0:00

News. It

0:08

came back to my own personal pain point.

0:10

It just takes a while to build that trust.

0:12

The problem that I was trying to solve,

0:14

it was all I was thinking about. You have

0:16

to be obsessed with the human condition. Means

0:25

your product wasn't designed right from

0:27

a self -service standpoint. What we'd call

0:29

it is you created exhaust into another

0:31

channel, into a higher cost

0:33

channel. That's Rohan Amin, the Chief Product

0:35

Officer of Chase. And he's talking

0:37

about why he focuses on all the

0:39

unhappy paths his customers might take. We're

0:42

going to get into that and so much more, so stick

0:44

around. Forward

0:50

thinkers know that when people

0:52

thrive, organizations thrive. This is

0:54

the future of work. This

0:56

is Workday, the AI platform

0:58

that elevates humans. From

1:03

LinkedIn News, I'm Jesse Hempel, host

1:05

of the Hello Monday podcast. Start

1:08

your week with the Hello Monday

1:10

podcast. We'll navigate career pivots.

1:12

We'll learn where happiness fits in.

1:14

Listen to Hello Monday with me,

1:16

Jesse Hempel, on the LinkedIn podcast

1:18

network or wherever you get your

1:20

podcasts. As

1:27

we get older, finance weaves its

1:29

way through so much of

1:32

our lives, loans, savings, investments,

1:34

credit and so on. Financial

1:36

products are easily one of the

1:38

most central products in our lives, but

1:40

they can feel confusing and cumbersome

1:42

to say the least. Doing

1:44

your finances feels like a

1:46

chore, something you prefer

1:48

avoiding. But there's so much

1:51

potential and building incredible experiences that

1:53

not only remove friction from your

1:55

daily life, but actually helped him

1:57

with financial literacy and empowerment. Done

2:00

well, financial products can be your

2:02

superpower. That's why I'm happy to

2:04

have Rohan Amin on the show. Rohan is

2:06

the Chief Product Officer at Chase, but

2:08

he actually started his career in

2:10

the defense industry, working as a

2:12

cybersecurity expert at Lockheed Martin. He

2:15

eventually came over to Chase to serve

2:17

as a Chief Information Officer, before taking

2:19

on the role of Chief Product Officer.

2:22

Security plays a critical role at Chase,

2:24

the largest bank in the US. Handling

2:27

a lot of sensitive information

2:29

is central to Rohan's job.

2:32

We'll cover that, including why

2:34

Rohan obsesses over the unhappy

2:36

paths, the power of incrementalism

2:38

when rolled out across scale, and

2:41

how Chase defines value at the

2:43

intersection of physical and digital products.

2:46

So let's get into it. I'd

2:50

love to start with your journey. For

2:52

you, you had your PhD

2:54

in electrical engineering. Then you became

2:56

a cybersecurity expert in Lockheed Martin. You

2:59

spent 12 years there. You became

3:01

the chief information officer at Chase. And

3:03

then you became chief product officer

3:05

at Chase. And I'm curious if you

3:07

can share more about your role

3:09

today and then kind of your journey

3:11

into building. Fundamentally, I've been in

3:13

two different industries, right? I spent more

3:15

than a decade in defense and

3:17

intelligence. And then I spent

3:19

the last decade plus in financial services.

3:21

And I've had a variety of different

3:23

roles throughout that journey. So

3:26

in defense and intelligence, that's where I

3:28

cut my teeth. That's where I got

3:30

my engineering chops. And

3:32

we built things there that really

3:34

mattered and had to work. And

3:37

in some cases, lives were on

3:39

the line for the things that we

3:41

were building. And so whether it

3:43

was a launch, a national security

3:45

mission, You know, that's where I got

3:47

my sense of purpose. And

3:49

then a decade ago, more than 10

3:52

years ago, I got a call to

3:54

join JP Morgan. You know,

3:56

fell in love with the sense of

3:58

mission and purpose and scale of this

4:00

place. And I started

4:02

out on the cybersecurity

4:04

team and was responsible for

4:06

the bank's cybersecurity globally. Did

4:09

that for a bit, several years.

4:11

Then moved over to Chase

4:13

and ran tech for all

4:15

the lines of business that

4:17

face our customers in small

4:20

businesses. And then a

4:22

few years ago, I was tapped

4:24

to be the Chief Product Officer. Then

4:26

that means I'm responsible for product

4:28

development, our data analytics,

4:30

design, digital, chase .com, the Chase

4:32

mobile app, and effectively any of the

4:34

customer or employee -facing experiences that we

4:36

build and ship. That's my team's responsibility.

4:38

And so it's been quite a journey.

