I talk a lot about innovation and the need for enterprise-wide innovation. As I talk with business leaders, though, I find it interesting that many C-Suite executives don’t consider organization-wide innovation to be a priority. And this is not just an “old school” mentality: I recently spoke with a Gen X executive who stated flat out that he was “not interested” in doing innovation workshops for the whole staff. While the benefits of having everyone focused on innovation are obvious to me, it’s unlikely I can change others’ opinions in the course of one conversation. But, I can influence them over time.
I recently conducted an innovation workshop on the financial services education channel BankersHub, and used branch transformation as the subject of the innovation. Over three days, I opined on the changes financial institutions need to make in their thinking in order to re-imagine what it will mean to be a future banker, and how that new thinking might play out in the context of their retail branches.
At the end of the webinar series, I asked the attendees to complete this sentence: “The Branch Transformation ideas presented in this webinar series will not work for us because ___________________.” And the first response I received? “Because our senior management does not believe we need to change.” I expected this, though; it has been brought up in every forum where I explore this topic. And it is the one thing holding most institutions back from true innovation.
Suppose you are a mid-manager at a midwestern regional bank. You own the retail branch experience, and you have seen your branch counts steadily shrink as more of your customers perform transactions online. Yet any effort you make to suggest ideas for how to transform the branch is met with staunch entrenchment from above. “We are a traditional community bank; we don’t do that here,” “You must think we are in a metro area,” or, “These changes would offend our current customer base,” are just a few of the typical excuses offered to stifle innovation.
This creates two intertwined problems. One, there is no real effort to examine how the branch should be transformed, and two, a potential future executive of this institution may get so fed up that they exit for more open-minded employers. These are the types of people asking questions on my webinars or speaking to me after keynotes on innovation in banking.
So what’s the answer? A drip campaign. Just like water wears down rock over time, you can encourage a new way of thinking in others through steadily exposing them to ideas. A drip campaign would entail a mid-level executive curating information that comes from a variety of sources, but with the common thread of how financial institution executives must think differently about how banking will be conducted in the future.
It’s all about small bits of information that can be consumed quickly, in a variety of formats, that are consistently delivered over time. These could include an article from The Financial Brand, a Snarketing post by Ron Shevlin, a live Facebook post from Eric Cook, or a short video from my innovation YouTube channel.
Create an FYI email at least once a week, but not so frequent that it becomes a nuisance (I realize that this cannot be codified, but you should know your boss and boss’ boss enough to know what annoys them). Always add an accompanying note from you that says, “Saw this article and wanted to pass this along,” or, “Interesting food for thought.” Don’t ever press for any action; just keep passing along powerful information. The goal is to get the executives to ask you to engage in a conversation or facilitate a brainstorming session at an upcoming senior leadership meeting.
Make sure the content is brief. Executives are time-challenged and don’t have time to read 3,000-word articles or watch a 60-minute webinar replay. Break everything down into five-minute chunks maximum. If there is an article that is large but important, break it down into smaller pieces and deliver these over a series of days. Videos should also be no more than five minutes.
If you attend a webinar session like the ones I create for BankersHub, do not send an executive my deck! It’s too big and, without my commentary, is likely to be taken out of context. Take one, maybe two, slides and send it along with the note, “I recently attended an interesting webinar, which I thought fascinating and relevant to our institution.”
Now, when your executive gets enough information from your drip campaign that he or she asks you to talk more about innovation, be prepared. Don’t wait to be asked to start thinking about how innovation can be implemented at your organization, or even which areas should be the initial targets for innovation. Start researching now. Talk with your peers (after all, they are just as frustrated as you are, and would love to plot and plan how they would transform their institution if they got the chance).
Wash, rinse, repeat. Take on a new attitude about how to change perception about the value of innovation within your organization.
For some of you, you may have already tried your level bet and are frustrated beyond measure at the lack of progress or interest in innovation, and you may feel that jumping ship is the only alternative. But that may not be in your best interest (see my blog post on April 10, 2017 on Y=X2 to understand why). I would love to hear from you–it’s possible I may have an idea or two that can jumpstart your ability to move perception or change traditional thinking. Shoot me an email to david@davidpeterson.com, and let’s get an innovation conversation started.