Customer Journey Operating Model in Banking in 2026: The TOM Blueprint for Customer-Led Execution

At a Glance

Banks in 2026 move from product silos to a Customer Journey Operating Model: govern end-to-end journeys with agentic AI, unified data, omnichannel orchestration, embedded controls, and outcome KPIs tied to economics and risk.

Why customer journey operating models have become the action blueprint

Many banks have declared “customer centricity” for years, yet still execute through product silos, channel fragmentation, and inconsistent decisioning across touchpoints. A Customer Journey Operating Model (CJOM) turns the ambition into an operating blueprint by organizing delivery and control around end-to-end journeys rather than product lines. In 2026, that blueprint is increasingly viewed as a Target Operating Model (TOM) choice, not a CX initiative, because it determines how the bank allocates funding, governs change, manages risk, and proves outcomes.

The practical driver is execution reality. Customers experience the bank through journeys—discovering an offer, onboarding, getting a decision, resolving an issue—not through internal ownership boundaries. Meanwhile, technologies such as agentic AI and hyper-personalization can improve responsiveness and reduce cost-to-serve, but only when they are embedded into repeatable operational processes with traceable accountability. Where banks have adopted journey-led operating models, they frequently report materially faster growth and better conversion outcomes than banks that have not, precisely because delivery is organized around customer outcomes rather than internal throughput.

What a CJOM is and what it changes in a bank’s TOM

A CJOM defines how the bank designs, delivers, measures, and governs customer journeys across digital and physical touchpoints. It changes the “unit of management” from products and channels to journey outcomes, and it formalizes how cross-functional teams coordinate decisions, data, controls, and technology components across that journey.

As a TOM construct, a CJOM clarifies decision rights, operating ownership, and performance measures for each journey stage. It also establishes how supporting functions—risk, compliance, data governance, cyber, finance, and operations—integrate into journey delivery without reintroducing handoffs that create friction, delays, and inconsistent customer treatment.

Core pillars of a 2026 customer journey operating model

Agentic AI and human collaboration

Agentic AI introduces a new execution pattern: automated actions taken on behalf of the customer or banker within defined policy boundaries. A CJOM must specify where autonomy is permitted, where human review is required, and how decisions are logged and explainable. The aim is not maximum automation; it is controlled automation that improves speed and quality without eroding accountability.

Unified data foundations

Journey-led execution depends on coherent customer context. Unified data foundations include consistent customer identifiers, event capture across channels, defined data ownership, lineage for critical elements used in decisioning, and access governance that supports personalization while respecting privacy and regulatory constraints. Without these foundations, journey orchestration becomes a layer of rules over inconsistent data, producing fragile outcomes and supervisory risk.

Customer-centric taxonomy

A customer-centric taxonomy standardizes journey definitions, stage outcomes, and measurement across business lines. This is the mechanism that allows the bank to manage journeys as assets: onboarding, lending origination, servicing, complaints, and retention can be consistently defined, instrumented, and improved. It also enables comparability across segments and geographies, which is essential for prioritization and governance.

Proactive and predictive engagement

In 2026, engagement strategies increasingly shift from reactive responses to predictive, context-driven interventions. Proactive engagement requires orchestration rules, real-time decisioning, and controls that prevent inappropriate or biased offers. A CJOM therefore ties predictive engagement to guardrails: suitability thresholds, fairness checks, and monitoring that detects drift in outcomes over time.

The five standard journey stages and how the operating model applies

Awareness

Awareness is where the bank’s proposition and trust signals are established. Operationally, this stage requires consistent offer governance, marketing compliance controls, and measurement that connects spend to journey conversion—not only to impressions or clicks.

Onboarding and activation

Onboarding is the most common point of friction in retail and SME journeys. A CJOM defines a single onboarding experience across channels with shared identity, KYC evidence, and risk decisioning, backed by data lineage and audit trails. Agentic support can reduce manual follow-up, but the model must clearly define exception routes for complex cases.

Monetization and decision

Decision journeys (credit, limits, pricing, approvals) require consistent policy application, explainability standards, and clear ownership for decision outcomes. In 2026, banks increasingly differentiate by decision speed and contextual relevance; however, the operating model must ensure that acceleration does not bypass controls or create inconsistent treatment across segments.

Engagement and retention

Retention depends on the bank’s ability to recognize intent signals, resolve issues quickly, and personalize interactions without becoming intrusive. The CJOM defines containment targets for self-service, service recovery playbooks, and feedback loops that translate customer signals into operational changes.

Advocacy

Advocacy is created by reliability and trust, not just by promotions. Operationally, it requires consistent handling of complaints, transparent outcomes, and proof that customer issues are used to improve products and processes. This stage is where the bank’s control effectiveness is often most visible to customers.

Implementation strategies that make the CJOM executable in 2026

Establish a chief customer owner with decision authority

Many banks are formalizing customer accountability through a Chief Customer Officer or equivalent executive owner for journey outcomes. The intent is to reduce diffusion of responsibility: if onboarding is a top strategic priority, there should be a named executive with authority to resolve cross-functional conflicts, set performance measures, and enforce operating changes.