4:40

I never thought that from cybersecurity landed

4:42

and up in this place. I love

4:44

it. And I'm thankful to be at

4:47

a place that also gives me an

4:49

opportunity, gives me a mobility opportunity, allows

4:51

me to try different things. It's

4:53

been fantastic. Obviously, security plays

4:55

a big role in those kind of

4:57

two industries. You spend a big part

4:59

of your career. And are there any

5:02

specific principles you brought from Lincoln and

5:04

Martin? Product philosophy of

5:06

how you build that you kind

5:08

of brought into chase. Yeah, so like

5:10

security controls resiliency reliability Those are

5:12

all things that were steeped into my

5:14

thinking and how I thinking about

5:16

building and I the way I think

5:18

about it is that for us

5:21

This is job one right you have

5:23

to get it right trust is

5:25

critical the digital experience and You know

5:27

the technology and all those things

5:29

have to work right In particular, people

5:31

want to be able to access

5:33

their money when they need to access

5:35

their money, as an example. We

5:37

have, of course, a ton of data

5:39

and very sensitive information. So like

5:42

all of that is really part of

5:44

the mindset. So I think of

5:46

that as job one. And

5:48

then the other thing we talk about with our

5:50

product teams when we build, and this also was

5:52

instilled from my days in the defense community, was

5:55

that reliability and resiliency is the first

5:57

feature of the product. There's no point

5:59

having fancy feature in your product if

6:01

it just doesn't work when it needs

6:03

to when it counts the most. Gotta

6:05

get that right. And when

6:07

you get the core components right,

6:09

the right controls, the right security,

6:11

privacy, all of that stuff, you

6:13

earn the right to innovate on

6:15

top of that and build a

6:17

fantastic customer experience. But it's built

6:19

on a solid foundation that you

6:21

can feel great about. And what

6:23

people would expect when you're talking

6:25

about something like financial services. and

6:28

your money. And that's the mindset that

6:30

I got when I came out of

6:32

defense. You know, for me, while I

6:34

did not, my career served in the army,

6:36

but my career as an engineer started

6:38

in semiconductors, it wasn't

6:40

the kind of mission critical defense system

6:42

or banking system reliability, but on

6:44

the flip side, you had to

6:46

make sure the chip was 100 %

6:49

designed before you dig into production, because

6:51

if there's a bug in the

6:53

chip and it goes to production, it

6:55

can actually bankrupt the company. There

6:57

was a golden model. There was the chip hardware.

7:00

There's software that was mimicking the chip as a

7:02

golden model. There was a silver model, which was

7:04

a plan B. There was a plan C. The

7:06

amount of fallbacks or the amount

7:08

of checks you have in the systems,

7:10

just make sure your product inherently

7:12

works the way you intended is something

7:14

that I think in consumer internet

7:16

nobody even thinks about. I think you're

7:18

spot on and I'm chuckling only

7:20

because I spent a lot of time

7:23

thinking about unhappy paths, right? And

7:25

so Sometimes when you're building a product,

7:27

you're so focused on what's the

7:29

happy path the customer is going to

7:31

take and all things work. I

7:33

spent a lot of time thinking about

7:35

the unhappy path. And

7:37

unhappy paths can take various forms. I

7:40

didn't accomplish the task I

7:42

was trying to digitally, and

7:45

so I dropped out of the flow and now

7:47

I've called you in the contact center to go

7:49

do the thing I was trying to do and

7:51

I couldn't do it digitally. To me,

7:53

unhappy path, right? means your product

7:55

wasn't designed right from a self -service

7:57

standpoint, what we'd call it is

7:59

you created exhaust into another channel,

8:02

into a higher cost channel as an

8:04

example. And so that's an unhappy path.

8:06

And then what are all the things that can go

8:08

wrong? Whether it's a

8:10

technical thing that can go wrong, whether

8:12

it's the wrong copy that gets in

8:14

front of a customer, whether it's the

8:16

expectation that is not met, how

8:19

do you work through all these

8:21

unhappy path things and make sure

8:23

that you've thought it through? I'm

8:25

sure there's so many things you

8:27

want to build, but on the

8:29

flip side, that notion of 100

8:31

% quality is hard. It's really,

8:33

really hard to kind of bring this together. curious

8:35

a little bit more about you.

8:37

So, you know, great product builders, the

8:39

index on the specific trait or

8:41

skill, they're well rounded and so on,

8:43

but there's something that almost becomes

8:45

their superpower. When you look back

8:47

a little bit, do you have a sense of

8:49

what that is for you? Is it that system

8:51

thinking? Is it that you can see behind the

8:53

corner when it comes to trust and security? So

8:56

what I'd say is, first and

8:58

foremost, I'm a strong collaborator and

9:01

trust builder. I have to work

9:03

across every line of business. And

9:05

I have to bring together a customer experience

9:07

that makes sense. And that's not easy to

9:09

do at the scale that we're operating with,

9:11

the number of segments with all the different

9:13

offerings that we have. So strong collaboration for

9:15

sure. Truth -telling. I

9:18

do think my engineering background

9:20

allows me to see what

9:22

is realistic versus what's not.

