01
The defining edge
AI is no longer a luxury. It is becoming the defining source of competitive advantage in financial services.
Programme opens 11 May 2026
Ten mornings. Five minutes each.
The Daily Dispatch is the runway into Sim Tshabalala's CE Leadership Conference on 25 May 2026. For ten working days, a single email lands at 7:30am. One Perplexity prompt that sits directly on a piece of the strategy. You work the question. Reply with a sentence. Done.
Opens 11 May
337
Senior leaders
setting the direction
setting the direction
10
Working days
of daily prompts
of daily prompts
5min
A morning
before the bank wakes up
before the bank wakes up
100lvl
Personal level cap
no public rankings
no public rankings
"
Start meetings with questions, not with presentations. Reward the room for asking, not for already knowing.
Aravind Srinivas· co-founder & CEO, Perplexity AI
Why now
02
Client evolution
Clients now expect real-time, intelligent, AI-enabled interactions as the new baseline, not a premium.
03
The cost of inaction
Pioneers are seeing a 0 to 2% ROE uplift. Slow movers face a 2 to 4% ROE hit. The gap compounds.
04
Our new identity
Standard Bank is moving from fast follower to AI-native provider. Posture, not just programme.
The question for the leaders in this room is
Which side of that curve are we standing on?
What it actually is
Not a course. A daily rep.
AI adoption moves at the speed of leaders. If the top 337 of us are visibly using it every morning, the rest of the bank follows. If we're not, no rollout plan or town hall fixes that. The Daily Dispatch is the runway.
Microsoft SSO from the email. No app, no platform.
Every prompt sits on a piece of the 2028 strategy
Posture, not programme. How Standard Bank thinks.
How a day will work · five minutes, four steps
0130 sec
OPEN
Open your Daily Dispatch email. One prompt, one screen.
022 min
ASK
Paste the prompt into Perplexity. Read what comes back.
0390 sec
REFINE
Push back. Add a follow-up that sharpens the answer.
0460 sec
SUBMIT
Submit one line. The insight, action or shift you'll carry into your day.
= 5 MINUTES A DAY · 50 MINUTES OVER TWO WEEKS · ONE NEW HABIT
The two-week arc
Week 1 · Days 1 to 5
Get sharper about my team
Five mornings to clarify judgement, not test compliance. What could move my team toward 2028, sourced credibly, from insight to action.
Week 2 · Days 6 to 9
Translate strategy into execution
From sharper thinking to competitive moves. Strategy in your seat, payments and fintech, group collaboration, competitor scans.
Day 10 · 25 May
On the stage
A pre-mortem on the 2028 strategy. Three winning 50-word messages are read live by Margaret at the CE Leadership Conference.
Each morning's prompt drops at 7:30am. No previews. No back-fills.
A daily prompt, up close
Tomorrow's prompt is waiting for you.
In PerplexityEach morning you'll get one sharp question, fixed to a country, a corridor, a target or a client. The output should change a meeting.
▸Then push back. Refine. Sharpen. The follow-up is where the answer earns its keep.
●Submit one line. The insight, action or shift you'll carry into your day.
⚡ Streak points📊 Depth score🎯 Levels & XP
That's it. Five minutes. One sentence back. Done.
Self-assessment, not a contest
No leaderboards, no peer voting, no public ranks. The scoreboard is yours alone. Two private metrics drive your level and tier through the ten days.100 lvl
70%
Streak
Days completed out of ten. Daily beats binge. Miss a day, the streak resets. The point is the habit, not the score.
Rule: one prompt, same day, no back-fills.
30%
Depth
How much thought you put into your reply. Click-and-run doesn't score; a considered sentence does. You see your own depth, no one else's.
Rule: bot-patterns and stuffing flagged and zeroed.
What you walk away with
Mid-presentation
01
Three signature stories
On Day 10, every leader writes 50 words on what their BU should be known for in 2028. Margaret picks three to read live on stage.
Three voices in the room get to set tone for the day.
Through the programme
02
Personal scoreboard
Your level, streak, and XP are private. The point is your own progress, not a public ranking.
No public ranking. No peer voting. Self-assessment only.
Day 10 · 25 May
03
A new shared story
Ten morning reps build a shared vocabulary across the room. The CMD stage gets a sharper conversation.
The room walks in primed. The conversation moves faster.
Day 10 · The Stage · 25 May 2026 · Sandton
The fact you wrote down.
On Day 10, every leader writes 50 words on what they want this room to believe about their BU's role in the 2028 story. Margaret picks three. She reads them in full, on stage, at the CE Leadership Conference. Leaders write themselves into the room.
Shape · Data
"In 2028, BCB clients will know us by what we anticipate, not what we approve."
Shape · Risk
"CIB's moat in 2028 is that we know what to underwrite before our clients ask."
Shape · People
"IAM in 2028 is the team my grandmother trusts."
Illustrative shapes only. The real lines come from your Day 10.
Three years. One arc.
2026
Refining foundations
Two to three Front-Runner use cases live in every business function. Pattern-finding, not platform-building.
2027
Enabling at scale
End-to-end deployment within each function. The Front-Runners become the way work gets done.
2028
Full value
R5bn EBITDA realised across the group. AI is no longer a programme. It's the operating model.
From front-runner pilots to full-group value. A deliberate, sequenced build. The Daily Dispatch is the posture shift that opens 2026.
The Hour · 25 May · sixty minutes, seven beats
01
Daily Dispatch
5 min
MC
02
Walk-on + Fireside
17 min
Margaret + film
03
AI Blueprint
15 min
Margaret
04
Roundtable
5 min
BU AI leads · film
05
Payments
10 min
Margaret
06
CMD Stories
3 min
Recorded
07
Day 10 + Close
5 min
Margaret + film
Margaret on stageFilm / pre-recorded
Margaret holds the room for five of the seven beats. Two film segments give her a moment to reset. Seven emotional temperatures, one rising arc.
What you'll need
5min
A coffee, a desk, and one focused window each morning.
SSO
Microsoft SSO from the email. No new login. No app to install.
AI
Perplexity, or the in-app coach we run on the same model.