatory adherence without compromising efficiency is a demanding but essential task for maintaining effective operations.

Benefits of optimized team management

Optimized team management provides numerous benefits for both organizations and employees:

1. Improved internal alignment: Organizations can achieve better strategic and operational alignment across departments by cascading key performance indicators and implementing a bottom-up communication and monitoring system.
2. Enhanced operational efficiency and quality: Optimized management practices focused on continuous improvement enable teams to identify inefficiencies and implement ongoing enhancements, reducing costs while increasing productivity and quality.
3. Reduced variability in processes and outcomes: Establishing standards, coupled with training and regular verification—with swift corrective actions for any deviations—ensures consistency and predictability in processes and outcomes, fostering stronger and more reliable operations.
4. Personal and professional development: A structured focus on training and skill development offers employees growth opportunities, fostering a more motivated and productive work environment.
5. Talent engagement and retention: A management approach that values employee well-being and development helps boost engagement, reduce turnover, and strengthen organizational culture.
6. Agility and adaptability: Well-managed teams are more resilient and agile, capable of responding quickly to market changes and emerging trends, keeping the organization competitive and innovative.
7. Sustainable results and a culture of continuous improvement: Structured team management ensures the achievement and sustainability of transformative results over time, making teams more autonomous and committed to collective success year after year.

Fundamental steps to improve team management in the financial sector

Transforming team management requires a structured approach that fosters continuous improvement, efficiency, and adaptability. These critical steps provide a roadmap for implementing practices that strengthen management and cultivate a collaborative and productive work environment. From planning and standardizing operations to problem-solving, each step helps ensure that teams remain aligned with the organization’s strategic and operational objectives, addressing challenges with resilience and effectiveness.

Figure 1 – Team Management Improvement Model: Daily Kaizen

Daily Kaizen Planning

Daily Kaizen planning is crucial for preparing the organization to implement the subsequent steps. The first step involves understanding the natural teams within the organization. Ideally, teams should be structured around the value stream. This ensures that teams focus on the real impact of each activity on the customer and the business, fostering customer-oriented management while effectively reducing waste.

Next, a structured cascade of meetings should be implemented to ensure seamless and aligned communication across all organizational levels, from the Gemba (the frontline where work occurs) to top management. This structure ensures that problems are quickly identified and solutions are discussed and implemented in a coordinated manner. When the team lacks the autonomy to resolve an issue, it should escalate the matter to the next level.

Another aspect to analyze is whether there is an appropriate span of control, which is a balanced ratio between supervisors and team members. This balance is critical to ensure leaders can dedicate time and attention to guiding and developing their teams.

All teams, from top management to operational units, should participate in planning and executing Daily Kaizen. This planning phase provides a solid foundation for successfully implementing subsequent steps.

Daily Management

Daily management is essential in the financial sector to ensure that team operations align with planning and that performance goals are consistently met. This process incorporates rigorous management practices to promote transparency and align teams with the organization’s strategic objectives.

Visual boards in the workplace are powerful tools for monitoring and communicating team performance. These boards display performance indicators, goals, action plans, and updates on activity progress. The indicators clearly show daily results, while the action plans outline specific steps to improve or address problems. Visual boards thus promote transparency and enable real-time information sharing among all team members.

Regular meetings are equally critical to keeping the team informed and engaged. Daily or weekly meetings allow leaders and team members to review progress, discuss challenges, and align priorities. Beyond encouraging open communication, these meetings foster shared accountability and help identify opportunities for continuous improvement. This collaborative environment encourages everyone to contribute to problem-solving and refine activities.

Daily management creates a more transparent, agile, and results-oriented operation. These elements are vital for maintaining high performance and fostering a culture of continuous improvement in the financial sector.

Workplace organization

Effective workplace organization is vital to maximizing efficiency and minimizing waste in daily operations—particularly in the financial sector, where compliance and process flow are critical. This includes optimizing leaders’ time allocation across different types of activities.