9:25

And call out things that may or

9:27

may not be possible. And so like,

9:29

in some ways, don't spend time

9:31

on that path because that's just going

9:33

to be Whole lot of wasted calories,

9:35

but down here. Yeah, there's a you

9:37

know, there's something that makes sense and

9:40

so injecting that into the business conversation

9:42

I think is super helpful And then

9:44

I do look around corners a lot.

9:46

There's a lot of people Who obsess

9:48

over what's happening in the next 12

9:50

18 months on a product roadmap and

9:52

I obsess over that stuff too But

9:54

my lens is also about leaving the

9:56

bank in a better place than I

9:58

found it How do I make sure

10:00

that we've got the right architecture the

10:02

right discipline? that we're building for the

10:04

future, the decisions that we're making today

10:06

ladder up to a better, you know,

10:09

three, four years down the road. Because

10:11

none of these things happen overnight. It's building

10:13

block on top of building block. And

10:16

we like to say it's a game of inches. You got

10:18

to grind it out. And that's sort

10:20

of my mindset is looking downstream. And,

10:22

you know, this choice that we're

10:24

making right now, what does that mean

10:26

for future choices? Small incremental changes

10:28

over time and up in aggregate being

10:30

huge from an impact standpoint. Just

10:33

moving the needle 1 % you

10:35

know for example at the scale

10:37

that we're operating is massive And

10:39

so sometimes you don't need to

10:41

have the next new whiz bang

10:43

idea Sometimes you just need to

10:45

be able to make the small

10:47

increment that improves, you know an

10:49

inch And then you do another

10:51

inch and then before you know

10:53

it, you know You've done two

10:55

feet and you're killing it and

10:57

so it's it's that sort of

10:59

like hustle scrappy type mindset interest

11:01

to touchdowns Exactly. So

11:04

if we played this through, when you

11:06

kind of played as inches coming together, those

11:08

feeds coming together, and you think about

11:10

your vision for the Chase product in a

11:12

few years, do you see it in

11:15

banking? Do you see it in finance? Do

11:17

you see it as your everyday companion?

11:19

Because I could see Chase becoming embedded in

11:21

so many parts of my life. I'm

11:23

curious from your perspective, how

11:25

you think of that product over

11:27

the long arc. We have 80

11:29

million consumers and 6 million small

11:31

businesses. So let's just start there

11:34

in terms of who we're servicing

11:36

every single day. And

11:38

of course, digital banking and adoption and all

11:41

that are on the rise and really important.

11:43

But I think first it's sort of

11:45

like to appreciate the complexity of

11:47

what we're trying to navigate. You know,

11:49

we have more than 67 million

11:51

people who are digitally active on our

11:53

properties. Many, many and many

11:56

of them are checking their app as an

11:58

example every single day, multiple times per

12:00

day. And whether that's for things

12:02

like I just need to know my balance or

12:04

engaging in other experiences, there's a lot of

12:06

that that's happening. And it's for moments

12:08

that really matter, right? You're buying your first home

12:10

and you need to get a mortgage. you're buying

12:12

a car or leasing a car. You want to

12:14

do some investments, checking, savings,

12:16

credit cards of all varieties, of

12:18

course we have that. And

12:21

then of course if you're running a small business

12:23

and you need a loan, you know we're going

12:25

to be your destination for that too. And so

12:28

like that's the framing of the traditional banking products

12:30

that you might think of. The thing

12:32

that people may not necessarily appreciate is

12:34

that we have to do that for

12:36

people who are just getting started. all

12:38

the way to ultra high net worth

12:40

individuals. And so when you think about

12:42

the spectrum of product offerings and the

12:44

spectrum of consumers and small businesses, that's

12:46

where all the complexity comes in. And

12:48

you're thinking about everybody, like there aren't

12:50

like primary audiences you start with. You're

12:53

thinking about the spectrum of like, I'm

12:55

16 year old, this is my first

12:57

account too. I've built my

12:59

wealth, what do I do with it? Yeah, our

13:01

ambition is to be the bank for all. But

13:03

we want to feel like the

13:05

bank just for you. And so

13:07

like that whole thing happens because

13:09

of AI and personalization. But

13:12

going back to your point about the, you

13:14

know, is it going to show up in other

13:16

parts of your life? Yeah, I

13:18

don't know if you know about the infatuation. It's

13:21

our restaurant review app.

13:24

You know, the Zagat, that's another one.

13:26

That's also a Chase property and

13:28

asset and experience. I

13:30

last week actually used my ultimate

13:32

reward points. and bought myself a

13:34

new iPad and laptop. Mine were

13:36

getting kind of old. And

13:39

I did that all through the Chase

13:41

app. So I thought of that as

13:43

an acquisition strategy, as a way to

13:45

acquire customers in. You're saying this is

13:47

more, this is the long arc, like

13:49

you'll be in travel and restaurants, which

13:51

you do today, but I thought about

13:53

it as an acquisition strategy. But how

13:55

do you define this thing? Like what's

13:57

the, what's the theme across? So, so

13:59

travel, for example, has always been a

14:01

value proposition of our credit cards, as

14:03

an example. We've been opening

14:05

new lounges throughout the country. So

14:07

travel has always been a core value

14:09

proposition, but now it's really about how

14:12

to provide great travel experience to customers

14:14

and time and again be the place

14:16

that they come to when they're thinking

14:18

of that next vacation. They're thinking of

14:20

planning a big trip with the family.

