Building a High-Performing Global Capability Center for a Leading Nordics Bank
From outsourcing mindset to ownership, customer-centricity and engineering excellence in 24 months.
- International Nordics Bank
- 3,500 employees (Nordics + India)
- Global Capability Center (GCC) in Bangalore, India
Client Overview
A reputed Nordics bank relied heavily on an outsourced partner in India for its core technology operations. Platform stability, enhancement velocity and customer experience were not meeting expectations. To regain control and build long-term capability, the bank decided to set up its own Global Capability Centre (GCC).
They chose to absorb 1,000+ employees from the outsourced partner and hire 2,500+ new employees directly into the GCC.
- International Nordics Bank
- 3,500+
- Global Capability Center (GCC), India
Transformation Goal
To build a captive GCC with strong Tech capabilities in India to support the current and future business expansion plans of the Nordics Bank.
- People Capability: In Platform and Mainframes
- Employee Strength: 3500+
- Talent Mobility: Global
Business Challenge
The bank faced a dual challenge:
- Strategic & Operational Challenges
- Establishing the GCC facility in India
- Migrating 1000+ employees from the Outsourced partner into own entity
- Rapid expansion from 1000 to 3500 employees
- Cultural Challenges
- Shifting the mindset of absorbed employees (1,000+)
- Integrating new hires (2,500+)
- Alignment with the bank’s Nordic ethos of trust, transparency and accountability
The GCC needed to operate as a strategic engineering hub – with ownership, speed, reliability and strong customer-centric thinking at its core.
Engagement Objectives
Planet Ganges was brought in to architect and implement a full-scale culture transformation program:
- Diagnose the current culture and mindset
- Design a top-down OD and change intervention for the new GCC
- Co-create a vision, mission, strategy and “intentional culture” with leadership
- Collaboration and camaraderie across the newly formed leadership team
- Align hiring and people systems to future behaviours and capabilities
- Build leadership and managerial capability across levels
- Deliver cross-cultural sensitisation (India–Nordics)
- Strengthen engineering excellence, ownership and customer-centricity
- Drive employee engagement and improved retention
Approach & Methodology
We used a structured diagnose → design → intervene methodology:
01
Deep diagnostics: leadership interviews, employee workshops, culture and mindset mapping
02
Leadership visioning: co-created GCC vision, mission, strategy and culture with the leadership team
03
Capability building: leadership and managerial development workshops across levels
04
Coaching: developmental coaching for selected senior leaders to model the new culture
05
Vertical OD interventions: focused work with teams showing behavioural or delivery challenges
06
Cross-cultural programs: sensitisation and collaboration workshops between India and Nordic leaders and teams
07
System alignment: hiring and talent practices realigned to future-ready behaviours
Results in 24 Months
- Cohesive leadership unit fully aligned behind the GCC CEO
- A compelling Employee Value Proposition to attract and retain top tech talent
- Resolved performance issues in select teams through vertical OD interventions
- Clear development and career roadmaps for employees
- Augmented Manager & leadership capability
- Stronger India–Nordics collaboration through cross-cultural work
- Employee satisfaction >85% YoY
- High-performance teams delivering significant value to the parent bank
- Talent progression from GCC into global roles in the parent entity
Client Testimonial
Planet Ganges is a prominent player in Business Transformation, delivering tailored interventions in Organisational Culture, Climate, and Leadership Capability.
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Planet Ganges is a prominent player in Business Transformation, delivering tailored interventions in Organisational Culture, Climate, and Leadership Capability.