Financial services comprise over 4 percent of the gross domestic product of the United States and employ over 5.4 million people. By offering vehicles for investment of savings, extension of credit and risk management, they fuel the modern capitalistic society.<p> <p>While the essential functions...</p></p>

How does a retail bank innovate? Traditional innovation literature would suggest that organizations innovate by getting new and/or improved products to market. However, in a service, the product is the process. Thus, innovation in banking lies more in process and organizational changes than in...

This case study in retail banking reviews the work of a Wharton School research team which has been tracking the process of change at one of the larger American commercial banks. The bank is referred to by the pseudonym "National Bank." The team's research focuses on how a bank chooses what...

Data Envelopment Analysis (D.E.A.) has been widely studied in the literature since its inception in 1978. The methodology behind the classical D.E.A., the oriented method, is to hold inputs (outputs) constant and to determine how much of an improvement in the output (input) dimensions is...