Case Studies

This case covers the period from 2014 to 2020, when DBS embarks on its second strategy under the stewardship of Piyush Gupta. The aim is to become the Best Bank in the World (BBIW) by 2020. The bank reaches its objectives in 2019 and continues to garner more banking accolades.

Building on Strategy 1.0 that is implemented from 2010 to 2014 to shape the bank up to international standards, DBS’s Strategy 2.0 focuses on “Making Banking Joyful” through three key tenets: (1) digital to the core; (2) being customer obsessed; (3) creating a start-up culture.

This case illustrates the requisite leadership and operational capabilities to translate the digital transformation vision into a strategy. It explains how the bank leverages technology as part of its strategy to make banking invisible for its customers, for example, by initially engaging employees through the adoption of hackathons and design thinking. The case also discusses how the bank successfully developed a start-up culture bringing everyone on the same understanding and developing digital tools. Finally, this case highlights the need for the top management team to canvass its Board’s endorsement and investment support for a transformation of such size, scale, and duration.

Part A of the case takes place in February 2010. In late 2009 Piyush Gupta joined DBS Bank as its CEO and set about transforming the bank. His first 100 days were spent familiarising himself with the business. He then hosted a three-day strategy formulation retreat offsite with his top leaders. The participants at the offsite retreat crafted a strategy that identified key areas of focus going forward such as the customer experience, people and processes as well as things that needed to be fixed, like technology and culture. The next question was how to implement the strategy.

Part B of the case is set in April 2015 and discusses the actions DBS took to execute the strategy. The bank addressed not only where it should grow and where it should not, but also fixed the basics that needed to be in place to support the strategy. It empowered its people to improve processes, updated management information systems, invested in premises, identified the right measures and developed its people. These actions contributed to transforming its culture, and changing the way people worked together, eliminating waste and being ‘Asian’ and customer-centric.

The case will examine how the company developed and used the balance scorecard that provided transparency while reinforcing strategic initiatives. In addition, students will discuss how strategy implementation can fail and explore best practices to avoid such failure.

This case study is set in June 2022, two and a half years since Raffles Quay Asset Management (RQAM) had rolled out its new vision in preparation for positioning itself for the workplace of the future. RQAM had been established in 2001 to manage and market the commercial properties developed by Asia’s leading developers.

The new vision provided the ‘north star’ for the whole organization and transformed how RQAM managed tenant relationships. It also revolutionized RQAM’s approach to commercial real estate management. The new vision leveraged technology opportunities and addressed the needs of RQAM’s various stakeholders, from its tenants to the community.

This is a two-part case series. Part (A) of the case is about how Shashank Nigam, CEO of SimpliFlying Pte Ltd, a company based in Singapore, searches for the corporate strategy and vision for his company. SimpliFlying was founded in March 2008 and was originally a blog that commented on issues in marketing aviation. After thinking about how he could find a niche for his business, Nigam decided to sell his company’s services by combining the three pillars of aviation, marketing, and technology through social media. However, he recognized that he still needed to decide on the long-term positioning of the company – should SimpliFlying focus on strategy consulting, strategy execution (agency) work, or both? At the same time, Nigam’s company was also receiving calls from hotels to help them with branding projects. Nigam needed to make a decision.