The broad theme is the failure of politics and the problem with the rise of economics over politics that has led (his words) to the end of left wing idealism as a counterweight to the right. 

Foreign Affairs:  He closes with this statement on what is needed:

It would have to have at least two components, political and economic. Politically, the new ideology would need to reassert the supremacy of democratic politics over economics and legitimate anew government as an expression of the public interest. But the agenda it put forward to protect middle-class life could not simply rely on the existing mechanisms of the welfare state. The ideology would need to somehow redesign the public sector, freeing it from its dependence on existing stakeholders and using new, technology-empowered approaches to delivering services. It would have to argue forthrightly for more redistribution and present a realistic route to ending interest groups’ domination of politics.

He got there by reviewing a host of historic movements and how they arrived. 

• the introduction of the rights of property owners
• the concept that government can only tax when voters agree
• the power to vote for non property owners (an American invention – Andrew Jackson)
• that technology carries some of the blame for driving efficiency that requires fewer workers and provides for greater income generation for well educated, something that supported the growth of middle class.

He moves us quickly through the history of democratic movements which he notes fall out of demographic movements.

• socialism and rise of unions
• communism and its failure
• rise of middle class which through passing of relative wealth to people in large numbers that displaced the earlier two movements
• latterly the flattening of middle class incomes over the past 40 years, and finally
• more recently the rise of a new group of culturally disenfranchised (immigrants, gay, less/uneducated, etc) which has itself displaced the power of the middle class, and further displacing the worker power of unions, by creation of a large third franchise.

Even the Arab Spring he notes can be rooted in a new Arab group that is better off, better educated, that can clearly comprehend the Dictators are firmly between them and a better life.  See this in Russia too now.

But he ends on a note of pessimism that with inequality and friction between these broad groups, each of whose opposing needs broadens, the solutions and endgame are not clear.  In the US, the top 1% of families take home 23.5% of income he notes.

Relevance to Bankwatch:

With this backdrop, we can see clues in the political quagmires we see in the Euro zone and in the US.  The governments are torn about which franchise to follow because it is just not clear.  In fact the structures of governments was designed for a different time and place with much different citizen structure.

We have the additional shift from demographic aging in western countries.

These factors exacerbate the mismatch of the structure of government to the requirements of the population.

This blog is not about politics, but I believe requirements for the design of banks is as dependent on the requirements of the population.  One thing we can see from the last 4 years, is that banks’ design are based on a different set of requirements and not around making them inherently useful and of value to the broad base of people.  Unfortunately, all people cannot successfully claim to be in the top 1% that make 23.5% of income.

Irving Wladawsky-Berger: The Complex Chemistry between Brands and Customers – Some Personal Experiences

As we know, Lou Dobbs has emerged as one of the major spokesmen rallying against illegal immigration. He has embraced what I consider to be a polarizing, red meat style in his tirades against immigrants, blaming them for all kinds of societal ills, some perhaps justified, others not. Clearly Lou Dobbs is entitled to his opinions, as I am to mine. In a free country with lots of choices, I simply do not have to listen to his program, Lou Dobbs Tonight, which is prominently shown on CNN seven days a week from 6 – 7 pm.

Increasingly, my feelings toward Lou Dobbs Tonight are spilling over toward CNN, which for many years has been my preferred source of news. CNN is a brand I have held in high esteem for a long time. But now I am upset at CNN for giving the angry, strident, divisive views of Lou Dobbs such prominence – although perhaps disappointed may be the more accurate description of my feelings.

The broader point here is that, implementing a reaction to other brands, that you feel are beating you is a bad idea. The Dobbs example is exemplified by the (inexlicably high) ratings of Fox News. Its apparently linked to taking a strong view, and voicing strong opinions. CNN levered the value and credibility of Dobbs, and promoted his book, and encouraged him to voice strident views including town hall promotions of his book.

I have no comment on his book, nor his views. The thoughtful Irving is simply no longer a customer, because the valued the previously news based CNN, versus the opinion based Dobbs.

CNN are guilty of following the leader, and trying to beat the leader.

It only makes sense that brands need to be able to define their purpose and meaning. If they are losing, because that defined purpose is a loser, then so be it, but changing on a dime will alienate and confuse customers.

Well worth the read.

Technorati Tags: brands, customer+experience

I expect this will drive some more innovation from BofA.

Having established itself as the only truly nationwide bank through a string of acquisitions in recent years, Bank of America is now taking steps to become more of a national advertiser. It plans a sharp increase in ad spending this year, with its first new ad campaign since 2003.

Source: WSJ.com – Login

Why?  The average bank will tell you behind closed doors that the ‘average’ annual profit per customer is in the range of $10.  This is the classic average with the lower end being a loss.  If you can add in a group such as unbanked at positive profit, you are basically off to the races.  Welcome to the immigrant banking war we are about to witness. (P.S. how the ‘H’ did I miss this in my 2007 predictions!)

El Banco de Nuestra Comunidad, which targets check-cashers by undercutting them. Imagine that!

Source: Phil Windley’s Technometria | The Longtail of Banking

I don’t see this so much as innovation, because anyone can do that.  However failure to implement such services, will doubtless result in reduced market share over time, as the population becomes more mixed.

Natwest says its new Welcome Account comes with a related money transfer feature that enables Polish customers in the UK to send money back home. Customers can transfer funds straight from the current account into the money transfer account. A family member in Poland, nominated by the customer, can then withdraw funds from the money transfer account from ATMs in Poland using a NatWest card.

…

Last week Lloyds TSB said it was transforming one of its Manchester branches into a city centre banking “superstore” designed to provide tailored services to all new immigrant arrivals, particularly the expanding Polish community in the city.

Source: Finextra: Natwest launches Polish account in the UK

1. Reinventing Financial Services: The financial services industry has been slow to reinvent itself in the face of an increasingly networked world. Without reinvention, institutions risk being disintermediated by nontraditional industries as new, previously unlikely competitors find their way into financial services. Rather than continuing to make tactical changes in response to shifts in the marketplace, successful firms will be those that consider how to reinvent the financial services institution from a blank slate — rethinking the full spectrum of products, services, and delivery options.
2. Repurposing Financial Services for Global Diversity: Financial institutions must begin responding more effectively to dramatic changes in a continuously shrinking world. Emerging economies will demand a broader range of product and service options to meet wider variations in customer needs and economic status. It is no longer acceptable to operate under a business model focused purely on shareholder value — meaning institutions must develop dynamic capabilities for serving a larger number of more varied and yet more modest customer relationships in a profitable way. Success will mean establishing a lifetime relationship with large numbers of people who were previously outside the normal scope of an institution’s services.
3. Restoring Confidence in an Uncertain World: News of security breaches, loss of customer data, identity theft, fraud, and terrorism has been disturbing to individual financial institutions and the industry as a whole. Meanwhile, none of the industry’s traditional risks (such as those related to credit, catastrophes, investments, or interest rates) have dissipated. To date, most institutions have pursued the single strategy of playing defense against the universe of global threats. Yet institutions have an obligation to take greater control by making an offensive foray into the global need for assurance, responsibility, and security.