Applying the 5S methodology (physical and virtual) is a valuable tool for workplace organization. The 5S framework consists of five steps: Seiri (Sort), Seiton (Straighten), Seiso (Scrub), Seiketsu (Standardize), and Shitsuke (Sustain). This approach promotes a clean and organized workspace, whether physical or digital, ensuring that employees can quickly access what they need without interruptions. In virtual environments, 5S helps maintain logical and easily accessible structures for documents and systems, reducing time spent searching for information.

The WILO (Week in the Life of) exercise is another effective practice that allows leaders to observe and reflect on their typical week. This helps identify opportunities to reorganize time and activities for more effective management. Leaders can optimize time allocation by planning their week and defining Standard Work based on priorities and the value added by each task.

By organizing the workspace and implementing Standard Work for leaders, organizations improve efficiency, minimize waste, and foster an environment that promotes sustained productivity and compliance.

Standardization and training

Standardization and training are fundamental for ensuring consistency and quality in operations—especially in the financial sector, where compliance is critical. These processes ensure that employees adhere to consistent practices and align procedures with organizational goals, minimizing variability and promoting stable, efficient performance.

Standardization (SDCA)—Standardize, Do, Check, Act—is a cycle designed to stabilize processes and ensure activities adhere to a standard that can be continuously improved when opportunities arise. Standards should be simple, visual, and accessible. Standardization provides a solid foundation for continuous improvement by reducing deviations and maintaining consistency.

Ensuring adherence becomes essential after processes are standardized and employees are trained in the new standards. Gemba Walks with process confirmation is a practice that allows leaders at all organizational levels to observe operations directly at the Gemba. During these walks, leaders use Kamishibai cards, a visual checklist to confirm compliance with standards. This verification method reinforces the commitment to standardization and enables leaders to identify deviations, offering improvement opportunities and immediate feedback quickly. By involving leaders in this process, organizations emphasize the importance of standardization and quality in task execution while keeping leaders connected to the Gemba.

The combination of standardization, training, and Gemba Walks fosters a culture of accountability and continuous improvement. This approach reduces variability and enhances operational quality by engaging everyone in the process.

Structured problem-solving

Structured problem-solving is a systematic approach to identifying and resolving issues, driving continuous process improvements, and enhancing outcomes. During daily meetings, problems are identified, and priorities are set for in-depth analysis for those too complex to resolve immediately. Specific problem-solving meetings focus on designing and implementing solutions.

To ensure effective resolution, it is crucial to use structured tools and methodologies such as Kobetsu Kaizen and 3C (Case, Cause, Countermeasure). Kobetsu Kaizen focuses on specific process improvements following a nine-step approach. At the same time, 3C is often applied to more straightforward problems, structuring the resolution by identifying the issue, determining the root cause, and defining countermeasures. These tools enable teams to address the problems at their source, preventing recurrence and driving sustainable solutions.

Structured problem-solving promotes a culture of continuous improvement in the financial sector, creating an environment where teams are empowered to autonomously and effectively identify, analyze, and resolve issues.

Process for implementing team management improvement

Adopting a well-structured process to improve team management in organizations with hundreds or even thousands of employees is essential, as is often the case with financial institutions. The Team Development Program (TDP) provides an efficient framework for implementing these methodologies:

1. Pilot workshop: The first step involves selecting a pilot group of up to 10 team leaders to launch the TDP. During the workshop, participants receive training on a specific Daily Kaizen topic and implement the approach within a pilot team.
2. Creation of the deployment manual: Based on the results of the pilot, a training manual is developed to establish the standards that will guide the program for the remaining teams. Coaching standards and the audit process are also defined to ensure leaders receive the necessary support throughout implementation.
3. Leader training: This step consists of a workshop designed to prepare leaders for implementing the selected Daily Kaizen topic with their teams. During the training, consensus is also reached on the implementation plan, aligning leaders with the program’s objectives and timelines.
4. Implementation with coaching: Leaders begin applying the behaviors and practices developed during the training within their natural teams, supported by frequent consultant coaching sessions.
5. Auditing and leveling: Finally, audits are conducted to assess the maturity level of each team in implementing continuous improvement practices. A leveling and best-practice-sharing workshop is also held to ensure all teams reach a consistent level of implementation.

