Amid All the Glitter, It Still Comes Back to Customer Experience: Nobody Actually Said, "It's People, Stupid," at This Year's Retail Delivery Conference, but Speaker after Speaker Said as Much in Different Words

It's somewhat ironic that BAI's Retail Delivery Conference was in Las Vegas, a city where experience--kitsch or not--is king. Want to "experience" Paris, Venice, and Egypt--in one day? Come to Vegas. Experience other worlds? Stroll over and catch Star Trek: The Experience at the Las Vegas Hilton. Likewise, this year's meeting was all about experience--the customer experience--more than it was about technology, which has been its dominant, if unofficial, focus for years. Noticeably absent as keynoters were such high priests of technology as Bill Gates and Larry Ellison. In their place were bankers who spoke about execution, the need to improve customer service, the need to make lower levels of the organization accountable, and other similar "soft things." The show's massive exhibit arena had all manner of technical "solutionware" on display, yet from the podium, technology--when mentioned at all--was described solely as a tool for accomplishing a better experience. One speaker from a megabank even went so far as to question whether some technology solutions are more trouble than they're worth. Another big-bank speaker, Ken Thompson, chairman, CEO, and president of Wachovia Corp., attributed part of the success of the Wachovia/First Union merger to a single-minded focus on creating a positive customer experience. During the merger, the corporation decided which systems to keep and which systems to trash based on how they would impact customers. "You can't sell enough product to make up for attrition," said Thompson. He should know: Wachovia has decreased customer attrition from 20% to 10.5%. Pumping up the branch manager In his keynote address, David Daberko, chairman and CEO of National City Corporation, told attendees that branch managers were critical to National City's success and one of the reasons the bank has been able to transform itself from a corporate banking powerhouse to a financial institution with a very strong retail component. This isn't just lip service. The bank removed incentive salary caps for branch managers, and top performers can now earn in excess of six figures. Branch management, rather than a stepping stone into a corporate job, has become its own career path. Branch manager attrition is down to less than 10%. In another instance of putting their money where their mouth is, Daberko said that National City has increased teller compensation by $2 or more per hour. The bank has also improved teller training, which is now measured in weeks rather than days, to instill company pride and culture and build commitment at all levels of the organization. Other speakers echoed Daberko's sentiments. Neil Hall, CEO of Regional Community Bank, a unit of PNC Bank, described how the bank has shifted authority to the branch manager and makes them accountable for branch performance. J. Steele Alphin, corporate personnel executive, Bank of America, told how important it was to hire branch managers with good leadership skills. Who packs your parachute? The importance of group effort was described during the closing session, in a radically different context. A near casualty of the Vietnam conflict, retired U. …