Source: Payments News: Three Major Strategic Shifts For Financial Services – November 27, 2006

I find it interesting to contrast different research, so here is the IBM view from August.

IBM – Paradox of Banking – 2015

1. Focus on core strengths and partner for everything else
2. Optimize the potential of each customer relationship
3. Harness the potential of the workforce through effective performance management
4. Recognize that technology will be a critical element of success.

And … IBM why Banking Innovation matters now in November.

Retail banks can’t assume that the growth and returns of the recent past will continue. Amid a throng of banking competitors - including new market entrants, forward-thinking incumbents and non-banks - banks need to differentiate themselves in ways that are not easily duplicated.

To restore confidence and realize strong future returns, banks must set the stage now. It will require uncommon innovation to stand out from the crowd and adapt successfully to marketplace demands.

Analysis:

The three Tower imperatives are active strategies.

1. Reinventing
2. Diversification – new customer base(s)
3. Restoring confidence …

The IBM views in Paradox, are focussed on how to accomplish the strategies, and 1, 2, & 3 are quite aligned with Tower 1 & 2.  The IBM Innovation piece is focussed on the ‘why’.

Diversification:  this explains the push by all Banks to enter markets that they have traditionally ignored – unbanked, and immigrants.

Restoring Confidence:  This is long overdue for Banks.  Banks have recently reacted to phishing by introduction of security guarantees, and multi factor authentication, but it still feels highly reactive.  There is lots of up space to introduce new ways to manage risk, for example, by being on the consumers side with regard to credit. 

The total reliance on FICO scores and the almost real time updates to credit histories remains highly one-sided.  There is real space there for Banks to work interactively with customers to:

1. see their scores
2. understand how the scores are calculated
3. see the direct results within their score related to their credit history
4. learn how to manage their scores

Other areas that Banks can proactively work with customers are in interest rate management.  Today each rate and the terms associated with the rates are individual to each product.  This seems like old thinking, and Banks don’t manage their own products that way.  They are managed as portfolio’s … good customers should be able to buy hedging services that can be traded against credit or deposit products to protect against interest rates.  Of course it would need to be simple and avoidance of the word hedging would be a good idea.

Just a couple of ideas that could fit in the “Restoring Confidence in an Uncertain World” category.

McGee: We’ve been running this business, consumer and small business, as a national business for about five years now. The decision that we faced at the time was whether to become a national franchise or, like most of the other large banks, run it market by market, state by state, etc.

Source: BAI Online | Banking Strategies | September/October 2006 | Investing in the Franchise

To Bank of America, strategic clarity is “making a difference for customers” by providing a consistent level of service and responsiveness across the company’s vast coast-to-coast franchise

The quotes just get better and better ….

We also made the decision to run a more integrated business. We’re different from almost anybody you’d compare us to in that our distribution channels — banking centers, online services, call centers, mortgage sales force, etc. — really work with the product groups in an integrated fashion, with the customer in the center. Most of our competitors run those businesses as silos — the card business is run as a silo, the mortgage business, etc. We’ve run a very integrated model for a long time, and that’s also helped us prioritize against the things that mattered for customers and for our teammates.

And this quote is as memorable as any … again remembering how big they are:

Q: How do you reduce complexity on the frontlines? You’ve got so many products, so many different divisions and services. Do you tell your branch people to focus on just a few?

McGee: We have tended to focus on a few products that we think are the most important for customers and drivers of growth. That doesn’t mean that associates don’t do other things. But it’s easier when you give them a context for what’s important for the customers and what’s important for the shareholders.

It wasn’t always popular at the beginning to do that because some associates might have been focused on other things. But, all of us have learned that if you can prioritize and simplify, the entire boat rises. If you try to be everything to everybody, then no one does well.

The ability to develop a laser like focus down to every front line employee, is a strategic advantage.

Q: Who is that single point of accountability?

McGee: We have five people who run our almost 6,000 stores, and four of the five are responsible for the high growth markets and the fifth the community markets, wherever they may be across America. Under each of them are region executives, the people the product groups are really accountable to—to get the right product, the right process and have that mutual accountability.

Five people – 6,000 branches (stores) – wow!  I know banks in with 1,000 branches, and 15 – 20 people responsible, without counting the SVP’s, VP’s, directors, & senior managers who also are involved.

Finally the positive aspect of dynamic tension:

Q: So, the dynamic tension comes in the discussion and give-and-take between the product groups and the regional executives?

McGee: Well, it’s not at all dissimilar to the classic retail market. You take any retailer and they interact with product manufacturers who want shelf space. The retailer has an accountability to put the product in the right space and sell it. But the retailer will hold the manufacturer accountable if the product does not deliver to the specs ordered and at the price point.

We are very much emulating that dynamic tension. It’s very different from having a head of cards who is only thinking about his or her bottom line. We have an integrated team that really has the new and existing customer as the focal point. So in our company, you have to be very good at running your business or area discipline, but you have to be equally good at balancing that with what’s the best thing for our customers in our enterprise.

That’s why you’ve seen a lot of innovation coming from us in the last couple of years, such as Keep the Change, Mortgage Rewards, Business 24/7 and Safe Send. Take Keep the Change, for example. The reason we were able to do that is, first of all, we spend a lot of time talking to customers. One of the things Six Sigma has taught us is to be very disciplined about the voice of the customer.

Relevance to Bankwatch:

The article is worth reading.  Its a standard bearer for how to organise, and implement across a (very) large organisation.  You are probably smaller than Bank of America, so no excuses.

Generating Customer Delight Across a National Franchise

BY KENNETH CLINE
Liam McGee, Bank of America’s top retail executive, seeks competitive differentiation by combining leading market share with responsiveness to local markets—and customers.

| SYNOPSIS | In an interview, Liam McGee, president of global consumer and small business banking, discusses how Bank of America Corp. bases its national franchise on delivering a consistent level of service and being responsive to local markets. Key to success are the distribution channels and product groups working together in local markets to produce customer solutions. McGee credits the “dynamic tension” generated by this process for innovative programs such as Keep the Change and Business 24/7.

