SEATTLE — U.S. Bank is tying its APIs into a workflow within the bank’s central tools to automate previously manual services and streamline bank processes.

The project was disclosed by Ian Eslick, chief technology officer for enterprise architecture and engineering at the $587 billion bank, during a fireside chat today at Bank Automation Summit Fall 2022.

“We start tracing through all these products, and that means something that today is a ServiceNow ticket. And that needs to be run through automation API,” Eslick said. “A lot of teams now have to build APIs around services that typically were done by hand. We’re taking something that used to take 37 steps and turning it into one. But it sounds good to start with that high bar of what is possible.”

Drawing on his previous experience working for Amazon Web Services, Eslick noted that the key to simplifying processes in a business the size of Minneapolis-based U.S. Bank, is mapping out which developers would be responsible for the various aspects of shipping a piece of code into production.

“Historically, I’d have to go file a ticket with Team A, to have that team that provision something and then I had to file a ticket with Team B to provision something,” he said. “That took a lot longer than it ought to. So, our goal is to say, instead of taking days or weeks to accomplish a particular task, the challenge is how we do attendance, and that needs to be run through automation API.”

Adapting to automated processes

One additional challenge faced by many financial institutions is automated processes and their tendency to break down. While manual processes used previously might be easier to use and more dynamic, they can present problems when a key member of the team departs or an error cannot be repeatable.

While automation to scale can be difficult to sustain, it is imperative that organizations embrace change from senior leadership to developers.

“You have to have people, processes [and] technology all changing together, which makes it a huge challenge, because that’s complicated,” Eslick said. “There’s a tendency to want to go back to what you did before, because while it was slower if it worked, it’s more reliable. But you have to lean forward.”

By having all aspects of the organization on the same page, businesses can be better prepared for the future despite roadblocks that automation may pose in the short term.

“If you want to start moving faster, one of the biggest ones is you got to test and say, ‘Okay, I can’t change my data contract,’” he said. “The only way to get automations to be robust is to ensure that every piece of that ecosystem has it has an enforced contract across its entire amount. And that’s hard, because it’s not typically the way things have been done.”

Bank Automation Summit Fall 2022 is taking place Sept. 18-20 in Seattle. View the agenda here.