TQM at HSBC

TQM at HSBC is not a new phenomenon. TQM at HSBC has very strong foothold. Like many organizations, HSBC has always managed knowledge; it just does not call it that. However, being able to capitalize on the technological capabilities now available to capture, develop and share knowledge globally is only half (maybe only a quarter) of the problem. Effective and intelligent working in the new ‘knowledge enabled’ environment is as much about the mindset of employees and their managers as it is about software tools that offer state-of-the-art collaborative working. Knowledge management and TQM at HSBC have not found much success in infiltrating the hard-bitten world of financial services, where bottom-line justification for any business initiative has to be clear. This is why KM work in such organizations can still be called pioneering even though the principles are no longer new.

The longer knowledge-management practitioners are largely unable to prove clear links between effective KM, improvements in performance and TQM at HSBC the bigger the danger that it gets tossed into the ‘yesterday’s fad’ bucket alongside, management by wandering around, business-process re-engineering, total-quality management, investors in people and the learning organization.  In 2002, HSBC created a small specialist KM and TQM at HSBC unit located within a newly re-organized human resources function. Remember, HSBC is a true giant in the financial-services world occupying the number two spot after Citigroup, employing over 250,000 people in 80 countries, with a grand and highly successful tradition dating back over 150 years.

Unlike some of the recognized ‘greats’ of KM, (BP and Buckman Laboratories, for example), HSBC is not an organization in crisis looking to KM to dig it out of a hole. Knowledge management has a more difficult remit in HSBC: it must improve an already very well-functioning machine that delivered $6bn pre-tax profit at the last count. Any company the size and power of HSBC will nonetheless have tremendous potential to harness the collective wisdom and ability of its global workforce, an area where KM should have a major contribution.

One year down the road and the KM and TQM at HSBC unit is no more, the victim of a further re-organization. This is not to say that the organization has stopped working on knowledge management or that the need for improving knowledge-related activities has passed. The need to effectively connect those with problems to those with solutions continues, but the strategy of driving KM through an autonomous unit is dead.

Successes achieved in the short time that the KM and TQM at HSBC unit was fully up and running included the introduction and development of a group-wide e-directory, pioneering the introduction of an electronic expertise-location tool. They also conducted the first ever knowledge audit, and introduced several knowledge-acquisition projects to minimize business risks and capture expertise. All of which led to significantly raising the profile of KM and TQM at HSBC issues.

Additionally, HSBC Bank Malaysia Berhad won the Asia Pacific ICT Awards 2003 (APICTA) for the Best E-Commerce Application at the recent Asia Pacific ICT Award competition held in Bangkok, Thailand, making it the first bank to have won the APICTA Award, both in Malaysia and at the Asia Pacific level.