Linking Innovations with Productivity in a Nigeria Banking Firm: What roles for ICT?

In the current knowledge-based era, the role of ICT in boosting productivity and economic growth cannot be over-emphasised. In this era, the Banking system constitutes a very important link between savings (capitalist) and investment (entrepreneurs). The banking system contributes significantly to economic development through venture financing in key sectors of the economy. Over the years, the operations of Nigeria banking sector were manual in nature. The advent of technology explosion however, had made the services faster and efficient. This paper therefore examines the roles of ICT on service delivery in a Nigeria banking firm. This is with a view to making suggestions that can improve the productivity of the banking industry in Nigeria. A survey technique was adopted using structured questionnaire with random samplingon 100 respondents of the bank. The result of the study reveals that ICT had made impacts on the productivity of the bank. However, factors such as affordability of the ICT equipment, high installation and maintenance cost, cultural factors, capability factors, inadequate skilled manpower, network connectivity, cybercrime and response to ICT dynamism among others pose challenges to the applications of ICT in the bank. Some strategies for mitigation of these challenges are suggested.