Tips for Cost-Effective Professional Development

Community banks face two relentless pressures: high employee turnover and a heavy compliance burden. Combined, these two realities consume most of their learning and development resources. This leaves little time or budget for growth-oriented training that drives results.

Letting skills stagnate and expertise fade creates problems that don’t surface right away, but that can have substantial long-term impacts. The good news is that this is fixable. Establishing professional development programs keeps people sharp, and these initiatives don’t have to break the bank.

“Community banks need formal professional development programs to keep their up-and-coming staff engaged,” says Shirley Ringhand, senior vice president for ICBA Education. “Those associates want to learn, and they want to be able to add credentials after their name. They want to know you’re investing in them and that there’s a path forward.”

That investment doesn’t have to become a major line-item expense. “Professional development can be as simple as mentoring or encouraging someone to attend a program,” says Ringhand, who has seen many banks pair newer employees with experienced staff and others point their employees toward certifications or short courses that build skills over time. She says ICBA offers certification programs, seminars and director education that banks can use as needed, “whether they’re starting small or building something more structured.”

Employees across all generations like to know that they’re valuable to the bank and that advancement opportunities exist. According to iHire’s 2025 Talent Retention Report, more than half of workers say they’re more likely to stay when their employers provide professional development and upskilling (57.4%) and clear advancement paths (54.8%), emphasizing that retention is tied to visible growth potential. iHire says recognition (50.2%) and cross-training (46.0%) also help employees feel both valued and challenged at work. 

Ringhand has seen this play out firsthand at the community bank level. “You might have [an employee] who starts as a teller, and if you never engage them in any professional development or push them forward—if you don’t create that plan—they’re going to go looking for another job,” she explains. “They want to know that you’re investing in their future, that they can move ahead in their career and that there’s a real opportunity to do that.”

Community Bank Career Path Planning and Mentoring

For banks, professional development can range from formal certification programs that build credentials and connect employees with peers facing the same challenges, to one-to-one mentoring programs where a newer hire learns the business from someone who’s been doing it for years. 

John Findlay, CEO at LemonadeLXP, a learning platform for banks, notes that artificial intelligence is playing a broader role in this educational arena. He says AI can quickly cull through data and information to find the most salient points in a specific training program, compliance manual or other materials. This is a boon for smaller banks that might not have internal data scientists or analysts to handle that work but want to give teams access to current, accurate information that will support them in their day-to-day work.

Findlay also advises banks to think beyond compliance when creating their professional development programs. “On one hand, compliance is a big deal because you’re trying to mitigate risk and make sure mistakes aren’t made, because they’re very costly,” he says. “But on the growth side, you also want staff members who understand your products and your offerings deeply and can connect them to customer problems.”

That’s where professional development shifts from avoiding mistakes to driving results. “If you’re investing in the right places, like teaching staff how to uncover real customer pain points and recommend the right products at the right time, that professional development can positively impact KPIs like [cross-sell rates and revenue per customer],” says Findlay. 

ICBA Certification Programs for Banks

There’s no need to overhaul everything at once to make professional development work. Banks can start small, stay consistent and build from there. ICBA’s certification programs can be a good starting point. The association offers nationally recognized designations in areas like compliance, BSA/AML and auditing, along with certifications in enterprise risk management, marketing and data analytics.

Ringhand says participants complete coursework, pass an exam and maintain their credentials through ongoing education. This helps standardize knowledge across the organization and gives employees a clear way to build expertise in their roles. And for banks, certifications help strengthen internal capabilities and show regulators that teams have the training and tools in place to run their departments effectively.

“There’s nothing like certification programs for putting together a solid professional development program,” says Ringhand. She also encourages ICBA members to explore the organization’s free resources such as ICBA Community, where employees can engage with peers across the country on topics like audit, compliance and security. “[There] are resources that don’t cost [members] anything but yield benefits in terms of what other banks are doing.”

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