Advisor | January 2022
Sometimes one wonders what distinguishes a winning team. The answer lies in the combination of people, women and men who play the same match.
In a winning team, each person plays a well-defined role, some on the field, some on the sidelines, some in the stands, some backstage.
On second thought, the same happens in other establishments of professionals – lawyer who take on an important deal, private bankers, bank managers or financial advisors.
What changes depending on the kind of profession or context is the intensity of the team spirit, which is often related to the size of the organization and to the separation between roles.
No wonder that the sense of belonging is much stronger within leading financial networks than in banks or financial networks that can scarcely identify with a management or common strategy.
There are meaningful differences: in some instances, 66% of financial professionals are proud of working for their banks, while some other instances barely reach 25%.
The sense of belonging is directly related to three factors.
The first is the sense of trust in the leading management of the bank of financial network (which ranges between 72% and 15%) which is often mirrored by group management.
The second is the level of loyalty to the bank or financial network that translates in the propensity of the employee to stay within the same organization for one, three or five years (with figures that range between 69% and 34%).
The third is the propensity to become ambassador of the bank or financial network by promoting it among friends and colleagues (with figures that range between 81% and 23%).
Here too there are meaningful differences.
In some cases, the sense of trust in the management, the level of loyalty to the bank or financial network and the propensity to promote one’s organization among third parties are strong and above average: these instances share a harmonious blend of intents and common wisdom.
In some instances, the sense of trust in the management is stronger than the sense of trust in the organization; in other instances, the level of loyalty seems to have a maturity of less than five years and is often related to the presence of stability pacts linked to the employment contract.
The factors that lead to such disparities between one organization and another are many: the ability of leaders to keep their promises; the work of the operating centre; the frequency of contact; contests; the level of pression on business objectives.
However, one factor more than any other seems related to the sense of belonging: a supportive management ready to work on the frontline to reach their goals.
The age of generals who lead from the sideline seems to have come an end. More and more valued are managers who work side by side with their teams.
So, between popular imagination and history, we need figures like Maximus Decimus Meridius or the Maid of Orleans.
Nicola Ronchetti