Navigating the pandemic and the emerging new normal

As lockdown eases for some, but the situation globally remains precarious and uncertain, I’ve come to accept that the world has changed and we’re having to adapt quickly. We are all now coming to terms with the fundamental changes that the pandemic has made to our daily lives and are having to accept the loss of established ways of living and working.

Some pre-COVID context. A number of members of our team at TAINA come from the financial services industry, with decades of intense experience at the coal face of regulatory compliance, at some of the world’s most complex financial institutions. We recognised the increasing complexity of the global compliance arena, particularly where many regulatory requirements have become mandatory. At TAINA, we developed our Platform around innovation, great customer experience and the resulting cost benefits. Our work is all about streamlining and simplifying for businesses the regulatory landscape that requires adherence to complex regulations and the management of large amounts of data.

Using our Platform frees up compliance teams or departments within individual businesses, enabling them to harness the high level potential within these teams and to, thereby, grow their business. TAINA removes the need to collate data from different sources and in different formats, a laborious and time-consuming exercise that often includes low level activities such as filling out forms. Productivity is improved, customer experience enhanced, cost benefit maximised.

Our Platform is relevant to financial institutions globally. To begin with, our two core hubs were the US and the UK; now we are also focusing on the Swiss market. Growing globally and getting through the COVID lockdown in our key hubs has been an emotional rollercoaster—ultimately very productive but certainly trying.

Working our way through the challenges brought on by COVID-19, we have learned some key lessons, all of which are around the importance of people; our team and our clients.

• 1. People are experiencing their own unique challenges and developing emotional literacy is important. Not always recognised in the workplace, empathy is crucial. It applies to everyone, particularly your own team.
• 2. Stay close to your customers—wherever they are—and be there to offer help and support.
• 3. With the world changing as rapidly as it is, make sure you stay up to date so you can be trusted counsel for your customers.
• 4. Stay close to your partners. In TAINA’s case, these include our clients, industry thought leaders, Big 4, other technology companies. The Department for International Trade (DIT), Mayor of London International Programme, TechNation and our legal counsel Wilson Sonisini have been absolutely awesome as well at every stage of our growth.
• 5. Remember that everyone is under pressure right now and emotions will flare up. Meditate!

During this difficult time, we’ve also discovered some hidden value drivers in our Platform, which have proven crucial in our new world. Here are some of the most important ones:

• 1. Our clients are empowered to continue onboarding new customers with great user experience—whether or not the operational teams are working normally.
• 2. Remote distributed teams are able to stay connected in real time, enabling work to continue.
• 3. Streamlined processes have taken the strain off already stretched operational teams.
• 4. By growing their own business in the new world—and a superior customer experience—our clients have developed a competitive edge.
• 5. Our clients are reassured that the validation rules continue to be followed even if their experts or managers are not available.

So, while we strive to recover from the effects of the pandemic on our working—and personal—lives, our restored understanding of the importance of our relationships with people encourages me to think positively about the future.

For more information on how our fully automated FATCA and CRS Validation platform can add value to your business, get in touch or request a demo to see it in action.