14:23

It's actually a way for us

14:25

to think about deepening with those

14:27

existing customers over time. The

14:30

non -banking stuff, travel, shopping,

14:33

offers, there's just other things that

14:35

we're doing beyond the borders of traditional

14:37

banking that I think are exciting.

14:39

Would it stay traditional? Would it stay

14:41

banking? I take myself as an

14:43

example, and I do use a lot

14:45

of those services, but

14:47

the core is still obviously the

14:49

banking. This is the trust point you

14:51

made before. That's the existential relationship

14:54

I have with my bank. Three,

14:56

five, ten years from now, how would they talk

14:58

about Chase? Like, how would you like me to

15:00

talk about Chase? So, look, of

15:03

course, you know, the banking, investing, card,

15:05

you know, all that stuff will continue

15:07

to be the main thing. But there's

15:09

lots of opportunities for us to add

15:11

additional value to consumers. And that's

15:13

what we're trying to do. And so, I

15:15

would say in three to five years, don't

15:17

think of us as a bank, think of

15:19

us as Chase. Talking

15:21

about all the richness of the experiences that

15:23

you have today, you want to build, I'm

15:26

assuming, actually, I'm going to ask, I'm

15:29

not going to assume, you still might have

15:31

like one flagship app, or you can

15:33

start unbundling those based on experiences. That's not

15:35

an easy decision because the cross -sell upsell,

15:37

which is really critical, and

15:39

it's one of the best practices of

15:41

banking in general, kind of

15:43

diminished a little bit, right? Within the flagship

15:45

app, you can kind of do a lot

15:48

of experiences across, but At the same

15:50

time, if you just keep it between an app,

15:52

it could be very complex to kind of satisfy

15:54

all those use cases, and then you run the

15:56

risk of, you know, actually, I

15:58

want to do something very simple, but I have

16:00

to kind of try and find my way into

16:02

that. How do you resolve that complexity? How do

16:04

you think about masking that complexity from the member?

16:06

That's something that we wrestle with often, right? So,

16:09

the restaurant reviews and all that, the

16:11

infatuation as an example, that's all a separate

16:13

app. Lightweight, separate app, you log in,

16:15

pick your city, get the reviews, all that

16:17

stuff. You can link your Chase account,

16:19

get additional insight into other experiences and things

16:21

that you can take advantage of. But

16:24

for the most part, everything else is in the core

16:26

app. And trust me

16:28

when I say that that is a conversation we

16:30

continue to have around what's the right way to strike

16:32

the balance. Because as you know, creating

16:34

another app and then convincing customers

16:36

to download said app is a lot

16:38

of friction. versus how

16:40

do you take advantage of the fact

16:42

that they're in their core app very often

16:44

and bring them to the right place.

16:47

And so discoverability is something that we have

16:49

to work hard at and is an

16:51

opportunity for us to continue to improve on.

