How to Nurture the Next Generation of Leaders

Gen Z workers are no longer newbies in the working world. With the oldest in the cohort nearing 30 years old, they’re poised to start taking over leadership roles. But only for the right opportunity, and the right balance.

What do Gen Z workers want in a bank career?

What Gen Z wants “doesn’t have to do so much with money. It has to do with well-being, [partly] because they went through high school during COVID,” said Dani Johnson, principal and co-founder of RedThread Research in San Mateo, California. “For this generation, it’s ‘How do I not choose one over the other, but make them work together.’”

Yes, salary remains important to this group, but it is less so than it was to the generations that came before them, according to a report from Deloitte. Gen Z is also more focused on work-life balance, with only 6% saying their primary career goal is moving into a leadership position. 

Another important thing to note is that their career goals align with the core values that many community banks also have. Deloitte found that 89% of Gen Z workers say purpose influences their motivation and engagement. They’re also eager to learn, with 70% saying they are developing skills to advance their career about once a week or more, compared with 59% of millennials.

Community banks with strong values—and learning and development programs—are setting themselves up for success when growing and promoting from within.

How can community banks identify potential Gen Z leaders?

Oxford Bank in Oxford, Michigan, makes reviewing employee potential a yearly event through an annual talent review. It’s done for every employee who has been with the $1.09 billion-asset community bank for more than a year. 

For the past decade, the executive team has taken a day to rate workers on a matrix that includes factors like accountability, performance and engagement, said David Lamb, the bank’s president and CEO. The team then works to identify who might be a superstar poised for leadership.

“We consider them stars, meaning they can absolutely do the next logical role for them, or something comparable to it,” Lamb says. 

The executives also identify who doesn’t have that kind of potential but is still an essential team player who can work under strong leadership to make a well-rounded team. They then discuss what they need to do to keep each employee, regardless of whether the individual is considered a future leader.

Commencement Bank in Tacoma, Washington, offers a Community Banker 101 and Banker Basics courses that can help identify who at the $683 million-asset bank is ready to lead.

“Somebody might come to us with cash handling and great customer service skills but might not have a background in banking,” says Rebecca Williamson, senior vice president and human resources manager at Commencement Bank. They teach those basics as well as soft skills like confidence and how to speak in bank lingo. 

The community bank also makes sure that it’s not just entry-level workers taking the classes. 

“It’s a great way for more experienced workers to intermingle with entry level, so they can share their success stories among our newer bankers that can help develop them along the way,” Williamson says.

How do you train the next generation of community bank leaders?

Five years ago, Native American Bank in Denver hired an executive coach to provide leadership guidance to senior leadership through an 18-month program of one-on-one meetings with a coach. Leadership found it so helpful, says Laura Lozano, vice president and human resources manager at the $418 million-asset community bank, that they decided to offer the course to “the next in line,” which was upper management. It proved to be so successful with that cohort that Native American Bank began to offer it to middle management and then, most recently, to potential leaders. 

The program, which is offered once a year, has been most valuable to people who the community bank has identified as potential leaders but who might not see that potential in themselves. The coach helps these folks drill down into “what’s getting in your way that’s preventing you to take that next step,” Lozano says.

Commencement Bank went the internal route and, three years ago, hired a full-time training and development officer. Williamson says this approach isn’t common, especially for a company with about 80 employees, but employee engagement surveys showed that training would fulfill an employee demand.

“Having [the training and development officer] on staff has really helped align our training and development goals with our strategic initiatives,” she says. “It allows us to dive deeper into what our employees need to succeed to help us meet our goals.”

The community bank also offers an annual course called HR for Managers, which helps anyone in a supervisory role become a better leader. The course works on two levels. First, it gives supervisors leadership training, especially for those managers who “essentially grew up in the bank,” Williamson says, which is common, because the bank tends to promote from within. It also helps them realize “they’re an extension of HR,” which means they have a role to play in retaining employees and identifying the next potential leaders who will come up behind them. 

In addition to offering leadership courses, Oxford Bank allows workers interested in leadership positions, or who might want to be exposed to a different part of the banking business, to shadow other employees on field exams. That’s especially helpful to Gen Z employees who are digital natives. They get to “look and see orders and paperwork, because even in this electronic age, there’s still paperwork,” Lamb says.

Shadowing can be a particularly valuable experience for Gen Z workers, Johnson says. And while mentoring is important, so is hands-on experience. All of this can help Gen Z workers see a different role in action and build relationships in different parts of the bank they may not be exposed to otherwise.

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