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Sharing Successes
As the annual list of Best Banks to Work For 2023 ranking is released by American Banker, one consistent theme runs across financial institutions of all sizes. Banks that focus on building more engaging employee experiences do better in the short and long term to attract and retain talent AND deliver better customer experiences at the same time. “There are areas where organizations can bring together customer experience and employee experience to drive improved business outcomes,” according to a Financial Brand article about employee engagement. But how are successful institutions doing it?
One inspirational bank that landed the #3 spot on the list for institutions with more than $10B of assets is Origin Bank. This Louisiana-based financial services leader takes employee experience so seriously that they conduct quarterly confidential surveys of all staff members to ensure their culture is being reflected and integrated across the brand – from top to bottom. “What has always been at the center of who we are as an organization is our deep commitment to culture,” says Drake Mills, Origin’s chairman, president and CEO. “We have a passion to be there for our employees, customers and communities when they need us most.”
Click here to find out more about how banks are building better experiences for their employees.
Data You Can Use
Of M&A participants in banking are community based financial institutions
The Story:
Community financial institutions have made up the vast majority of merger participants for the last decade, on both sides of the deal. But when banking experienced a pandemic slowdown in merger and acquisition activity starting in 2020, community financial institutions – both community banks and credit unions – needed a renewed approach to growth. Strategic M&A and mergers of equals provided just the shot in the arm the sector needed. Today more than 9 out of 10 deals are among community financial institutions. “As stock prices sunk in 2023, more community banks focused less on obtaining attractive premiums and instead looked to low- to no-premium MOEs as a way to gain scale,” according to S&P Global Financial Intelligence.
The Takeaway:
Given that 90% of financial institution CEOs report plans to engage in M&A by the end of the year and 72% intend to increase investments in acquisitions, mergers are on the minds of banking leaders. Even more, smaller institutions are under pressure to operate at larger scale, according to former World Bank governor Yerbol Orynbayev, in an interview in The Banker. That sentiment is echoed by M&A expert Michael Bell on the Believe in Banking Podcast. “Depending on how you want to serve your members, the community, your people, scale does matter,” says Bell. “If you want to be a full-service institution with robust digital banking, best of the best fraud detection technology, the best people… you need scale, period.”
Source: S&P, “US Community Banks Still Striking Mergers of Equals to Manage Climbing Costs,” February, 2024; Ernst & Young, “2024 CEO Outlook Pulse Survey,” November, 2023; The Banker, “Wave Of Consolidation Could Save Smaller U.S. Banks,” December, 2023; and Believe in Banking Podcast, “Community Commitment: M&A for Credit Union Growth,” April, 2024
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