16:53

And so we're working very hard on navigation

16:55

and discoverability and then personalizing and making

16:58

sure that the right content is showing up

17:00

for customers at the right time. We

17:02

can talk about how we think about data

17:04

and machine learning and AI and how

17:06

that applies to the customer experience. But

17:08

it is a balance. And I

17:10

wouldn't say we've sort of finalized the debate on, you

17:12

know, one app or multiple apps. It is something that

17:14

we're going to continue to pressure test. Let's say I'm

17:16

a PM on your team, and I

17:18

want to pitch you on taking the travel part

17:21

out of the flagship app. Yeah. This is partly

17:23

my pain point today. Like I wanted to travel

17:25

because the moment I like click back, I'm like

17:27

the whole thing resets on me. Yeah. So let's

17:29

say I want to pitch you on taking this

17:31

out. Like what kind of principles do you want

17:33

me to come with? Like, because ultimately. The

17:35

pathway from my credit card to the

17:38

points to travel is very seamless in

17:40

the flagship app, but going deep on

17:42

travel is hard a little bit. So

17:44

to me, that type of decision we

17:46

should tie to what objective we're trying

17:48

to achieve, right? And so if I'm

17:50

trying to establish a brand new customer

17:52

acquisition path as an example, and

17:55

let's say travel is something that we want

17:57

to be able to support even for people

17:59

who aren't a Chase customer, then

18:01

I'd say, yeah. That might be a factor

18:03

in terms of how we think about that being

18:05

a separate app. But we also

18:07

score pretty well. If you look at

18:09

how we rate on our customer experiences,

18:11

we rate really well when we have

18:13

some of these core experiences together versus

18:15

separating them. Banking and

18:17

investing, great example. Some

18:19

people might separate those. There's others, competitors

18:22

of ours who keep those separate. We

18:24

actually put them in the same app

18:26

and we rate well on that because customers

18:28

like to see those things together. So

18:30

it depends on the use case. depends if

18:32

what objective we're trying to achieve, whether

18:34

it's a new channel, a new distribution mechanism,

18:37

a new way to acquire customers, travel

18:39

today for the most part is something

18:41

for existing customers. Maybe that changes

18:43

in the future. But those are all the

18:45

things that go into the debate over

18:47

one app, multiple apps, and that sort of

18:49

thing. We're

18:51

going to take a quick break, but don't

18:53

go anywhere. When we come back, Rohan

18:56

is going to explain why Chase is doubling

18:58

down on branches when we are in a

19:00

digital world today. People come for transactional things

19:02

that they have to get done, but increasingly

19:04

over time, a lot of it has to

19:06

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started today at linkedin .com slash

20:05

marketer. Terms and conditions apply.

20:12

OK, we're back. And I'm speaking with Rohan

20:14

Amin, Chief Product Officer of Chase. I'm

20:17

super curious about the physical and digital. Like

20:19

one could say, hey, why even have physical, right?

20:21

You think about it. There's so much I

20:23

can do. digitally, and you want

20:25

to talk to somebody on the phone, I can

20:27

get you somebody on the phone. Why have

20:29

physical branches? I think Chase has been like, no,

20:31

no, this is part of our strategy. It's

20:33

not like, it's not an evolution. We believe in

20:36

physical branches. What's the thinking behind that? Like,

20:38

what's the principle? Is it like, you

20:40

deeply believe that for some

20:42

parts, you have to have

20:44

that human in -person connection

20:46

physically? Absolutely. And

20:48

so just a little bit of context about

20:50

the branches. About roughly a million

20:52

people every single day are in

20:54

our branches. What's the

20:56

top use cases? Consulting? It's a lot

20:58

of advice. So of course, people come

21:00

for transactional things that they have to

21:02

get done. But increasingly over time,

21:05

a lot of it has to be about

21:07

advice and things that people are looking to

21:09

do, really important life decisions. I'm

21:11

looking to buy that first home. I'm looking

21:13

to buy a car. I want to make

21:15

sure I'm armed with the right loan information

21:17

so I can go shopping, you

21:19

know, at the dealers. I need to

21:21

know how to save for college. I want

21:24

to understand how do I invest? I'm

21:26

a small business and I'm trying to

21:28

get established. So like big, big decision

21:30

advice, big decision advice,

21:33

important life moments. People want

21:35

to talk to somebody. And so

21:37

a million people per day coming to

21:39

the branches and we're opening them to

21:41

your point. We have not shot away

21:43

from this strategy and the data is

21:45

very clear. We open branches. in certain

21:47

cities and regions and all that, and

21:49

we immediately see greater digital adoption and

21:51

digital growth as well. And

21:53

I think for something as personal as finances,

21:56

it's deeply personal and important

21:58

to people, I think they

22:00

have a sense of comfort that there's somebody

22:02

they can go talk to. And of

22:04

course, you can call and do that as

22:07

well, but I think for a lot

22:09

of people, they want to go face -to -face

22:11

and interact with somebody. especially on these

22:13

big decisions, things that matter, in addition to

22:15

the everyday banking needs that they have.

22:17

Of course, there are some customers who choose

22:19

to only bank digitally. We

22:21

support that as well. But the branches

22:23

are really important to the strategy.

