Balancing Efficiency, Security, and Customer Satisfaction in Digital Transformation in the Swedish Banking Industry : A mixed-methods study of managerial and customer perspectives

Sammanfattning

The banking sector has in recent years experienced significant changes with digitalization, where digital technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) have increasingly been integrated into banking operations and customer services. Meanwhile, this digital transformation has created new opportunities to improve efficiency, accessibility, and customer convenience. It has also introduced new challenges related to security, trust, and customer relationships. This study examines how Swedish banks balance efficiency, security, and customer satisfaction when adopting digital technologies, with AI as a key example. This study uses a mixed-method approach where it combines quantitative and qualitative findings. The quantitative analysis consists of a survey of 125 respondents which examines customers' perceptions regarding the different digital banking services, trust, convenience, customer satisfaction, and digital technology use. The qualitative component consists of five semi-structured interviews with employees from different banks which are aimed at providing deeper understanding of the organizational perspectives, technological implications, and the trade-offs that are associated with digitalization. The empirical findings have been analyzed using different methods such as regression analysis, ANOVA, and thematic analysis. The findings suggest that digital technologies and AI-based systems have helped improve efficiency within different banking operations through automation, improved workflows, faster communication, and simplified customer interaction. Customers seem to generally reactpositively towards digital banking services if they perceive them as convenient,accessible,and easy to use. However, at the same time, the findings have indicated that this increase in digital technologies within banks has created an increase in concern in new security risks such as fraud, cyber threats, privacy, and system reliability. As a result, banks seem to always prioritize security even if this might reduce efficiency and convenience. The study has also found that for banks to have a successful digital transformation, they must maintain a balance between technological innovation and continued human involvement. As the findings show that customers usually seem to be more willing to accept this shift towards more digital technologies and AI-supported banking systems if human oversight remains present. The results therefore show that this digital transformation is not only driven by this idea of maximizing efficiency but rather trying to find a way to continue balancing efficiency, security, and customer satisfaction. The study contributes to already existing research by providing a deeper understanding of how efficiency, security, and customer satisfaction are connected within these highly digitalized banking sectors and how banks find ways to manage them. It also highlights the continued importance of trying to balance technological innovation with human involvement in these AI-supported banking services.