As president of global consumer and small business banking at $1.4 trillion–asset Bank of America Corp., Liam E. McGee runs the largest retail bank in the country, with 5,742 branches and 110,000 employees. Aware that large organizations can easily become encumbered with excessive bureaucracy, McGee has a laser-like focus on local responsiveness and customer service.

To Bank of America, strategic clarity is “making a difference for customers” by providing a consistent level of service and responsiveness across the company’s vast coast-to-coast franchise. As McGee explains in the following interview, thousands of branches in markets as diverse as Los Angeles and New York could not be administered effectively if all important decisions were made centrally in the bank’s headquarters in Charlotte, N.C.

Related Sidebar

About Liam E. McGee

Acknowledging this, McGee has built a system where distribution channels and product groups in the various regions develop their strategies in a climate of give-and-take, or what he calls “dynamic tension.” This approach, McGee points out, has spawned several innovative programs, such as Bank of America’s “Keep the Change” promotion, where customers earn savings on their debit card usage.

Ultimately, McGee’s goal is to use Bank of America’s size as a competitive differentiator in a business where customer service and local relationships are so important. “When you have leading market share and you operate appropriately in local markets, you have a fairly compelling advantage,” McGee says.

Q: BAI’s upcoming Retail Delivery Conference & Expo focuses on strategic clarity, management innovation and customer service—all themes the banking industry can use to escape “commoditisation.” Let’s start with strategic clarity. What does that mean for you at Bank of America? How do you think about strategic clarity for such a large business?

McGee: We’ve been running this business, consumer and small business, as a national business for about five years now. The decision that we faced at the time was whether to become a national franchise or, like most of the other large banks, run it market by market, state by state, etc.

We decided that we would run it as a national franchise to create a consistent, recognizable brand for customers and for our own teammates. Although we have more to do, we’ve largely accomplished that.

Part of that process was simplifying. We are big, with virtually every capability that you could want in financial services. But that diversity can be a challenge if you don’t simplify for your teammates and customers.

So, over the five-year period, we’ve been zeroing in on a few things, the things that make a difference for customers, things that are material financial levers for the business. That’s where a lot of our success has been: a national franchise approach, simplifying the business and having an appropriate amount of consistency.

We also made the decision to run a more integrated business. We’re different from almost anybody you’d compare us to in that our distribution channels — banking centers, online services, call centers, mortgage sales force, etc. — really work with the product groups in an integrated fashion, with the customer in the center. Most of our competitors run those businesses as silos — the card business is run as a silo, the mortgage business, etc. We’ve run a very integrated model for a long time, and that’s also helped us prioritize against the things that mattered for customers and for our teammates.

Q: What are those things that mattered?

McGee: In its simplest form, we’re in the business of acquiring and retaining as many customers as we can. We are very much about market share. Our strategy is to grow the number of new customers that do business with us and to build relationships with those new and existing customers.

It doesn’t have to be more complicated than that. We’ve been very consistent over the past five years, and I suspect it will largely be our strategy five years from now. What could be more important than to have more consumers and businesses to do business with and to build quality relationships with? That ought to be profitable for us and ought to be profitable for customers in ways that make a difference for them. We give them solutions to their life challenges, whether it’s to buy a home, start a business, send that first child to college or take care of an aging parent.

We’re very much about customers. That’s our strategy.

Q: How do you reduce complexity on the frontlines? You’ve got so many products, so many different divisions and services. Do you tell your branch people to focus on just a few?

McGee: We have tended to focus on a few products that we think are the most important for customers and drivers of growth. That doesn’t mean that associates don’t do other things. But it’s easier when you give them a context for what’s important for the customers and what’s important for the shareholders.

It wasn’t always popular at the beginning to do that because some associates might have been focused on other things. But, all of us have learned that if you can prioritize and simplify, the entire boat rises. If you try to be everything to everybody, then no one does well.

Q: How is that focus determined, centrally in Charlotte or by market?

McGee: Some products may differ by market. We run our business against what we call our “high growth markets” and our “community markets,” the latter being more rural with primarily small bank competition. In high growth markets like Los Angeles, New York, Washington, D.C., or Houston, we really are looking underneath the averages; we don’t manage by averages, we get beneath averages and look at the components.

So, if you look at greater Los Angeles, 60%-plus of the households do business with us. That’s a remarkable penetration. In New York, where we have not been doing business as long, we have under a 25% household penetration.

Looking at these two extremes, our strategy in greater New York is about acquiring and keeping customer households. In Los Angeles, while we certainly want to continue to grow households, it’s really about deepening relationships through credit—mortgages, for example. In conjunction with the relative importance of real estate equity in a consumer’s life, that makes a lot of sense.

The next phase of our growth and maturity is to leverage the strengths and advantages of who we are, which is having a leading market share in virtually every product. We have size, scale and efficiency, but we also want to operate appropriately in local markets. We’ve made progress there. When you have both leading market share and operate appropriately in local markets, you have a fairly compelling advantage.

Q: How do you construct your retail operation so that you can be responsive to local markets and still stay integrated?

McGee: There are two parts to that. One, being very integrated causes dynamic tension between the product groups and the distribution groups. The product groups are re-sponsible for listening to the voice of the customer and the voice of the associate wherever they are — e-commerce, banking centers, local markets, etc.—and build a product with the best features, with the ease of sale and the appropriate balance. The distribution channels are accountable for throughput. So, the two hold each other accountable.

Two, we have leaders who are responsible for local markets. For example, we have a leader who is responsible for the greater Los Angeles area and a leader who is responsible for Dallas. Those people run the banking centers and the channels in those areas. So, the head of card and of mortgage is accountable to the head of Los Angeles for getting the right products into that market.

We are constantly working on creating that mutual accountability. In the past year, we’ve really formalized a single point of accountability in each market.

Q: Who is that single point of accountability?

McGee: We have five people who run our almost 6,000 stores, and four of the five are responsible for the high growth markets and the fifth the community markets, wherever they may be across America. Under each of them are region executives, the people the product groups are really accountable to—to get the right product, the right process and have that mutual accountability.

Q: So, the dynamic tension comes in the discussion and give-and-take between the product groups and the regional executives?

