Bringing Out the Best at Your Bank Through Professional Development

By Katie Reiser

When talking to experts in the area of professional development and leadership coaching (Vicki Kraai, chief engagement officer, Interaction Training and Mika Moser, founder and CEO, At C Level Consulting Group) as well as those leading the charge in this area at Wisconsin Bankers Association-member banks (Kari Geyer, human resources officer, Mound City Bank; Sue Neuzil, PHR, vice president of human resources, Bank of Luxemburg; and Nona Zahn, organizational development manager, Forward Bank) it became clear that investing in professional development sends a strong cultural signal to your team that you are willing to invest in them, that you believe in them as part of the growth story at your bank, and that you want to set them up for success.

Kraai put it blunty, “I’m often asked, ‘What if we develop them and they leave?’ Well, what if you don’t develop them and they stay?”

A Better Buys survey found that employees who have professional development opportunities are 15% more engaged and have 34% higher retention than those who don’t.

Not providing development opportunities can lead to costly turnover. The ExecuSearch Group reported that 86% of professionals would leave their job for one offering more opportunities for professional development.

Contributing to a Culture of Engagement
Moser consults banks across the country and sees that great talent craves growth opportunities. She believes there is real value to providing learning opportunities and professional development because it improves employee
engagement. This is key because, as Moser pointed out, “Employees that are engaged tend to be happier, more productive, more collaborative, and more innovative.”

Not Your Parents’ Career Trajectory
Neuzil suggested that older generations may have been “content staying in the exact same role for the next 40 years.” But now, potential employees from younger generations are “looking for an organization who is going to help them grow.” That is why Bank of Luxemburg highlights the possible career development paths in their recruitment ads and draws individuals in by sharing examples of employees who have gotten the bank’s help in developing their careers. She thinks that banks need to be more outspoken in pointing out that they offer career development.

Professional Maturity
Kraai consults on many banking topics with a strong focus on frontline training. She describes tellers as the CEOs of the customer experience. She cautions banks to avoid a practice they may inadvertently engage in, simply checking off a list of training requirements on policies and procedures without first training on how to talk to customers.

A big piece of her work developing bank employees at all levels involves professional maturity training — essentially how one acts and reacts on the job. Kraai considers all employees to be on a professional development journey. “We all need coaching … professional maturity training needs to be done at every level.”

For Kraai, it boils down to emotional intelligence, “We need to train on emotional intelligence, which is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and others and your ability to use that awareness to manage your behavior and your relationships.” She added, “That’s what we need to be focusing on, how to act and react not just to customers but also with our coworkers. It’s a learned skill, but sometimes we all need to practice it.”

Hire for Character, Chemistry, and Lastly Competence
LinkedIn VP of Talent Development Linda Jingfang Cai said in their 2023 Global Talent Trends Report, “We have to evangelize the shift from valuing our people’s experience to valuing their skills.”

Kraai shared that when she asks trainees to name an organization that does a great job training their frontline, everybody says Chick-fil-A. She encourages banks to use their model, “At Chick-fil-A, they don’t put you behind the cash register, they don’t teach you how to make food, bag food, or run the drive thru until you have graduated from customer experience training.”

When Chick-fil-A hires for their frontline, the first thing they look at is character and the last piece of their hiring hierarchy is competency. Kraai thinks this approach makes sense, “What we do in our banks, though, is backwards. I did it too, all those years running a bank. I went with competency first.” Kraai cautions, if you’re hiring people because they have great cash handling experience, but they have zero ability to work well with others, you’re likely missing the boat.

Neuzil explained the Bank of Luxemburg’s approach to certain hard-to- fill positions like credit analysts, “For probably the last five years, we can’t find experienced credit analysts out there in the world, so we have started working with recent college graduates with no experience.”

The bank developed a program for new employees right out of college to go through a two-year program starting out as entry level credit analysts working on smaller loans with their more experienced credit analysts. The bank trains them and if they meet milestones during their two years, they are promoted to a full-fledged credit analyst role.

