“Lead, follow, or get out of the way.” — George S. Patton
Leading First Niagara from Last Place to First Place
SITUATION
In May 2013, The Pew Charitable Trusts released a study of checking account practices at the top 36 U.S. banks. They specifically looked at banks’ policies from a customer perspective. After finding that the bank used none of the industry best-practices or good-practices, Pew ranked First Niagara dead last among the 36 banks reviewed (see p.14 of the report for the 2013 rankings).
Original disclosure: 31 pages, complex legal language, uses no Pew best-practices or good-practices.
ACTION
As a result of the bank’s poor showing in the report, and in keeping with executive leadership’s passion to make things right, I took on the challenge of improving disclosure policies. I formed a team with representation from the legal, compliance, branch operations, information technology, product and marketing functions. Over the following 6 weeks, I led the team to identify and implement changes to more closely align the bank with industry best-practices. In August 2013, in all branches and online, we introduced process improvements and Pew-inspired summary disclosures for all checking products.
RESULT
In Pew’s next report (April 2014), the pool of banks reviewed was expanded to include the Top 50 U.S. banks. Now employing all Pew best-practices and good-practices, the disclosure changes I made resulted in First Niagara moving up to the highest ranking possible for disclosures (see p.14 and p.15 of the report for the 2014 rankings). First Niagara retained it’s top spot in the 2015 review as well.
New Disclosure: One-page, simple language, uses all Pew best-practices and good-practices
It’s a great leadership example where I brought people together under a common vision and quickly delivered a solution that significantly improved customer experience.
Contact information:
Alpine Jennings
Senior Financial Services Executive