Figure 2 – Team Development Program

This structured process, divided into five stages, is repeated for each Daily Kaizen topic, offering a systematic approach to optimizing team management. One of its main advantages is its adaptability to organizations of varying sizes. Additionally, it assigns responsibility to the natural team leaders, who drive the process with the necessary support. This dynamic strengthens leadership, promotes autonomy, and ensures that improvements are sustainable over time.

The future of team management in the financial sector

The future of team management in the financial sector revolves around building more flexible work structures with autonomous teams and leaders who act as coaches, driving the continuous improvement of their processes. Investing in structured methodologies for team management and development ensures more effective operations. It equips the financial sector to thrive in a future where adaptability and change management are critical drivers of success. This management model, grounded in continuous improvement practices, positions organizations to respond swiftly to market demands and prosper in an ever-changing environment.

Still have some questions about improving team management in the financial sector?

What is a Gemba Walk?

A Gemba Walk is a practice in which leaders—ranging from top management to frontline supervisors—visit the “Gemba,” the place where work is actually performed. This could mean a branch, a customer service area, or an operations center in the financial sector. The goal is to observe processes directly, ensure compliance with established standards, and identify opportunities for improvement. During a Gemba Walk, leaders can interact with employees, clarify doubts, provide immediate feedback, and confirm that processes are being followed as defined. This practice fosters continuous improvement and demonstrates leadership’s commitment to quality and operational efficiency.

What Is the difference between the SDCA and PDCA cycles?

In the context of continuous improvement, the SDCA (Standardize-Do-Check-Act) and PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act) cycles play complementary roles.

• SDCA (Standardize-Do-Check-Act): This cycle focuses on stabilizing existing processes. It begins with standardization (Standardize), where best practices are documented as standards. The work is then carried out (Do) according to these standards, followed by verification (Check) to ensure results meet expectations. If necessary, actions (Act) are taken to correct any deviations. SDCA is particularly useful for maintaining consistency and compliance.
• PDCA (Plan-Do-Check-Act): This cycle is aimed at driving improvement. It starts with planning (Plan) a change or improvement, implementing it (Do), and then verifying (Check) the results to assess the effectiveness of the change. Finally, actions (Act) are taken to correct deviations if needed. PDCA is ideal for implementing improvements and adapting processes to changing conditions.

While SDCA focuses on maintaining stability, PDCA emphasizes improvement and adaptability. These cycles are used alternately to ensure both consistency and progress.

What are the steps of Kobetsu Kaizen?

Kobetsu Kaizen is a continuous improvement methodology focused on resolving specific process issues. This structured approach ensures problems are analyzed and resolved effectively and sustainably by following these steps:

1. Problem identification: The team identifies a specific issue affecting process performance or quality.
2. Root cause analysis: Tools such as the cause-and-effect diagram or the “5 Whys” method are used to identify the root cause of the problem. This step ensures solutions address the source of the issue rather than treating symptoms.
3. Definition of countermeasures: The team develops specific actions to eliminate or mitigate the identified root cause.
4. Implementation of countermeasures: The countermeasures are systematically implemented, and the process is adjusted to integrate the improvements.
5. Verification of results: The team evaluates whether the applied countermeasures effectively resolved the issue, monitoring performance indicators to confirm the improvement.
6. Standardization of the solution: If the countermeasures prove successful, the new process is standardized to prevent the recurrence of the problem. This step includes training employees to ensure adherence.
7. Evaluation and continuous improvement: Finally, the process is periodically reviewed to validate the sustainability of results and identify new improvement opportunities.