22:25

And to your earlier question about, you

22:27

know, how do we integrate with the community? The

22:30

branches aren't just a place for

22:32

transactions and advice. We have community centers

22:34

like one local to me and

22:36

Harlem. Those community centers are

22:38

a place for us to do

22:40

financial education. We do classes, we

22:42

teach people, help them understand the

22:44

basics of finances. We will help

22:47

small businesses and help people get

22:49

started. And so a lot of

22:51

that interaction, that relationship, all of that connection to

22:53

the community, you can't replace the

22:55

branch interaction. When you're inside and you see the magic

22:57

of the community coming together in one of our community

22:59

centers, you can't replicate that fully

23:01

online. And you know one other thing I'll

23:03

tell you at Tomer is that when you look

23:05

at the data, it's not just a certain

23:07

generation. People might think like, oh, It's only a

23:09

certain type of person who uses the branches. We

23:12

see everybody using branches. Gen Z

23:14

people are in the branches. So

23:16

data is really easy when it comes

23:18

to digital products, but when it comes to

23:20

physical branches, assuming you

23:23

can look at like food traffic, but

23:25

in terms of getting to that kind

23:27

of nuances of what people come for,

23:29

is this kind of an intentional data

23:31

strategy to kind of map the physical

23:33

branch so you can understand exactly almost

23:35

like you had a digital product of

23:37

what's going on there? Yeah, we look

23:39

at interaction data from every channel that

23:41

we have. So whether you're

23:43

calling us and what you're calling for,

23:45

whether you're on digital, what

23:47

you're clicking and doing, when

23:49

you're in a branch, what are you there

23:51

for? So all of that sort of interaction

23:53

data, that's the stuff that we're looking at

23:55

to understand, are we meeting the needs of

23:57

customers and small businesses that we have? What's

23:59

the trends that we're seeing? All of that

24:02

comes from that mindset. So yeah, so we

24:04

definitely have a way to look at the

24:06

physical experience as well. Here, so for folks

24:08

listening, when you think about kind

24:10

of the omnichannel, by

24:12

the way, omnichannel versus multi -channel, for

24:14

omnichannel, they're integrated multi -channel, kind of

24:16

separate. When you think about the

24:18

omnichannel, like, what's your rule of thumb for what

24:20

each serves the best process? I'm assuming digital

24:22

is really easy for transaction, right? I got a

24:24

check, I scan it, boom, you know, it

24:26

used to take me 25 minutes to drive to

24:29

the branch, now it's 25 seconds. Wonderful. Big

24:31

life decision. I want to

24:33

talk to somebody, even if they're going to tell me

24:36

what I think they're going to tell me. Just

24:38

having that reassurance that the human being is there with

24:40

me is a big one. Calling,

24:42

I'm assuming customer support, something

24:44

is not going well. Is

24:46

that the right way to think about it? Are you

24:48

thinking about those channels differently? Some of

24:50

that, what you said is accurate, but

24:52

we see crossover effects all the

24:55

time. And the whole multi -channel, omnichannel

24:57

thing I think is really important, right? And

24:59

for us, the mindset is definitely about omnichannel.

25:01

And how do we make sure that

25:03

sort of the state that you're in as

25:05

a customer is known to all of

25:07

the channels. And so something as

25:09

simple as, let's say you had a fraud event,

25:12

and unfortunately you had to replace your

25:14

credit card as a result. Well,

25:16

the next time you call, we

25:19

know that you're calling probably to find out

25:21

where your card is at. Is it in

25:23

the mail? Did it get shipped? Whatever, right?

25:25

That is a very simple example. But

25:27

things like that, when you call, you

25:30

know, the IVR, the thing that picks up, the

25:32

automated phone thing that picks up, is gonna know, eh,

25:34

he's probably calling because he wants to know where his

25:36

card is. We're gonna server that up right away. So

25:39

you don't have to like navigate the thing and find

25:41

out or even talk to somebody because we already knew

25:43

that you're probably calling for that. We'll just give that

25:45

information right away. Or you log into the app, you'll

25:47

see that right at the top of the screen. So

25:49

that's like the whole, you know, how to be proactive

25:51

with the OmniChannel bit. And that

25:53

way customers come to us in

25:55

the channel that they choose. And it

25:57

matters in problem situations, right? You

26:00

are at a restaurant and you swipe

26:02

your card and it's declined. Tough

26:04

situation to be in. Well, you might be agitated. The

26:07

more and more that we make that awareness and

26:09

state known, that's how we think about

26:11

it. This makes a lot of

26:13

sense. I'm sure folks listening saying,

26:15

wow, like obviously if you have omnichannel

26:17

execution correct, you have a phenomenal

26:19

customer experience. But I think

26:21

it would be a must for folks

26:23

to understand that if, at

26:25

least for established companies that existed before, We

26:28

had the diversions of channels. This was not

26:30

just a quick change in strategy. I

26:33

know for us, for example, once

26:35

we had multiple businesses and there

26:37

was like phone call and chat

26:39

and systems and integration and customers

26:41

are across multiple business lines, undertaking

26:43

that transformation in infrastructure and platform

26:45

was not an overnight success. But once

26:47

you do, you see massive dividends

26:49

from them. I'm assuming this was a

26:51

multi -year strategy for Chase at one

26:53

point. Totally. And what I would

26:55

say is that we still have a

26:57

lot more work to do on

27:00

it. And we have goals and ambitions

27:02

in this space to continue to

27:04

focus on omnichannel. There could

27:06

be a lot of work without LLM to

27:08

try and figure out all the flows. But

27:10

if you had an LLM that can reason

27:12

over, right, Rohan stumbled over there and then

27:14

he went there, I think I

27:16

know what's going on. That could feel really

27:18

magical. Right now with this new wave of

27:20

AI, what can you do that you before

27:22

thought will take many, many years or even

27:24

impossible to do? And from a

27:26

customer experience, what should they expect

27:28

next? So first, we

27:30

have a ton of data, right? And

27:33

it's not just, you know, the financial data,

27:35

it's all this interaction data that I

27:37

was talking about earlier. The channel

27:39

interaction data, but also all the lifestyle stuff.

27:41

You know, what hotels you're booking, airlines and

27:43

flights and destinations and where are you going?

