Building a Work Culture You Can Bank On

I recently joined my friend and client Joe Williams, President and CEO of County National Bank, to share a presentation about the value of culture at the Michigan Bankers Association’s 2024 Bank Management and Directors Conference in Grand Rapids.

County National Bank is committed to the communities it serves across its 13 branches throughout south-central Michigan, and it’s my belief that their commitment stems from the great culture they foster from within.

Our presentation called “Building a Work Culture You Can Bank On” featured ADVISA’s great collaboration with County National Bank through the lens of the five drivers of cultural competitive advantage.

Here’s your executive summary of my presentation with Joe:

In banking, innovation and competitive advantage don’t come easily. But what if there was an innovation that could bring you around 50% organic growth in 3 years? Would you pursue it?

What if that innovation was your culture?

Don’t believe it? Believe the statistics:

• 77% of job seekers say company culture is very important when applying for a job
• Organizations with strong cultures have a 72% lower turnover rate
• A positive work culture leads to a 31% increase in productivity

Don’t believe the statistics? Believe a CEO in construction, another industry where innovation and competitive advantage don’t come easily, who recently shared that in 3 years since partnering with ADVISA on culture has seen revenue grow from $120 million to $200 million.

In today’s business landscape, culture is your biggest opportunity or greatest threat.

Culture drives employee engagement, creates satisfied clients and leads to bigger, better, faster results for your bank.

What do we mean by “culture?” It’s a system of shared beliefs and values – modeled and reinforced by leadership’s communication and behavior – that shapes the employee experience. More succinctly, it’s what most of your leaders say and do most of the time.

So how does an organization go about creating a culture that drives growth?

After almost 40 years of helping organizations create magnetic cultures, ADVISA has illuminated 5 key drivers of culture – a framework we call ATLAS:

1. Activation from above
2. Trust and shared purpose
3. Leader effectiveness
4. Actionable people data
5. Systems that support leaders

Here’s why each is crucial to building culture into competitive advantage, along with a prompt for each to help you determine if your culture is adding fuel to (or creating friction for) your organization.

Culture drives employee engagement, creates satisfied clients and leads to bigger, better, faster results for your bank.

Activation from above

Magnetic cultures are designed, implemented, nurtured from the executive table. When the top of the organization fails to activate the culture, there will inevitably be a moment where mid-level leaders say “What about them… why aren’t they doing this? Culture must not be that important.” At that moment your culture is eroding.

Does your executive team talk about the importance of culture to business success in meetings and communications?

Trust and shared purpose

Strong cultures bring resilience in the midst of challenge, change and headwinds – and trust and shared purpose forms the backbone to create that strength. At its root are the cultural pillars of mission, vision, values and strategy. It’s imperative that you make sure these exist, are alive and well, and are aspirational.

Do core values inform your organization’s approach across recruitment, coaching, and recognition?

Leader effectiveness

Effective leadership is the lifeblood of your culture, yet most leaders are overwhelmed and underequipped. Therefore, organizations must invest in providing leaders clarity and capability. Executive teams must identify 3-5 key leader capabilities that every leader in the organization can focus on to move the cultural needle in the right direction. With this clarity, they become more effective in helping achieve your organization’s unique aims.

Do your leaders know specifically what to say and do to create the intentional culture the organization needs to succeed?

Actionable people data

Cultural development is hard. Actionable people data brings a level of simplicity to:

1. What motivates and drives people, which empowers leaders to meet their people where they are. This comes about through data sources like personality and emotional intelligence assessments.
2. How employees are experiencing leadership and culture; which provides bloodwork-like insights. This comes through data such as ADVISA’s Leadership and Culture Assessment®.

Does your organization have the right measures in place to monitor and assess employee engagement?

Systems that support leaders

W. Edwards Demming said, “A bad system beats a good person every time” – and your people can make or break your culture. So if you define your aspirational culture in one way, but the operational systems and processes your leaders need to engage their people are in opposition to that aspirational culture, the systems will win.

Do you use software that makes one-on-ones and reviews easy and effective for your leaders, managers, and employees?

What do your answers to those prompts reveal?

What if following the ATLAS framework could make your culture a competitive advantage?

I love this quote from the same CEO client I referenced earlier: “It gets to the point where you don’t even talk about the numbers anymore,” he said. “You focus on the people, and the numbers take care of themselves.”

Access additional guiding questions and receive a report about the current status of your culture – along with actionable steps your organization can take today – today at: advisausa.com/atlas