Companies want things easier these
days. Everybody is under a time
crunch, and time, as they say, is money. That includes commercial banking
clients, who more often are looking for a
bank that can be a one-stop shop for all of
their treasury management needs.
Those banks that succeed in treasury
management are those who can combine
technological innovation and expertise
with highly personalized service, says
Shawn Griffin, senior vice president of MB
Financial Bank in Chicago. Banks that give
their commercial clients the tools and
attention they need and resolve their problems quickly are the ones who will stand
out above the rest.
Smart Business spoke with Griffin about
what companies can expect from treasury
management services and how partnering
with a good financial institution can facilitate their growth.
What is treasury management?
Treasury management is services offered
by a bank to commercial customers that
have four objectives: accelerating cash and
information flow, controlling or slowing
down disbursements, reporting information in real time, and offering numerous
investment options for excess capital.
A good treasury management program
has rich feature functionality within the
core treasury information reporting system. It also features tight integration
among all the various treasury systems and
offers the flexibility to deliver individual
customer value. All of the above must be
supported by outstanding implementation,
service delivery and operational support.
Commercial banking customers tend to
want high-touch service. They want to be
able to talk to people and have issues
resolved at a one-stop shop where they can
do Internet banking, ACH, lockbox or wire
transfers. They want to talk to a single
expert who can handle all of those issues.
That’s where the servicing component has
taken on more value than some of the
more operational/transactional areas,
which today tend to be viewed as commoditized.
Those customers should seek out a bank
that has made the financial commitment
and put dedicated experts in place to service them. There’s an added cost to supplying that level of service, so not all banks
have done that. Many banks tend to just
look at transaction processing and automated telephone and online channels. It’s
really about people resolving unique problems in a timely manner, and that’s critical
to commercial customers. Problems need
to be fixed within minutes or hours versus
days. Banks need to be staffed to resolve
these issues on a same-day basis.
Where do banks fail in offering treasury management services?
First, it’s not the ‘least expensive’ — most
banks won’t make the financial commitment in technology to excel in this area.
Banks that want to be successful in the
treasury management space need to not
only have the sophisticated products necessary to deliver that service today but a
product road map for the future. Those
who invest in electronic delivery of certain
products and services, such as remote
deposit capture, and new product development around the ‘electronification’ of payments will be the ones who stay ahead of
the curve.
Secondly, most banks fail because they
decentralize the servicing to the operations
area. There are dozens of different treasury
management options, and banks who do a
poor job in this department decentralize
service to those silos. Clients are then left
to navigate these multiple locations within
a city or sometimes multiple states, which
creates multiple touch points and inconsistent customer experiences. All issues really should be centralized to a single area
with expert consultants who can resolve
all those issues quickly and with a high
degree of professionalism.
Is there a commercial client best suited to
this service-oriented treasury management
model?
The client who gets the most out of this
model is the one who uses the most complex and greatest number of products and
services. A sophisticated treasury customer who uses multiple services appreciates all of this. Banks who succeed with
this model supply all those needs and create synergies with a client that occur from
a single institution being a one-stop shop.
What about clients who are afraid to change
from one bank to another?
Transitioning has a lot to do with product
implementation paired with the treasury
management process. A bank needs to
have dedicated resources to facilitate that
transition. Banks need to have a formal
process in place that ensures that the customers’ needs have been met, that they
understand the functionality of the products and that their staffs have been properly trained.
SHAWN GRIFFIN is senior vice president of MB Financial Bank
in Chicago. Reach him at [email protected] or (847)
653-1051.