R I S Sidhu, General Manager — IT, Punjab National Bank

R I S Sidhu has 36 years of experience in the banking sector, having worked
in various capacities. He is presently nominated for various reputed banking
committees and has several IT achievements to his credit.

What role is IT playing in the growth of your organization?

IT is no longer an enabler, it is an integral part of the business and the
IT strategies are aligned with the business strategies. Today, business needs
are met by IT power.

What are some unique challenges that the Banking sector is facing today
that IT can resolve?

The dynamics of the market is changing very rapidly and it can be matched
only by IT. The customer satisfaction with quick and dependable delivery of the
products is the need of the hour and it can be met only through IT. Another
issue is regulatory compliance that IT can ably address.

How difficult is to manage a huge but distributed setup like yours? How
does IT help in this?

Earlier, the time taken to convey the decisions and directions to all the
branches spread across the country was a challenge. The data/information
gathering from each of the location and consolidation could not be completed in
time.

R I S Sidhu, General Manager — IT, Punjab National Bank

Geographically spread setup like ours can be brought into close group with
the networking. With the south ward movement of bandwidth charges, it is no
longer an issue to connect the remotest branch of ours with multiple solutions
like VSAT, Radio frequency etc. The enterprise management
solution, which we have recently deployed, plays a pivotal role in achieving the
same. The speed and the ease of telecommunication coupled with automated
solutions have brought down the time lag considerably.

What are the expectations from an IT head in an organization like yours?

- Adopting the technically robust, commercially viable and economically
feasible products which will give a competitive advantage.

- Product forecast and anticipating customers' future needs and adopting
appropriate technology.

- Product innovation, service innovation and process innovation.

- Avoiding the project over run (both in terms of cost and time).

What is the importance that IT gets in your organization, vis-a-vis
other departments?

The issue can not be viewed in comparison, since every arm of the Bank is
important and has a great role to play for the growth. In fact IT is the binding
force by meeting all the requirements and accelerating the growth.