McGee: Well, it’s not at all dissimilar to the classic retail market. You take any retailer and they interact with product manufacturers who want shelf space. The retailer has an accountability to put the product in the right space and sell it. But the retailer will hold the manufacturer accountable if the product does not deliver to the specs ordered and at the price point.

We are very much emulating that dynamic tension. It’s very different from having a head of cards who is only thinking about his or her bottom line. We have an integrated team that really has the new and existing customer as the focal point. So in our company, you have to be very good at running your business or area discipline, but you have to be equally good at balancing that with what’s the best thing for our customers in our enterprise.

That’s why you’ve seen a lot of innovation coming from us in the last couple of years, such as Keep the Change, Mortgage Rewards, Business 24/7 and Safe Send. Take Keep the Change, for example. The reason we were able to do that is, first of all, we spend a lot of time talking to customers. One of the things Six Sigma has taught us is to be very disciplined about the voice of the customer.

In this instance, we heard from moms in particular that they wanted to save. They didn’t know how to do it on a regular basis. Out of that and other feedback came the sense that the debit card, the checking account and savings can intersect. But, if we ran the company in a siloed mindset, somebody would have to give up revenue. Since we look at aggregate customer profitability, we understood that one business is going to have to pay to match the savings, but we make so much more from increased debit usage and increased balances in checking and savings that it more than offsets the expense.

So, that’s an example of the integrated model in action. (For more on Keep the Change, see “Keeping —and Aggregating — the Change” in the March 1, 2006, issue of BAI’s Banking Strategies Retail Delivery Insights at www.bai.org/nl/v1/n13/articles/V1_N13_01.asp).

People think of innovation sometimes as incredible new technology, and there are elements of innovation like that. The i-Pod, for example, was an innovation of a break-through method, and we will seek those out. But innovation can take another form, which is to take things that you already have, listen to the customer and combine them in an innovative way that is responsive to a customer issue.

Business 24/7 was exactly the same thing. The voice of the small business owner—mostly home-based businesses with two, three or four employees—said doing payroll consumed too much time and caused frustration and errors. To make a long story short, we combined capabilities we had and brought in some we didn’t and produced an innovative product.

In banking, perhaps the greatest innovation is combining things you already have in ways that can help the customer.

Q: How have you used innovative techniques to reduce employee turnover? BAI research shows that has a huge impact on employee engagement and preparedness.

McGee: We have had fairly significant improvement. Without giving away too many secrets, I would say it’s another example of really looking at an end-to-end process. Companies have tended to look at turnover and tried to fix this or that. We took a step back and said, let’s look at associate stability and satisfaction.

So, we re-invented our end-to-end associate process, beginning with identifying a need for a job to recruiting, all the way to the end. And the results are quite good. There is a definite correlation between that and many other business measures.

There’s a fine line in a business of our size. On one hand, you’re pressing for results, but on the other hand, you have to calibrate that against the capacity of our teammates. If associates have two or three other things that are coming at them, when is the right time to roll out something new?

It’s my ultimate responsibility, and I take it very seriously, to ensure that we have a culture and leadership methods to create an environment where our teammates can reach all their dreams and ambitions. If you do that, other things take care of themselves.

Q: Customer delight has become an industry buzz word lately and, in fact, is another theme of BAI’s Retail Delivery Conference. How do you approach that issue? How do you make the customer experience the best that you can make it?

McGee: The most fundamental difference is that the integration I described is around the customer. We have been obsessed with customer delight. We don’t like to use the term “customer service,” we use the term “customer delight.” That is our aspiration: to delight customers, to wow customers.

In that regard, again, we don’t measure averages; we only measure the percentage of customers that we delight, who give us a nine or 10 on a scale of one to 10. Banks, including us, four or five years ago, spent a lot of time managing average customer service scores. There was a lot of patting on the back.

What we’ve learned, and what we’re committed to, is that customers you truly delight have a distinguishing experience. They don’t leave you, and that’s been a big part of our growth. It hasn’t just been sales performance, it’s been dramatically improved retention rates.

We have brought some behaviors into our stores that people tend to notice. We expect our managers to manage their stores from the lobby. In most of our stores when you walk in, you’ll see the manager not only greeting customers but experiencing the store as the customer does, so they can adjust to current conditions.

We have done some good work but we need to do more around looking at fundamental core processes. Not how we’re organized, but how the customer experiences us, eliminating errors and hand-offs. Service is more than just, am I friendly to you when you walk in the store? It’s also, does the ATM work? If you want to take $200 out, do you get it, or does it swallow your card? When you go online, can it do what you want? All those things are fundamental parts.

Q: Weren’t you influenced by Disney’s approach to customer service?

McGee: We studied a lot of companies and some of our teammates did talk about Disney. I think the most fundamental thing we got from Disney was the concept of “on-stage/off-stage.” There are certain things we prefer to be done off-stage, whether it’s telemarketing, completing reports, etc. In our new banking centers, we actually build off-stage space. If you go into one of our new stores, you will notice that no one is assigned a desk. There are universal sales stations, so people are up talking to customers. Your personal space would be off-stage.

But we studied other companies as well. It was almost totally from non-financial services where we got our best ideas.

Q: On that score, a lot of bankers talk about emulating Starbucks. But is that realistic, since Starbucks sells almost an entertainment-type product? Banking, by contrast, usually involves basic transactions.

McGee: That’s a fair pushback. We have many retail attributes, with our size and our traffic. The difference, of course, is when you walk in, there are no shelves or physical products. Many times, our customers are going in to transact, as opposed to buying a latte.

But like a retailer, we would like to convert a higher percentage of that traffic we get into building relationships. We manage our business around that concept. We measure same store sales, for example.

We have what a lot of retailers would die for, including Starbucks, which is a lot of traffic. And a high percentage of those customers are going to buy what we sell in some reasonable period of time. Our job is to convert as many of those existing customers into deeper relationships.

Q: How do you, as an individual, oversee so many departments, so many people—110,000 in your retail area—most of whom you will never meet personally?

McGee: First of all, I have the privilege of having great teammates. I think any leader’s responsibility is to surround himself or herself with the best team. The business does not revolve around me; it is very much about the teammates, whether they are people who directly report to me, or those out in the marketplace.

The person who is managing Los Angeles cannot wait, and I would not want them to wait, for day-to-day direction from someone in Charlotte on what to do in one of our most important markets. We have strong leaders who have the self-confidence, are proactive by nature, and can do that within the parameters of our culture, our values and the franchise we’re trying to build.

