Listen Up: Talent recruitment and retention

In episode 3 of the Independent Banker podcast, community banker Kim Kirk and fintech insider Tommy Marshall discussed today’s competitive job market and explained how they attract and keep skilled employees in a highly competitive job market.

“[Employees] want to enjoy coming to work every day … Being able to provide that flexibility when we can is very important to folks. And then creating a team where you have harmony, and that everybody knows their role in the team—it makes talent retention so much easier because there isn’t so much infighting and people aren’t dreading coming to work because they have to deal with this today.” —Kim Kirk

“One of the biggest issues that we’re hearing from community bankers today … is recruiting and retaining and training the top bank talent and finding talent in this very fast-moving place to help stay ahead of the curve. We always know that finding the right people with the right experience is crucial to the innovation needs of community banks.” —Charles Potts

“Colleges and universities are always on the cutting edge of what’s happening in the [technology and innovation] environment and teaching these students so that they can be marketable to companies all across the world. To see what these students are learning and what’s out there is a great thing for a community bank to be engaged with, understand and benefit from. And then hopefully be an employer of some of these students, too.” —Kim Kirk

“The number one thing we talk about is how to improve the diversity of the workforce, from a gender standpoint and from underrepresented groups: Black, Hispanic, Latinx and Asian Americans … Great growth and innovation, etc., is much more likely when we’re able to create diverse work teams across every dimension we can imagine.” —Tommy Marshall

“You may be able to find someone who has a good skill set, who maybe doesn’t have banking [experience], that you can teach banking to if they harmonize well with your team. So that‘s important to be open to.”—Kim Kirk