27:45

And like, there's a lot of data. The

27:47

metadata behind the transactions, basically. A lot of

27:49

that, right? A lot of data. So first

27:51

is that. you know, making sure that we

27:53

use that, you know, to power the experience

27:56

in the right way. Because, again, I go

27:58

back to the point I made in the

28:00

very beginning around trust, security, privacy, that being

28:02

job one, right? But, of course, I

28:04

was chuckling when you gave the example of

28:06

the LLM being able to help you understand

28:08

the journey. That's exactly the type of thing

28:10

that we're doing. And it's as simple as

28:12

you put in a comment in the App

28:14

Store. Within seconds, that comment

28:16

is known to us and in the

28:18

hands of the Red Product team. Like,

28:20

that's a simple example. But when you

28:22

start to actually structure the data in

28:25

a normalized way around all these interactions

28:27

and things that we've been talking about,

28:29

that's where the LLM stuff becomes magic,

28:31

is that you're able to apply an

28:33

LLM to help you start to reason

28:35

through these problems and understand where the

28:37

customer is in the journey and help

28:39

identify drop -off points. It's one

28:42

thing when you're looking at your product data and

28:44

your product conversion funnel to understand where the friction

28:46

points are, It's another thing when the LLM tells

28:48

you, based on the analysis of traffic that I'm

28:50

seeing, this is where the two points that I

28:52

think are problem areas for you to go look

28:54

at. Hey, product team, go look at that stuff.

28:56

That's exactly the type of mindset that we have

28:58

around this problem, looking at tools

29:00

and capabilities to do exactly that. We have

29:02

some green shoots in this area, which are

29:04

really exciting. And so that's kind

29:06

of like the internal thing, but externally, because

29:08

you asked about what a customer might see.

29:10

And obviously, this is an area we want

29:12

to get exactly right. Being

29:14

first, with a LLM AI thing

29:17

facing customers, isn't necessarily our

29:19

focus. Being right about it is

29:21

probably more of our focus,

29:23

right? Because, you know, there's been

29:25

some missteps with these things

29:27

that have been out there, some

29:29

of these LLM things saying things that

29:31

they shouldn't have been saying. And for

29:33

something like finances and money, you'd have

29:35

no room, you know, for that kind

29:37

of mistake. And so,

29:39

of course, we're experimenting, we're thinking about

29:41

that. And you're likely to see

29:44

that type of thing take form in

29:46

the chase digital system. What does that mean

29:48

from an eval perspective for you? How

29:50

do you do evaluations for those? For example,

29:52

we play in different industries. For us,

29:54

the bar is really high. If you're seeking

29:56

a job or if you're looking for

29:59

career advice or so on, we would optimize

30:01

for being right and accurate. than

30:03

the incomprehensive and fast, or in

30:05

many ways, performance sometimes. We'll make

30:07

sure we're indexing more on the

30:09

accuracy side. That means that we'll

30:12

take a more conservative approach to

30:14

what we produce. Our evaluations

30:16

are ranked on a conservatism, almost like

30:18

standpoint. I'm assuming something is very similar

30:20

for you. Yes. So, a similar mindset,

30:22

right? For us, it's going to be

30:24

about that accuracy for sure, and making

30:26

sure that we know the bounds of

30:28

what an LLM would say in response

30:30

to a particular question. And

30:32

it's not just about LLM, right? Because, you know,

30:34

you have everything from questions that people have.

30:37

I want to understand more about this product or

30:39

that capability or whatever it is. Two, I'm

30:41

trying to complete a task. I'm trying to get

30:43

a job done. So it's a broad range

30:45

of things that we have to think about when

30:47

we think about applying AI to that problem

30:49

space. But that isn't the only place where AI

30:51

gets applied. You know, I go

30:53

back to the home screen, something as simple as you

30:55

log into the mobile app, and what is all

30:57

the stuff that you see on the home page? Of

30:59

course, you're going to see your accounts. Of course,

31:01

you're going to see the things that really matter. But

31:03

then what about the rest of that on the

31:05

homepage? Given the spectrum of customers we're

31:07

talking about, given all the different

31:09

product offerings, what's the next right thing

31:11

for a customer to engage in? It

31:14

wasn't too long ago where people just

31:16

came in, checked our balances, and took off. Now

31:19

we're finding more and more customers are

31:21

actually deepening their engagement with us because

31:23

there's more relevancy that they're seeing. more

31:25

opportunities for them to take advantage of

31:27

stuff they didn't necessarily know of. One

31:29

wonderful aspect we've seen is once you

31:31

start opening the prompt box for people

31:33

is you start seeing what they would

31:35

like you to do for them. Right?