We have become, under CEO Ken Lewis’ leadership, one cohesive culture. Our very diverse teammates feel the same, and believe in the same things, if they’re on the West Coast, the East Coast, the Southwest or the Northeast, and that cohesive consistent culture is very important.

I’m blessed to have the job that I do because it’s about people. It’s not about checking accounts, it’s not about mortgages, it’s about people. When we make a mortgage, we may have helped an immigrant buy the American dream. You open a savings account, and you may be helping somebody send their first child ever to a university. Our company is helping families fulfill their dreams, and I take that very seriously.

Q: Looking ahead to the next year or so, there’s a general consensus that retail banking is going to be tougher as customers flee to higher interest rate products. Do you see some clouds on the horizon and are you concerned?

McGee:There’s no question that growth rates will be less than they are now. I would say that size, scale and efficiency are going to be far more important in the next couple of years than they have been in the prior few years. There will be much more price competition and consumers will be better shoppers. So, we’re all going to have to be a lot better.

We plan to be more innovative in the ways that I discussed with you earlier, and some players will rely only on price. Competing solely on price will be problematic for those who are not particularly efficient.

Mr. Cline is senior editor of BAI’s Banking Strategies.

The question from Jeff was “Can this in any way be used as an end run around the opposition in the United States?”, and Jeff started it off on his blog here.

______________________________

I have to think it cannot be a co-incidence that Canada and the US are right beside each other. However Canada is tiny (32 million pop) at 10% of the US in population.

When I listened to Jane Thompson speak she went out of her way to demonstrate that the Wal-Mart efforts were intended to provide synergy with their business model, that included, the “unbanked consumer”, and transactional efficiency to support their own payments. The argument being that this is not a space the banks are active in anyway. Of course the American Banks’ don’t buy that.

So the Canadian effort could be an effort by Wal-Mart to demonstrate to the American regulators that the American Banks’ fears are misplaced, and no need to worry.

Time will tell, but these are fascinating plays. My take would be that anything which dilutes the Banks’ efforts is bad for Banks but good for consumers. Its not that I think Banks need to go out of there way to encourage competition, but its a fact that competition will drive efficiency and effectiveness. And its no co-incidence that CitiBank are currently peddling their international payments capabilities to the home countries of North American and European immigrants. Banks everywhere recognise that the demographic shifts arising from immigration require strategy changes.

So bottom line, and just my opinion, but Wal-Mart is a machine.  With sales closing in on $ 350 billion annually, and net profit closing in on $12 billion annually, they can dictate the markets they play in, where the regulations allow them.

 Here is a further update on the Canadian Banks efforts to develop market share amongst “new Canadians”.

In order to reach them, RBC too has set up a multilingual website and can facilitate non-resident account openings online. The site averages about 5,000 hits a month.

“The Chinese version is already about 35 per cent of the traffic,” Whitmell said.

“We’ve launched that so that anybody, anywhere around the globe has the ability to initiate that relationship with RBC – even before they arrive in Canada.

Source: NEWS. TALK. SPORTS – 570news.com – Big banks compete to court immigrant clientele; market worth about $3B a year

Banks are using all kinds of activities to attract immigrants:

For its part, Bank of Montreal (TSX:BMO) plans to hold free seminars in Hong Kong and mainland China in the coming months to brief prospective immigrants about Canadian banking, taxation, education, real estate and culture.

Prior to their departure, new Chinese clients are able to establish personal deposit accounts in Canada while also arranging MasterCards, banking cards and residential mortgages.

“We want to be proactive,” said Peggy Sum, BMO’s senior vice-president, Asian market. “All those things are important for settlement.”

There is real incentive to attract new immigrants because their profile is generally positive.

Immigrants, however, are generally encouraged to bring enough to support themselves for at least six months.

That’s creating a lucrative opportunity for Canadian banks given the high savings rate in some Asian countries. In China, that number is high as 40 per cent compared to a negative savings rate in Canada.

Relevance to Bankwatch:

International migration between countries is significant, and unstoppable.  The profile of those migrants is strong because they are advised or required to bring deposits with them for self protection and support. 

Clearly immigrants backgrounds required different approaches, based on different cultures and attitudes, but here I am speaking about the size of the opportunity relative to traditional marketing.  Also I am looking here at new business opportunity, not share of wallet.

Continuing with Canada as an example there are 220,000 – 256,000 (2005) new immigrants annually.

Canada has about 10 million “bankable” households.  Of those, churn runs about 10 – 15%.  This would be people moving, dissatisfied with their bank or accepting an offer from another bank.  That churn accounts for 1 million - 1.5 million new bank sales annually.

The new immigrants of which 60% are economic immigrants, i.e. skilled and or business class, represent a pool of guaranteed new customers for someone.  They are new so they have to open a bank account somewhere.

256 / 1,000 (assuming 10%)  represents a 26% increase in the size of the marketing audience.  But if your marketing tactics are designed to attract people in the 1,000 category, i.e. traditional locals, then by design your marketing is missing 20% of the market.  In fact its worse than that, because the 1,000 comprises existing residents many of whom are recent immigrants (2 million immigrants between 1996 and 2005).  Therefore traditional marketing will be missing 20 – ?? (50% perhaps) of the market.

The more I think about this, the opportunity here is very significant.

“Yet here we are in 2006 and the banks look stronger than ever, — ageing Baby Boomers and a lot of enthusiastic immigrants.

“There’s a good steady wind in the sails of the industry,” says Robert Pearce, president and chief executive of personal and commercial clients at Bank of Montreal. That steady wind will only get stronger with favourable demographics, he adds.”

Source: “Canadian Banks & Insurance – Mozilla Firefox”

The baby boomer wealth transfer has been long predicted for the last 20 years, and now its coming through big time.  Bank are in a great position to take advantage.

Its good timing to review some of the core activities that have been covered here recently.  This is precisely the time to invest in strategies for the future, that fit with the reality that is upon us, yet its not clear Banks’ are doing so. 

Some obvious activities:

1. automate lending activities:  the demographic shifts require less need for lending, and combined with the commoditisation of mortgages, indicate cost elimination in this sector is essential. (nice tie in to yesterdays debate, which began here and continued here with James)
2. automate all branch transactions for self service. Examples are passbooks, statements, cheque images, complete bill payment capability including bill presentment, interactive financial messages (account alerts), CRM fully integrating online and branch, online and ATM sales referrals, online account opening.
3. re-engineer the call centre. Answering the phone is a waste of time for 90% of todays calls, and all we do is irritate customers.  Call centres should be focussed on sales, and levering  click to talk and here.
4. re-engineer branch design.  Future branches don’t need vaults, and tellers.  But that’s not an overnight shift. 

