The former ANZ CFO, who took over the chief executive's reigns from previous incumbent Mike Smith just last month, chose a KPMG-hosted Melbourne fintech meetup as his first public speaking engagement, the Sydney Morning Herald reported, and emphasised the bank's openness to new ideas.

Inviting the roomful of local entrepreneurs to email him or the bank's CTO Patrick Maes personally to share their ideas, Elliott said: "We want to make it easier for people to better engage with the bank. In the old days that was just about having great people in the branch who could greet them with a smile and help ...increasingly it is now about having good technology."

One of his first acts since taking over the CEO's chair was a shakeup of senior management and the creation of a new role for a group executive, Digital Banking, who will be responsible for driving the bank's digital transformation strategy.

He told the bank's internal news sheet ANZ BlueNotes "We have terrific businesses today, particularly our retail and commercial businesses here in Australia and New Zealand. We really want to get focussed on those and we're adding a whole new part of it around our digital announcement, which is really the future of those businesses."

At the Melbourne meeting, Elliott said he wants to emulate the experience of new digital economy companies that are elevating customer experiences around shopping and banking. "Uber and Airbnb are now the sorts of companies that are defining what a good customer experience looks like for booking a cab or a room. People want to know why transferring money isn't as easy as that," he said. "We need to learn to think like a small disruptive company that is prepared to cannibalise our revenue streams, because it is in digital opportunities that we are going to find growth."