Budget allocation that follows journeys, not silos

Journey-led operating models fail when funding remains product-centric. Banks that operationalize CJOMs typically allocate budget to journey backlogs and shared enabling platforms (identity, data, orchestration, consent, monitoring), with explicit rules for prioritizing shared components that unlock multiple journeys.

Cross-functional teams with embedded risk and control design

Cross-functional teams are necessary but not sufficient. The CJOM must specify how risk, compliance, and control design integrate into delivery so that governance is not a late-stage review gate that slows change. Embedding control-by-design into journey work reduces rework and improves auditability.

Outcome-based KPIs that connect experience to economics and control health

Journey KPIs need to connect customer outcomes to bank economics and risk posture. Leading banks pair conversion and NPS measures with operational metrics (cycle time, containment, error rates) and control indicators (exception rates, decision overrides, complaint themes, model drift signals). This prevents “experience uplift” from being achieved by creating hidden operational debt.

Customer expectations that are shaping 2026 operating choices

Customer expectations in 2026 are less forgiving of discontinuity. Customers want immediate service, expect the bank to retain full context across channels, and judge the experience by how seamlessly digital and physical touchpoints connect. Personalized recommendations are increasingly expected, but personalization is only valuable when it is relevant, timely, and trustworthy. These expectations raise the bar for journey orchestration because they require unified context, consistent decisioning, and resilience when services degrade.

Validating CJOM ambitions and prioritizing the TOM build

Moving to a customer journey operating model is a strategic commitment that depends on current digital capability. Leaders need a disciplined way to test whether their CJOM ambitions are feasible: whether data foundations can support context-aware orchestration, whether AI governance can support agentic actions with traceability, whether operating ownership and decision rights are clear, and whether delivery discipline is strong enough to sustain iterative change without degrading resilience.

That is where a maturity benchmark strengthens prioritization. By assessing readiness across governance effectiveness, data management, omnichannel operations, operational resilience, and AI controls, executives can sequence the TOM build so early journey wins do not create long-term fragility. Used as an execution tool in this context, the DUNNIXER Digital Maturity Assessment provides a structured way to evaluate CJOM readiness, tighten investment choices, and increase confidence that journey-led transformation will scale under the bank’s risk and regulatory constraints.

References

• https://www.fintechfutures.com/ai-in-fintech/banking-in-2026-production-scale-ai-agents#:~:text=Conclusion,those%20still%20navigating%20early%20experimentation.
• https://www.zendesk.com/se/blog/customer-experience-in-banking/
• https://www.publicissapient.com/insights/scale-customer-journey-transformations-for-financial-services#:~:text=Provide%20the%20right%20organizational%20support,well%20as%20all%20underpinning%20capabilities.
• https://latinia.com/en/resources/customer-centric-banking#:~:text=Understanding%20the%20Customer%20Journey%20in,value%20and%20optimize%20the%20experience.
• https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/banking/accenture-banking-trends-2026#:~:text=Banking%20everywhere%20it%20matters,non%2Dbank%20and%20bank%20channels.
• https://www.hirehoratio.com/blog/customer-centricity-in-banking#:~:text=Key%20takeaways,customer%20behaviors%20in%20real%20time.
• https://www.accenture.com/us-en/insights/banking/accenture-banking-trends-2026#:~:text=The%20future%20of%20banking%20hinges,connection%20with%20AI%2Ddriven%20convenience.
• https://www.ey.com/en_ly/insights/banking-capital-markets/customer-centricity-in-banking-transformation#:~:text=As%20a%20starting%20point%2C%20banks,but%20it%20is%20an%20afterthought.
• https://www.capgemini.com/insights/research-library/banking-top-trends-2026/#:~:text=Banks%20and%20payment%20providers%20are%20rapidly%20adopting%20innovative%20payment%20solutions,to%20adapt%20their%20business%20models.
• https://www.profilesw.com/insights/how-tailored-customer-journeys-enhance-digital-banking/#:~:text=Understanding%20the%20customer's%20journey,of%20customers%20at%20each%20stage.
• https://thefinancialbrand.com/news/artificial-intelligence-banking/three-key-shifts-to-make-2026-your-inflection-point-for-ai-in-banking-194723#:~:text=The%20Bottom%20Line,well%20as%20leading%20Microsoft%20Stores.
• https://www.zendesk.com/sg/blog/customer-experience-in-banking/
• https://www.zendesk.com/blog/customer-experience-in-banking/
• https://curinos.com/our-insights/curinos-perspective-stages-ai-maturity-banking-pilots-to-performance/#:~:text=2026:%20The%20First%20Full%20Year,growth%2C%20efficiency%20and%20customer%20engagement.
• https://www.ibm.com/think/insights/building-customer-operations-drive-growth#:~:text=Use%20IBM%20Watson's%20AI%20or,and%20operational%20workloads%20and%20data
• https://www.factors.ai/blog/stages-of-the-customer-journey#:~:text=The%20customer%20journey%20consists%20of,and%20strategies%20for%20each%20stage.
• https://cxomni.net/en/definition-best-practices-customer-journey-mapping/#:~:text=Additionally%2C%20Journey%20Management%20is%20outcome%2Ddriven%2C%20focusing%20on,conversion%20rates%2C%20or%20customer%20lifetime%20value%20(CLV).