What is not in the list >>>  more branches.  We don’t need that, at least not yet.   We may require more ‘feet on the street’ but lets understand branch design, and capabilities of current physical networks first.

tags: bank+strategy, online+banking, branch, call+centre, re-engineer, bpm

OCC Ombudsman Shares Insight on Leadership Opportunities in Financial Services

My concern, rather, is the narrower one involving the future of the banking industry. I’m here to ask whether the industry to which you have dedicated your careers can afford to leave on the table the billions in current business – and multiples in future business – that the fringe industry collects by catering to the needs of our growing minority population. Given the projected size and potential earning power of that population, I think the answer is self-evident.

What can be done? The key to gaining or improving a position in any market is understanding it better, and here I think that the members of this organization bring some unique advantages of empathy and first-hand insight.

The full text of this speech is available at http://www.occ.gov/ftp/release/2006-66a.pdf.

Relevance to Bankwatch:
Walmart see this as an opportunity, yet traditional banks in all countries are not equipped, nor are they considering becoming equipped to address the opportunity with new products, and different didstribution aligned to the group.  This opportunity exists everywhere: Algerians in France, Sikhs and Chinese in Canada, Indians in UK etc etc.

Technorati Tags: unbanked, banking+strategy

SUSAN TOMPOR: Hispanics live on fringe of U.S. banks

Unlike some banks that require a Social Security number, Chase allows Hispanic immigrants to use a Metricula Consular, a document of identity issued by the Mexican government, as one piece of identification to open a banking account.

Imagine being able to write a check in Madrid to send as a wedding gift to a friend in Taipei — and she can easily cash it at a local bank. Or having your checking and credit-card accounts open and waiting for you in New York City the day you arrive from your former home in Shanghai.

Banks don't typically provide such services to every retail customer, even as the industry globalizes amid a series of cross-border mergers. But some banks have been rolling out checking account services in recent years that better address the needs of globe-trotting consumers.

It's happening as multinationals and banks continue broadening their global reach. One recent example: National Bank of Greece announced plans in early April, 2006, to buy a 46% stake in Turkey's Finansbank for €2.3 billion ($2.77 billion).

And speculation has been rampant this month about what — or where — global banking pioneer Citigroup (C) will buy next, now that the Federal Reserve has lifted its prohibition against the New York financial services company's pursuit of acquisitions.

CALLING ALL EXPATS.  Citigroup saw the need to provide financial services for expatriates more than a decade ago, when a section of the bank did nothing but handle the finances of its employees abroad. The bank soon decided to extend the service to expats from other companies. It continues helping them with money transfers, accounts, and other matters as part of its "Personal Banking for Overseas Employees" program.

Now banks are improving their services for consumers around the world. "What you're seeing is recognition, on a number of different levels, of the increasing mobility of the population," says Jim Eckenrode, managing director of banking and payments research at Needham (Mass.) research and consulting firm TowerGroup.

He says that banks want to make their services more accessible to consumers abroad for many reasons. Banks benefit from having a global brand that retail consumers recognize in more than one country, he says. They also don't like to lose customers who move away.

HSBC (HBC), which has more than 9,500 offices in Europe, the Asia-Pacific region, the Americas, the Middle East, and Africa, has been working hard to encourage customers to keep using its retail branches in different countries. In recent years the London bank began offering a "Premier" service, which includes perks such as quick credit and mortgages for people moving overseas.

THE SUN NEVER SETS.  Geoffrey Byrd, business integration manager for London power systems and services company Rolls-Royce, used HSBC's new service when he moved to the U.S. from Britain in November. The Englishman has lived in his native country for most of his life and banked with HSBC for at least 10 years.

When his company transferred him in September to a position in East Hartford, Conn., Byrd went to an HSBC branch in Britain to discuss his plans to move. The bank's British office filled out paperwork about his account information and sent it to an HSBC office in the U.S.

"We can base everything here on what he has in Britain," says Kristy Moore, a premier relationship manager at HSBC. In most cases it takes three days to transfer the information overseas and adapt it to the new country's financial system. An easy transfer from Britain to the U.S. could take an afternoon, while it might take a few more days from a place like Australia.

HSBC's accounts are geared for higher-income customers, however. The services are free for those who maintain at least $100,000 of assets in the U.S. For those who have less, it costs $50 a month — which could make lower-income customers swallow hard.

IMMIGRANT AID.  Company executives who travel aren't the only ones who need global checking accounts. Daniel Ayala, senior vice-president for global remittance services at Wells Fargo (WFC) in San Francisco, has been sending money to his mother in Colombia for 22 years.

When he did this recently, it took him about an hour. He had to rush out of his office at lunchtime, find an ATM to withdraw some cash, go to an ethnic neighborhood on the other side of town, find an agent at a remittance company there, give them his cash, get a confirmation number for proof of the transaction, go back to his office, call his mom, and give her the confirmation number so she could obtain the money in Colombia. Then he had to call her again the next day to make sure she got her money safely.

If Wells Fargo had a remittance program to Columbia –- it doesn't yet — Ayala would have opened one of the company's InterCuenta Express accounts in the U.S. Within 24 hours or so of setting it up, Ayala would be able to log into the account online at Wellsfargo.com whenever he needed it.

He could transfer up to $3,000 per day, at $5 per transaction, from the Wells Fargo account, which would be linked to another account in Colombia. His mother could then withdraw the money from the Colombian bank whenever she needed it, instead of having to pick up a wad of cash at the local supermarket.

SNOWBIRD SERVICE.  Wells Fargo has been expanding such services for its immigrant customers in recent years and plans to continue doing so. Most recently the bank started providing InterCuenta Express accounts to El Salvadoran and Guatemalan immigrants last May.

To make it happen, it partnered with Guatemalan banks Banco Industrial and Banco De Desarrollo Rural, as well as Banco Agrícola of El Salvador. Wells Fargo has formed such partnerships since the 1990s with banks in Latin American countries, India, and the Philippines, in an effort to better serve its immigrant customers on the West Coast.

It's also happening in the Great White North. Toronto-based Royal Bank of Canada (RY) acquired Rocky Mount (N.C.)-based Centura Bank in 2001. Since then the Canadian bank has been trying to expand its U.S. presence by using the branches of its U.S. subsidiary (now called RBC Centura and based in Raleigh).

