As the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered workplaces around the world, organizations raced to pivot to remote work. Fidelity rolled out a comprehensive strategy to minimize exposure to the virus and protect the communities we serve. Nearly all of our colleagues were working remotely by the end of March. Major advances had already been made towards the goal of a fully paperless office—but the pandemic urged our teams to move even faster.
At this time, a small team at Fidelity Labs was already developing FidSafe for Business—a secure document-sharing platform for Fidelity associates and external users. The team was able to test and quickly launch FidSafe, making it possible for multiple business units to continue “work as usual.”
FidSafe for Business is more than an important pandemic-prompted adaptation. It’s also a shared database that promotes a more seamless experience for our customers, who interact with Fidelity in numerous ways. Harshal Morparia, head of product management, shares their journey.
Despite Fidelity’s strides towards digitization, paper-based documents still played a role in customer service. But when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, going paperless wasn’t just about a more convenient customer experience; it was also about keeping people safe. Can you describe the urgency of this moment?
Fidelity quickly pivoted to remote work. Our customers were depending on us and needed our advice and service even more during this difficult period. We rose to the challenge. We needed safe ways to handle planning and advice appointments, and secure, efficient processes for sending and receiving service forms and other documents. All across the firm, teams were challenged to move fast to handle these immediate needs.
“Fidelity quickly pivoted to remote work. Our customers were depending on us and needed our advice and service even more during this difficult period. “ – Harshal Morparia
The first generation of FidSafe was developed by Fidelity Labs. It was a service that provided free personal document storage that our customers could use during major life events, like buying a home or managing retirement. What’s different about FidSafe for Business?
FidSafe for Business is built on the original vision of FidSafe, and we extended it for enterprise use. FidSafe for Business is a platform for sending and receiving documents and forms which is tightly integrated with several major systems and processes within the company.
Your team ran a month-long pilot before your national launch. That sounds like record-setting speed. What helps an internal startup within an enterprise like Fidelity handle tight deadlines?
The main enabler for this was platform and product thinking and execution. Building a single infrastructure that could be configured for multiple groups of users and use cases made rapid implementation possible. We implemented four different use cases simultaneously. Other enablers include great mentorship, guidance, and support from Fidelity Labs and Fidelity business units.
Now that FidSafe for Business is live, are we starting to see some of the impact of more widespread digitization?
We’ve received glowing feedback. An advisor in Hartford, Connecticut, has called the client vault feature “game-changing.” A relationship manager in Durham, North Carolina, also uses FidSafe’s client vault and “absolutely loves it.” Since our national launch in December 2020, we have saved hundreds of hours of Fidelity associate time within our branches, and usage of our platform is ramping up quickly.
“We created a highly scalable platform that solves a big need. “ —Harshal Morparia
FidSafe is a great example of how nimble we can be in a crisis. But it’s more than that. How does FidSafe promote a more seamless customer experience?
Our customers may interact with many parts of Fidelity over the course of their lives. They trust us with their personal investing, workplace investing, life insurance and charitable giving, among many other things. FidSafe aggregates an individual customer’s data into their own designated data vault. This promotes a more seamless and holistic service across all parts of Fidelity, no matter who a customer speaks to at our company. Of course, access is only granted to the people our customers are interacting with. Our fine-grained permissions rules keep the vaults secure.
What was exciting and fulfilling about building FidSafe?
We built the platform like we would build a product—from the ground up. We’re using all the latest technologies and platforms. We have a great team that is highly motivated by our mission. We created a highly scalable platform that solves a big need. Encouraged with this initial success, we are expanding our vision and looking forward to creating a vault for customers that will help to satisfy many other additional needs. It’s exciting and fulfilling that we have the opportunity to improve the customer experience for millions of users in a meaningful manner.
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