Craig Bright, Barclays’ Group CIO, explains how Barclays is harnessing new developments in GenAI capability, moving fast – but doing it safely, securely, and thoughtfully.
At Barclays, we’re advancing the way we work by integrating cutting-edge AI technologies. Our journey with AI is about creating tangible benefits for our customers and colleagues.
That’s why we're excited about what’s coming next – particularly as we explore the practical applications of Generative AI (GenAI) and scale our use of this powerful technology to enhance customer experiences, support decision-making with real-time insights, streamline workflows, and improve the speed and efficiency of change.
Scaling AI to enhance customer experience
We’re applying cloud-based AI models across our organisation. For example, in Barclays UK we’ve launched a GenAI colleague assistant that instantly provides colleagues with the information needed to support customers, reducing average call handling times. Meanwhile, in our US Consumer Bank and our Private Bank and Wealth Management divisions, we’re further leveraging AI technology and seeing visible improvements in summarising calls, and in Markets we're now in production with a FX tool we call 'BarxBot' that enables our colleagues to initiate trades more effectively. While across the organisation, we're using Gen AI to unlock deeper insights from our data and deploy intelligent agents to automate routine workflows. As the technology advances at pace, we’re progressing new opportunities – including emerging agentic AI patterns to deliver innovative solutions to our customers and clients in a safe and responsible way.
“The opportunity lies in how we use AI alongside everything we know about our customers to improve their experience with us”
Craig Bright, CIO, Barclays
From Code to Collaboration
Customers can see some of the things we’re doing where this work interacts with them, but much of our innovation is happening behind the scenes. We’ve been rolling out GitLab Duo to enhance the developer experience and accelerate software delivery. By integrating AI into the developer workflow – from code suggestions to test generation and vulnerability detection – our teams are writing better code, faster. And it's not just about writing new code. We're refactoring legacy code, models and complex spreadsheets into their modern form. Our developers are experiencing meaningful productivity gains - freeing them up to focus on higher-value problem solving.
In parallel, Microsoft Copilot is helping teams across functions work more efficiently – drafting documents, analysing data, summarising meetings, and streamlining everyday tasks. Later this year 50,000 colleagues will be enabled with Microsoft Copilot, with this set to double in early 2026.
These tools are reducing friction, freeing up time and allowing our people to focus on what matters most: Thinking, creating, and connecting.
AI as an ‘augmenter’: rethinking how we work
AI is not a standalone solution – it’s a strategic augmenter. We’re entering a new era of work where productivity is no longer defined just by individual effort, but by how effectively we engage with both people and intelligent systems.
Over the past year, we’ve been actively testing AI tools and learning how to embed them into our workflows and ways of working. Importantly, we’ve involved our colleagues early in the process – co-designing solutions with them, and in some cases, being led by them, as we’ve seen through initiatives like our hackathons. And because the technology is evolving rapidly, we’re staying agile – adapting as we go, learning continuously, and refining our approach to keep pace with change.
When used thoughtfully, intelligent agents will become collaborators – surfacing insights faster, anticipating needs, and navigating complexity - so we can serve our customers with greater precision and responsiveness. This fusion of human and digital collaboration enables people to focus on what matters most, amplify their strengths, and ultimately be their best.
The opportunity lies in how we connect AI with everything we know about our customers. In complex environments like banking where clarity, trust and speed are critical.
Our GenAI Centre of Excellence
We also need to recognise what AI can’t yet do. It’s not a silver bullet, and there are still areas where it’s not yet fit for purpose, particularly in a regulated sector like financial services.
That’s why responsible adoption matters. We need strong safeguards, clear governance, and a deep understanding of where AI adds value – and where human judgement must remain central. It’s about trust, not just technology.
With the pace of change in AI, organisations risk taking a wrong turn if the right safeguards aren’t in place – particularly around security and fraud prevention.
This is why we’re focused on pace with purpose – we have clear goals, run pilots with measurable outcomes, and then adopt – within a framework of responsibility and trust.
We’ve set up a GenAI Centre of Excellence that is a hub for sharing ideas, successes and lessons learned – it encourages cross-functional collaboration and continuous improvement in how AI is used, while maintaining strong governance and control. They identify high-value use cases, provide reusable components, and support rapid experimentation – so teams don’t reinvent the wheel but build on shared best practice.
The Centre of Excellence also drive enablement and education – equipping our teams with the knowledge, tools and training they need to use AI safely and effectively, promoting AI literacy and responsible use right across Barclays. They run the hackathons, mentioned earlier, with thousands of colleagues involved - a great way to ideate and drive interest. Unsurprisingly, GenAI has sparked huge enthusiasm, not just within technology teams but across every function – operations, risk, compliance, human resources and front-line customer service.
Everywhere, any time, all at once
In some ways, personal engagement with the customer might sound old-fashioned – but it’s more possible than ever. Thanks to AI and data-driven tools, meaningful interactions can happen everywhere, anytime, all at once – because colleagues who connect with the customer will have relevant insights at their fingertips.
What excites me is this opportunity to fundamentally change how we engage with customers, which in turn means we can rethink our internal processes. It creates a virtuous circle.