An Investment, Not Just Budget Line-Item
All three member bank interviewees described the positive benefits of professional development like improved retention, attraction of better talent, the boost to morale, and an element that is so important in the heavily regulated, compliance-centric banking industry — staying up to date on regulations.

Geyer described Mound City Bank’s approach, “Our bank’s professional development and education budget is set high enough to be able to give all our employees who are interested in receiving external training the opportunity to do so. We want to encourage the employees to seek out education both externally and internally.”

Those dollars are well spent. Data from Deloitte shows that organizations with a strong learning culture are 92% more likely to develop novel products and processes, 52% more productive, 56% more likely to be the first to market with their products and services, and 17% more profitable than their peers.

Identifying Potential and Interest
Banks have different strategies for identifying employees for professional development opportunities.

Neuzil said, “We started doing stay interviews, and out of those stay interviews came input from employees regarding their desire to know what was available from a career development standpoint.” She added, “From the stay interviews, we created a career development committee.” The bank also conducts monthly one-on-one meetings with a portion of those meetings focusing on career development with questions like, “What would you like to learn more about in regard to career progression? What is some training that we can do?”

Zahn stated, “At Forward we create a list of individuals who have shown an interest or those who are up and coming in managerial or leadership roles and keep track of possible professional development opportunities that would be a good fit.”

Matching employees with appropriate professional development opportunities is a two-way street at Mound City Bank. Geyer said, “An employee might identify an opportunity they’re interested in or I could see something in a WBA email which I might send to a manager and say ‘Hey, this could be beneficial.’”

Ensuring Equitable Access to All
Moser recommends having a codified program to identify potential employees for leadership development. She cautions that relying solely on suggestions from managers might cause banks to “miss out on the next great leader from an underrepresented group,” because managers may tend to fall back on developing people they know and like the best. A formal program may be more inclusive because clear criteria can be established with transparent processes and parameters to avoid unconscious bias. For example, banks can stipulate that employees can nominate themselves, or require nomination from managers, establish a minimum number of years on the job, and set deadlines for applications and completion.

Stagnating Takes a Toll on Succession Planning
Moser warns, “If you’re not developing your managers or other leaders, it impacts your succession planning and you’re not going to be able to bring up the next executive level.”

When that happens, you end up with a gap in your leadership pipeline, and “now you have to go outside and recruit that person and we all know that is much more expensive,” explained Moser.

Moser added, “The other cost of not developing leaders is that you end up keeping people on the team that are just poor performers. So now you’re retaining not the best, you’re retaining the mediocre and that has a real impact on productivity and your ability to innovate.”

Tap into Local Resources
Bank of Luxemburg had an innovative program partnering with students from a UW–Green Bay organizational development class to create career road maps for employees. Neuzil said, “We looked at all our positions to identify the different paths you can take in your career and the courses to help on that path.” Interestingly, one of the students ended up working part-time for the bank during the pandemic re-finance rush.

Zahn has found success linking Forward Bank employees up with Dale Carnegie courses offered locally. Additionally, Leadership Marshfield is offered through the Marshfield Chamber of Commerce and provides networking and educational opportunities, as well as a community service component.

Getting Creative
Zahn and the team at Forward Bank were busy gearing up for the bank’s annual training and leadership symposium, Epic Day. “We bring in guest speakers and really hone in on leadership styles.”

For over ten years, the bank has been highlighting different departments to showcase their expertise, conduct team building games, and bring in fun guest speakers (some from pop culture hits like Survivor and American Ninja Warrior) who are uplifting and motivational. It’s an ideal day to focus on
continuing employee education and the interconnectedness of the departments and teams.

Woven into the Employee Experience
A LinkedIn report found that employees believe professional development is the number one way to improve company culture.

Additionally, 35% of employees rated learning and development among the top three elements of the employee experience according to MetLife’s annual U.S. Employee Benefit Trends Study.

