Business Knowledge for IT in Retail Banking: The Complete Handbook for IT Professionals (Bizle Professional) (Bizle Professional Series) [Paperback]

An excellent introduction for an IT professional getting into Retail Banking. It is an equally good reference for IT professionals in other areas who need some domain knowledge of this industry vertical, which is one of the biggest users of this technology. The book reads well and is extremely comprehensive in its coverage. Alas, it is a bit too concise; it whets your appetite for more. For a young student in an IT course, probably the book needs to be twice in size - in terms of detail. The coverage is extensive and contemporary. It covers the different areas of IT applications for Retail Banking for a modern bank in today's times. Two valuable additions would be additional chapters on IT Infrastructure / Remote Infrastructure Management and IT Enabled Services, both important, growing areas for managing IT in this domain. The Bizle Professional Series covers the Banking and Financial Services domain very well. I look forward to this series moving on to two more fast growing industry verticals, Organised Retail and Telecom.Lalit Sawhney, Immediate Past President, Computer Society of India Director, Creative IT India Pvt. Ltd. Chairman, Marketing Committee, International Federation for Information Processing**********************************************************************Review By:John Ward FICSThis book is one of a series of books in the Bizle Professional Series, published by Essvale Corporation, which are designed to provide IT professionals working in the financial services sector with a guide to the business knowledge relevant to various aspects of financial services.There are others in the series which cover business knowledge for IT in Investment Banking, Investment Management, Insurance and Hedge Funds.As someone who came to financial services from a software development background, I would have found a book such as this very useful in my early days in financial services. It could not be described as a comprehensive guide to all aspects of the business of retail banking but would serve as a very useful introduction to anyone coming into or seeking a role in IT in the retail banking sector.The introductory chapters cover an overview of retail banking, the product types provided by retail banks and an overview of the current business environment in retail banking in the UK.This followed by a reasonably up to date view of current trends within retail banking including some very current topics like SEPA and Faster Payments in the UK.There are a couple of chapters which go into a reasonable level of detail in describing transaction flows for the business processes of account opening and lending with a further chapter on payments in retail banking. As someone who has worked in the payments business for the last number of years I can confirm that the chapter on payments was fairly accurate and up to date and would have been very useful reading for me when I first came into the payments business five years ago.The next couple of chapters were the ones that I thought would have been of most interest to me when I first looked at the contents prior to reading the book. They cover common systems used within retail banking and an outline of a number of types of typical IT projects in the retail banking sector.The first of these is a useful point of reference to a number of the systems uses by retail banks today. However a lot of the detailed material in this chapter is comprised of little more that the marketing material of some of the providers of these systems. Similarly the chapter on typical IT projects in retail banking is comprised mainly of case studies which have been provided by various software vendors.If I have one criticism of this book it would be about the lack of any critical analysis of the merits or otherwise of any of these common systems or the products used in these case studies. However having said that, if you assume that the potential readership of these books will be IT professionals then I suppose you can also assume that they will have the ability to see through the marketing hype and understand the functionality of these common systems and the relevance of the typical projects to their own business.The last few chapters cover terminology used in retail banking, an overview of various IT methodologies, skills and tools which are commonly used in the banking sector and a view of future trends in retail banking. One of the lessons I have learned in my 24 years working in IT is that whatever technical skills you gain may only be of use to you for five or ten years and you will find that you need to constantly work to update and renew those technical skills. However any business knowledge you gain will stand to you throughout your career and will usually still be of benefit many years later.I think the concept of a series of books that provide IT professionals with business knowledge is a very welcome one and I suspect that I will have occasions to refer to my review copy of Business Knowledge for IT in Retail Banking in the future.I think that this is a book which should be read by people who are coming into retail banking from a technical IT background, however I would recommend that you should treat it as an introduction and overview rather than a comprehensive handbook. The bibliography and list of useful websites are good points of reference to finding further information on the particular aspects of retail banking that you may need to go into further detail on.*********************************************************************It is not often that a book on IT receives praise and recommendations from so manyreviewers. Rated ten out of ten by the British Computer Society A"Book of the MonthA"(reviewer Alan Pllard), it was reported as A"superb and highly recommended readingA".It is the third in a series of guides for IT professionals working in the finance sectorand, we are told, A"goes a long way to bridging the understanding gapA" between IT andbusiness.It is billed as the complete handbook for IT professionals who are working in thefinance sector and the publishers believe, it should be of value not only to IT people butalso to the customers of the finance sector.The book includes discussions of the most frequently used methodologies as well asthe software suites and the packages produced for financial-activity in business.It claims to be topical and to contain information about the current regulations andtheir effect on business and the strategies required to respond to them.One of the big problems with producing a book of this type is that not only are ITsystems and methods changing at a great pace but also the regulations, with the resultthat new editions would be required to be produced at very frequent intervals. Even so,the present text is for the moment, up-to-date in most areas and remains a useful andhighly recommended text to consult.Reviewed C.J.H. MannBook Reviews and Reports Section Editor Emerald Group Publishing Limited *********************************************************************Coming soon .www.bizle.biz, the definitive online networking portal dedicated to the alignment of IT and business across industry sectors. Features to include news, chartrooms, articles, job board and much more. For more information please contact us on info@bizle.biz.

Knowledge is power; business knowledge is even more so! Business savvy IT professionals to rule the world; it is a given. The future is bright for IT professionals with business knowledge of their chosen industry sector. Ladies and gentlemen in IT, it is our pleasure to introduce "Business Knowledge for IT in Retail Banking" designed to deliver the required business knowledge to discerning IT professionals in the Retail banking industry. The 12 chapters in this book cover the following topics: an overview of the Retail banking; recent trends in Retail banking; the business environment in Retail Banking; major players in the Retail banking industry; the common systems used in Retail banking; and, the future of IT and business in Retail banking.Latest innovations in business and IT in the Retail banking industry discussed in the book include SEPA, The Faster Payment Initiative , Business Process Automation, Islamic Banking, SWIFT for Corporates, Banking in the Virtual World , Customer Analytics and much more. The contributors to this book include: Misys, Blue Prism, Polarlake, Iflex Solutions, Chordiant , Voca, Temenos , Oracle Corporation, APAK Group and Infosys. "Business Knowledge for IT in Retail banking" is an invaluable handbook for professionals working in retail banking and crossovers. It is targeted at IT professionals such as: Project Managers; Application developers; Development Managers; Test Managers; Business Analysts; Data Analysts; Systems Analysts; Test Analysts; Support Analysts; Database Administrators; and HR staff responsible for IT recruitment.