The Canadian bank and its U.S. subsidiary have been offering checking accounts in recent years for migrant customers from Canada. Many "snowbirds" live north of the border but spend their winters in Florida. There are also Canadian students at U.S. colleges and people who live in one country but work on the other side of the border.

KEEPING CUSTOMERS. People who sign up for the "RBC Access" service get access to two checking accounts — one in Canada and the other in the U.S. It costs $3.95 per month, but the fee is waived for a minimum balance of $700.

Customers can then make instant foreign currency transfers between the two accounts, even though they are denominated in different currencies. They can also use their Canadian credit history to obtain credit cards or mortgages from the Royal Bank of Canada in the U.S., among other things.

"It's an easy way to access [your money] without going to another institution," says Michael Reed, a senior manager who comes up with business strategies for affluent clients at the Royal Bank of Canada. And easier access to dollars, euros, and pesos appears to be the order of the day as globe-girdling banks try to hold on to customers — and attract new ones.

October 28, 2005

BY MARY WISNIEWSKI Business Reporter
Advertisement

Chicago banks want your business. Fiercely. Plaintively.

Anyone who turns on the radio can hear about great CD rates, Sunday hours and free checking. And new branches seem to spring up on every urban corner.

With the hot competition in Chicago area banking over the last few years, you’d think a few banks had gained some ground. But a government report on area market share shows the rankings mostly unchanged. It’s like a tug of war, in which combatants pull with all their might but hardly move.

“The fact that it doesn’t change is bizarre. It’s bizarre that the market hasn’t consolidated more,” said Mitchell Feiger, CEO at MB Financial.

“Maybe it speaks to the fierceness of the competition here and the fierceness of small and middle-sized guys like us,” Feiger said. “We battle tooth and nail for every customer.”

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.’s deposit market share report for the Chicago area, released this month, shows Chase, LaSalle and Harris at the top of a heap of 309 banks, where they’ve been for years.

These three banks account for 38 percent of the market. The FDIC report is a snapshot showing where deposits were on June 30, 2005.

“The big competitors that came in haven’t done much,” said David Rudis, president of retail banking at LaSalle.

Rudis noted that LaSalle not only kept its number two spot this year, but increased deposit balances by 9 percent.

Perennial top-20 contenders include Chicago area natives Northern Trust, MidAmerica and MB Financial.

The stagnancy in market share distribution hasn’t come from lack of trying — most obviously in branch building.

The number of bank branches in the Chicago area jumped by 561 to 2,989 in three years, accord- ing to FDIC reports. Chase added 133 branches from June 2002 to June 2005, and Harris added 109.

National City, Fifth Third and Washington Mutual are all playing the branch-building game. Washington Mutual has put up 163 new branches since it entered the market in June 2003.

Washington Mutual’s deposit share is at 0.3 percent, or about $711 million, ranking 48th in the area. This shows how hard it is to grow in the market without making acquisitions, analysts say.

“Organic growth in Chicago is difficult,” said Ron Peterson, vice president at Moors & Cabot. “If someone wants to come to this market and get meaningful market share, they’ll have to do acquisitions — probably more than one.”

Shane Winn, a spokesman for Washington Mutual, said the bank is “performing at expectations.” Winn noted that Washington Mutual is a middle-market retail bank, which isn’t trying to go after large commercial deposits like LaSalle and Chase, so a direct comparison can’t be made.

Fifth Third came to Chicago in 1999 and now has 135 branches in the area, 60 percent newly built and about 40 percent acquired through the takeover of Old Kent. Another six new branches are planned for this year, and 20 for next year.

Fifth Third Bank Chicago CEO Terry Zink said that while branch building is important, the Chicago affiliate is also is focused on what products it needs to develop for a particular community, such as a low-cost way to wire money for Hispanic immigrants.

Feiger said that the “jury is still out” on whether all the branch building will pay off.

LaSalle’s Rudis said LaSalle hasn’t stayed at number two by standing still. The growing competition in the Chicago market has forced the bank to become more focused on the customer and relationships, Rudis said.

“When all else is a commodity, the relationship wins,” Rudis said. “You can’t get a relationship by just opening up a new build- ing.”

The number of Chicago area banks continues high relative to the rest of the country. Illinois has a history of having a lot of small banks, because of now-defunct state laws that restricted how many branches a bank could have.

Even after the laws were repealed, Illinois residents who need to park or borrow money still have plenty of choices. The Chicago area has 309 banks, with just under $240 billion in deposits. In comparison, New York City has $655 billion in deposits with 233 banks.

“It kind of screams for consolidation,” said Brad Milsaps, an analyst at Sandler O’Neill & Partners, who predicted the area would see more merger activity in 2006. He said mid-size banks, like First Midwest, Midwest Banc Holdings and MB Financial, might look to acquire smaller banks.

“It’s possible the competition’s going to get more and more fierce among banks until people say I can’t take it anymore and give up,” said MB Financial’s Feiger.

Whatever happens to the banks, Feiger said, the competition is great for customers. His own bank led the current trend of staying open on Sundays, which was taken up by Chase and LaSalle.

“This is the finest banking market to be in,” Feiger said. “People banking in this market are getting fantastic value.”

ank Branches Deposits in Market (Billions) Market Share
1. JPMorgan Chase Bank 324 $38.4 16.02%
2. LaSalle Bank 140 31 12.92
3. Harris 163 21.7 9.04
4. Northern Trust 18 8.5 3.53
5. Fifth Third Bank 123 8 3.36
6. Charter One Bank 136 6.4 2.69
7. Corus Bank 14 5.5 2.3
8. CitiBank 51 5.4 2.27
9. MidAmerica Bank 49 4.9 2.05
10. First Midwest Bank 56 4.5 1.87
SOURCE: FDIC

by Jon Ashworth
A look past the media reports at Matt Barrett�s rise to the top post at Barclays

I AM excited about meeting Matt Barrett, who steps up to the chairmanship of Barclays this week after four years as chief executive. Where to begin? Shall I ask him about his ex-wife, the former model? Or should I start with that marvellous �gaffe� about not borrowing on credit cards? This is going to be fun.

The door swings open, and there he is tall, impeccably dressed, eyes twinkling. With his rakish moustache and winning smile, Barrett, 59, looks like one of those ageing matinee idols who would have your mother swooning in the aisle. It is impossible not to like Barrett. He oozes Irish-Canadian bonhomie, outlining his rise from humble clerk to millionaire banker. He roars with laughter when I recall his arrival in the UK in 1999, which coincided with a rumpus over (words edited out) photos of his second wife, Anne-Marie Sten. Barrett quipped at the time that employees saw parts of my wife that I never saw .

