What organizational models support digital delivery?

Most financial institutions have tried to change how they build digital products: agile training, new roles, squads and tribes. Many found that the names changed and the speed did not. The difference usually lies in how ownership, funding and decision rights are organised, not in the ceremonies.

The organizational models that support digital delivery best are cross-functional product squads, shared platform teams and a product-oriented operating model in which clear owners are accountable for whole customer journeys such as onboarding, claims, lending or advice. Squads bring business, design, engineering, data and risk skills together around one product or journey. Platform teams provide reusable capabilities, such as identity, payments or data, so squads do not rebuild them. Journey ownership prevents the fragmentation that occurs when channels, products and operations each optimise their own piece. Adoption varies widely: fintechs operate these organizational models almost by default, banks have moved furthest among incumbents, and insurers and wealth managers are earlier on the journey.

The core tension, in one line:

Customers experience journeys; most institutions are still organised by function.

1. The main building blocks

2. Sector adoption maturity

Banks have generally moved furthest because of high transaction volumes and strong digital competition. Insurers and wealth managers face more intermediated distribution and longer product cycles, which slows the shift.

3. Why organizational models matter more than tools

• Speed comes from fewer dependencies: a team that can deliver without waiting for others is faster than one with better tools.
• Ownership drives outcomes: journeys improve when one person is accountable for the customer result.
• Stable teams retain knowledge: project teams that disband after delivery lose what they learned.

Supervisors have noticed the link. The ECB’s 2024 review of digitalisation practices describes “digital labs” operating as miniature start-ups, each focused on a specific business domain, as one sound practice, and it assesses governance and execution capability alongside strategy. When the ECB surveyed 105 large banks, it found that almost all had a digital strategy, yet many lacked adequate indicators to steer it, a gap that clear product ownership helps to close.

4. What most firms get wrong about organizational models

• Renaming without restructuring: calling departments “tribes” changes nothing if budgets, targets and approvals stay the same.
• Leaving risk outside: squads that must queue for risk and compliance reviews lose most of their speed.
• Too many squads, too few platforms: without shared foundations, every team rebuilds the same capabilities.
• No journey owner: product teams optimise their part while the customer journey stays fragmented.
• Copying a template: a model from a technology company may not fit regulated, multi-channel financial services.

Example: an insurer introduced squads for its digital channels but left claims operations, underwriting and broker management in their existing structure. Digital journeys improved, yet end-to-end claim times barely moved. A second phase created a claims journey owner with authority across digital, operations and supplier management, and claim times began to fall.

5. The contrarian view: not everything should be a squad

Some work is better organised in other ways. Regulatory reporting, core system maintenance and specialist functions such as actuarial modelling often benefit from stable functional teams with clear service levels to product squads. The aim is not to put everyone in a squad, but to organise each type of work in the way that delivers best, with clear interfaces between them.

6. Making the transition

• Start with one or two journeys where value and pain are both high.
• Appoint accountable journey owners with real decision rights.
• Form stable, cross-functional teams and fund them for at least a year.
• Build platform teams for capabilities several journeys need.
• Embed risk and compliance, with clear rules on what teams can approve themselves.
• Measure outcomes: lead time, journey completion, cost per case, customer satisfaction.

7. Leadership’s role

New organizational models only work when leaders change how they govern. That means reviewing outcomes rather than activity, delegating decisions to journey owners within clear limits, and resolving conflicts between functions quickly. Leaders who keep approving every change themselves recreate the bottlenecks the new model was meant to remove.

Key takeaways on organizational models

• Effective organizational models combine product squads, platform teams and clear journey ownership.
• Banks have moved furthest on new organizational models; insurers and wealth managers are earlier on the path.
• Renaming departments without changing budgets and decision rights leaves organizational models unchanged.
• Embedding risk partners in teams keeps new organizational models fast and well controlled.

For executive teams, the choice of organizational models is one of the most consequential decisions in a transformation. It shapes speed, cost, quality and control for years, and it is far harder to change once embedded than any technology choice.

Optimizium helps banks, insurers and wealth managers design organizational models that fit their products, channels and regulatory obligations. We respect the expertise held in existing functions, because product teams need it to succeed. And we bring HR, risk and compliance into the design as co-authors, so new ways of working are both faster and well controlled.

Explore how we approach this across Banking, Insurance, Wealth Management and Beyond Banking, browse the FAQ Hub, or read the related question: Why is cross-functional governance particularly difficult in financial services?