31:38

So I can imagine for me going to the

31:40

Chase app, yes, you give me the balance and some

31:42

kind of basic trends and so on. And those

31:44

are good. But sometimes I have

31:46

very specific questions like, hey, who

31:48

am I paying to? Like what happened

31:50

like this month versus, you know, uh,

31:53

December last year or how am

31:55

I trending on my debt or my

31:57

balance? You can actually go more

31:59

specifically, which actually you always have those

32:01

questions in mind. You just assume

32:03

you can't ask them or, you know, they

32:05

will. take a big Excel spreadsheet to do them,

32:07

all you have to go to the branch

32:09

and figure this out. But those are actually transactional

32:11

questions in many times. And I'm not here

32:13

to make product announcements, but I can tell you

32:15

that's exactly the type of thing that we're

32:17

thinking about and working on every single day. How

32:20

to make your financial data more accessible

32:22

to you, how to make it easy

32:24

to understand, help you make decisions, all

32:26

of that. Last question for you, Erhan. If

32:29

you were to start off your career,

32:31

what would you advise people to study or

32:33

for your kids to study? Of

32:36

course, I have a little

32:39

bias here, you know, being

32:41

an engineering person, where

32:43

I think really having,

32:45

being grounded, I think, in

32:47

a core discipline, I

32:49

think is super important. So

32:51

my bias, of course,

32:53

is I think great product

32:55

people also have enough

32:57

deep technical appreciation, curiosity as

32:59

well, because the how

33:02

you build is equally if

33:04

not more important sometimes than what you're

33:06

building because going back to the earlier point

33:08

that I was making around, you

33:10

know, making sure that you leave the place better than you

33:12

found it, that how aspect I think

33:14

is critical. And these days, as

33:16

far as my kids, I'll tell you exactly, you

33:19

know, my older son has been playing

33:21

around a lot with data and AI. I

33:23

can't even believe the type of stuff that he's

33:25

able to do today compared to what I was

33:27

doing when I was in high school. It's the

33:29

future for sure. And so

33:31

them getting closer to all things

33:33

data science, machine learning, AI, they're

33:36

on their own. I'm actually not even pushing it.

33:38

They're on their own sort of, you know, taking

33:40

interest in this. And I think that's the future

33:42

for them. So we'll see where it goes. So

33:45

financial literacy and AI literacy coming together. I love

33:47

that, yes. Thank

33:49

you to Rohan for coming on the show

33:52

today. As always, let's get into my takeaways.

33:54

First, privacy and security

33:56

are important in every product.

33:58

But in banking, they are

34:01

the product. Rohan emphasizes

34:03

that trust is not just a feature,

34:05

it's where they start. Drawing

34:07

from his experience in the defense

34:09

industry, he is clearly aware that reliability,

34:12

privacy, and security must

34:14

come first. For Chase, earning

34:17

customer trust by protecting

34:19

sensitive information and delivering rock

34:21

-solid reliability unlocks the permission

34:23

to innovate and build

34:25

great experiences on top. Second,

34:28

Think about the unhappy paths.

34:31

We're all trying to build an ideal

34:33

experience, but to do so, we

34:35

have to anticipate how things can go

34:37

wrong. We're all obsessed

34:39

over what might send people down

34:41

an unhappy path. For instance,

34:43

if a customer struggles to accomplish what they

34:45

want in the app, not only

34:47

are they frustrated right now, but they'll

34:50

end up in a higher -cost channel like

34:52

a call center. Now,

34:54

nobody's happy. It's not

34:56

just about anticipating needs, It's about stress

34:58

testing your product to make sure it

35:00

shows up for your customers exactly when

35:02

they need it. Third, don't

35:05

underestimate the power of a physical

35:07

product. It might be surprising

35:09

that Chase, a banking behemoth, is

35:11

vigorously expanding its branch access. But

35:14

Chase is not confused. It knows

35:16

that for many people, money is

35:18

a deeply personal issue. People want

35:20

to talk to a person. They

35:22

want a personal touch. Conventional

35:24

wisdom will tell you to move quickly into

35:26

a digital and virtual world. But in

35:28

this case, what matters most

35:30

is human interaction. I'm

35:33

Tomer Cohen. Thank you for listening.

35:35

I learned a lot from this conversation, and I hope

35:37

you did as well. We'll

35:39

be back in two weeks

35:41

with Mark Papermaster, AMD's Chief Technology

35:43

Officer. Building One is a

35:45

production of LinkedIn News. Our

35:47

host is Tomer Cohen, LinkedIn's Chief

35:49

Product Officer. This episode was

35:52

produced by Max Miller. Our associate

35:54

producer is Rachel Karp. This episode was

35:56

mixed by John Parthum and engineered

35:58

by Asaf Gadrom, and we get additional

36:00

production support from Alicia Mann. At

36:02

At LinkedIn News, Sarah Storm is senior

36:04

producer. Dave Pond is head of

36:06

productions and creative operations. Maya

36:08

Pope Chappelle is director of content and

36:10

audience development. Courtney Koop is head

36:12

of original programming. Dan Roth

36:15

is the editor -in -chief of LinkedIn. If

36:17

you know a product leader we can

36:19

all learn from, send us a line at

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pitchesatlinkedin .com.