Was he taken aback by the ensuing tabloid furore? I expected it completely, he says, adding that he would have preferred a more low-key arrival. What people forget is sometimes these (things) are quite painful. But you say, look, it s good copy and they can t resist it, so I ll live with it.

Barrett is similarly nonchalant about last year s disastrous select committee appearance, when he told MPs that borrowing on credit cards was too expensive . This did not do much for morale at Barclaycard. Barrett says his remarks were taken out of context. It was an honest answer to a question about long-term debt. But I didn t trash the company. I didn t trash credit cards.

He goes on: I ve been CEO for nearly 17 years, and I have more arrows in my back than Saint Sebastian. It s the old one-liner: if you can t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen. You don t go into these jobs at the point of a gun, and you accept that the slings and arrows of outrageous media will grab you from time to time.

Barrett reads two books a week and peppers the conversation with literary allusions. If I could paraphrase Kipling: good or bad media, two imposters just the same . I ve trained myself not to get overly excited about nice pieces, and not to get overly depressed about others, and to accept that it goes with the turf.

Do you like it when it happens? No. But are you going to spend your life beating your breast? No, you get on with your job, and if you have the belief that over time you ll do good things, then the world will cut you some slack.

Barrett once dreamt of being a writer, but his life story is far more intriguing than many works of fiction. The only son of a Kerry bandleader, he was brought up in Kells, Co Meath, on the road from Dublin to Donegal.

He attended the local Christian Brothers School where discipline was instilled through the cane. I learnt tolerance for pain, he laughs. I tell my children stories of growing up, and they don t believe me. It sounds like something out of Dickens.

In 1962, aged 18, Barrett set off for London to seek his fortune. If you wanted to eat, you emigrated, he says of Ireland in those days. Unemployment was as high as 30 per cent. If you weren t on the farm, you automatically headed for the ferry to Holyhead.

He landed a job as a clerk with the Bank of Montreal. We had a walks department, which meant you walked the cheques and handed them off to the banks in the City. Imagine me as a utility clerk, at 18 or 19 years of age, walking in the City delivering cheques.

In 1967, aged 22, Barrett went to Canada on a two-year training programme with the bank. I often joke and it s a true story that when they asked me, I said, Well, there s good fishing in Canada, so I ll go for a couple of years. And I never got back. Moving to Canada was a huge, life-changing experience for me, and I fell in love with the country.

Canada had none of the UK s class hang-ups. Here, you were more preordained for what your status in life would be. I became very excited about the meritocracy that I saw within the Canadian environment. There were lots of opportunities. Lack of credentials didn t seem to matter. Performance was what counted.

He got off the plane in Montreal on January 15, 1967, with a borrowed C$100 in his wallet. I think I was on 500 a year in London, and I got an advance to help me buy winter clothes. It was about 20 below zero when I arrived with a 20mph wind. It cut me in two. I ll never forget thinking: Have I gone stark, raving mad? Nothing can be this cold.

On his first day at work, Barrett met Irene Korsak, a Polish immigrant working with him on the foreign exchange desk. They married 18 months later, and went on to have four children, Tara, Kelly, Andrea and Jason, all now living in Toronto.

They re unreconstructed Canadians, he says, pointing with pride to a family photograph on the sideboard. It s nice when your kids get to the stage of becoming your friends, not your kids.

Barrett rose through the ranks to become chairman and CEO of Bank of Montreal. In 1999, soon after announcing his intention to retire, aged 55, he took a call from Barclays chairman, Sir Peter Middleton. The bank had recently parted company with its chief executive, Martin Taylor, only for his successor, Mike O Neill, a former US marine, to retire after one day on health grounds. Sir Peter called me and said, Why don t you drop in for a discussion? and I said, No, no, please go away! I ve just finished. But he was pretty persuasive.

Barrett had told journalists that he planned to retire to the trendy beach suburb of Conchas Chinas in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. I gave this press conference saying that I was going to smell the roses before I fertilise them, and going to grow a pony-tail and go down to Mexico and write bad books in Conchas Chinas. Then, a month later, I announced I was coming to one of the most historic, conservative institutions in the world. They pulled my leg pretty badly.

He has no regrets about returning to the UK. This is a very different England, a very different London, to the one I was in as a kid. It has moved from aristocracy to meritocracy. You hear a delightful range of accents these days. If you go back 40 years, you wouldn t have heard those accents and you wouldn t have an Irishman as chairman of Barclays.

That said, Barrett admits that he still feels a bit of an outsider. This is the first time in my life that I ve been hyphenated, he laughs. He s Irish-Canadian . When you re labelled like that, it has a slightly marginalising effect. It kind of hints at not quite one of us . In Canada, I was never called anything except Matt Barrett.

Still, he feels settled enough to call London home and recently bought a property in the West End. I ve decided that I will spend the rest of my life in London. I won t go back to Canada.

Barrett expects to devote about 60 per cent of his time to the Barclays chairmanship, which is a non-executive role. I haven t drawn breath for 42 years. I m looking forward to having a little more time for friends. He intends to rekindle his interest in fishing, with trips to Argentina for brown trout, Florida for tarpon and Russia for Atlantic salmon. As the interview draws to a close, I ask him whether he is still happily a bachelor. No one s ever happily a bachelor, but you have to play the cards you are dealt, he says, eyes twinkling with amusement. So, yes, I m unattached, I m afraid.

What about all those articles about Barrett attending glittering receptions with a beautiful girl on each arm? I wish it were true, he sighs. I wish I was having half as much fun as is sometimes reported, but I m afraid my life is a bit more boring than that.

Perhaps, as chairman, Barrett s luck will change. He has the magnetism to attract the ladies, not to mention the wealth. But as he says about money, in his own disarming way: There s only so many filets mignons you can eat.

THE POWER 100

CV: MATT BARRETT

Name: Matthew W Barrett

Born: September 20, 1944

Residence: London

Marital Status: Twice divorced, four children

Education: Christian Brothers School, Kells. Harvard University (Advanced Management Programme, 1981)

Career: Clerk at Bank of Montreal in London in 1962. Moved to Canada in 1967 on two-year training programme. Settled there. Chief operating officer from 1987-89. Chief executive officer from 1989-99. Appointed chief executive of Barclays in 1999. Succeeds Sir Peter Middleton as chairman this week