Bank of Luxemburg’s commitment is underscored by having a full-time training coordinator on staff, bringing in subject matter experts, and tapping into the experience and insights of long-term employees like a commercial lender who is retiring, but serves as a consultant to mentor newer employees in sales training and business development.

Job Shadowing and Mentorship Make a Difference
Bank of Luxemburg enhanced their job shadowing program. Neuzil elaborated, “We’ve created a job shadow application, set up time for shadowing, and follow up with questions like, ‘What did you learn from the job shadow? Is this something that you would be interested in as a career path?’ This has made job shadowing more interactive and led to more impactful conversations about career paths.”

Their mentorship program doesn’t necessarily match up employees who work in the same role. “That’s not what it’s for. It’s more for developing your soft skills, how to network, how to be a good leader, how to be more organized, how to prep for meetings, how to run a meeting.”

Measuring the Impact
Zahn revealed, “While we don’t have an actual rubric, employees who have participated in professional development often use performance reviews with their managers to measure outcomes and benefits as well as set new goals.”

Geyer shared that Mound City measures the effectiveness of their program by tracking all education completed for all employees including seminars, webinars, workshops, and schools adding, “If there is a certification of completion, we make sure to obtain that for that particular employee and also
honor them for completing the course.”

Neuzil looks at the number of employees who go through different programs, whether it’s their youth apprentice or in-house training and development and track how many people can continue to move into higher positions within the bank.

Let WBA Help
WBA has a robust lineup of training and professional development opportunities that are available yearround; ranging from webinars, seminars, conferences, schools, and customized training from WBA’s Legal Team.

Offering options for everyone is key, because as Zahn pointed out, “Everybody learns in so many different ways. You really have to keep an open mind about the best way to present training when it comes to promoting and developing people.”

Like Geyer does, keep an out for WBA emails to help identify upcoming opportunities that are a good fit for your staff or visit the WBA website regularly to see what’s new in both in-person and virtual training.

Geyer shared that the BOLT Leadership Summits have been instrumental in developing their employees’ leadership potential. Geyer also finds webinars from WBA partners a helpful approach to disseminate knowledge that often generates conversation between employees after viewing, “employees might say, ‘I have a follow-up question on that topic,’ and they can bounce ideas off one another.” Geyer praises the many Mound City Bank employees who have completed the Graduate School of Banking at UW-Madison (GSB). It’s a rigorous and rewarding course with a commitment of 25 months. Right now, their Cuba City manager is enrolled. “She took the initiative and wanted to take on that challenge despite her very busy schedule,” Geyer stated.

Neuzil said, “We do a lot with WBA classes, whether it’s Principles of Banking, Supervisor Boot Camp, or Commercial Lending School.” The bank also looks to GSB for professional development. In addition to the Graduate School of Banking course, they send employees to a variety of GSB’s
weeklong schools.

Neuzil explained the benefits of those shorter courses, “Our marketing manager started as a youth apprentice and has been with the bank for about 20 years working her way up. Attending the GSB Strategic Marketing School for a week allowed her to see how other banks are marketing using different methods. It also connected her to a network of other community bankers and marketing people from across the country.”

Zahn has sent employees to WBA’s Supervisor Boot Camp, Personal Banker School, as well as Consumer, Commercial, and Ag Lending. “We utilize WBA for leadership training or skill training that focuses more on an
employee’s specific role at the bank.”

Zahn is a fan of in-person professional development because it can increase camaraderie in the banking community, explaining, “You make those connections and then if you’re stuck on something back at your bank, you can always connect back to them.” She shared
that Forward developed a good rapport with Horicon Bank. These valuable connections can be forged through professional development.

Summing it Up
Many banks may be asking the question that Neuzil posed, “How can we be creative and innovative when it comes to retaining our employees because we don’t want to lose them since they’re so hard to find.” Adding, “If we can keep having those good conversations, we can help employees continue to develop and grow without leaving for other opportunities.”