Take advantage of opportunities
Once Delie addressed the issues that would help stabilize the bank, he started looking for other avenues to grow and expand their reach. During a tough economic time, it’s important to not be one-dimensional.
“We are not in a high-growth market,” Delie says. “For us to grow in a market that isn’t a high-growth market like other areas of the country, we had to focus on niches within the marketplace that we compete in where the growth is growing at a faster clip than the overall market.
“You have to study the market that you’re competing in. If you see a particular niche where you feel there’s going to be more robust activity, where there’s growth that outperforms the overall market, then you can benefit from that if you focus on it. That’s what good companies and good management teams do.”
Relying on what got you growth in the past will not help your company grow to new heights. You have to constantly reinvent yourself and be thinking of ways to refocus and re-engineer.
“I think a lot of companies during a period of economic turmoil or downturn, they tend to become paralyzed,” Delie says. “They just cut expense and cut expense and they really don’t think about how they are going to continue to manage the top line through that process. That is something that needs to be focused on.”
Delie focused on areas where he saw room for growth and revenue and reallocated resources to go after those areas. Companies must commit to their growth strategies completely in order for them to work.
“We beefed up,” Delie says. “We didn’t pull back like other institutions. We actually added people and developed certain departments. The other thing we had done was focused our people on cross selling. We didn’t want to just push products to clients. We coached them to be more holistic in their approach to providing financial solutions. If a company has a particular need or is looking to mitigate a risk, maybe the insurance company can provide a product or service that helps the company accomplish their objective, and we win by getting that business opportunity.”
Along with finding niches that can help you grow during tough times, new markets can also offer unchartered growth opportunities.
“We are always evaluating our plans,” Delie says. “You have to look at the opportunities that exist in the marketplace. We had to focus on new client acquisition going into the downturn. Our incentive compensation, our strategies were all geared toward going after market share during a period when many other banks were hunkering down or evaporating. That’s what’s led to our growth and our success during a period when outright demand diminished.
“If we are looking to open a new branch, there’s two ways to look at it. One is to try to anticipate what the opportunities are within that micro-market and the other is evaluate whether or not it will be supplemental to your overall delivery channel. You have to look at the market itself that you’re looking to move into and whether or not that move provides support to the rest of the infrastructure. You start with where the customers are and who you are trying to reach and why. Those are the questions you ask yourself.”
Once you identify niches and new market opportunities you need to plan and staff accordingly for growth in those areas to be successful.
“We focused on where the best opportunities were in a particular segment and we staffed that area appropriately to go after the opportunities,” Delie says. “We are in a people business. Even during a cyclical decline, particularly one as severe as what we just went through, where other financial institutions were falling by the wayside, there was a lot of disruption in the marketplace. We were able to capitalize on that, because we had staffed up with good commercial bankers from much larger financial institutions. We upgraded our talent during that time; we didn’t just cut bodies. We looked for ways to become more efficient in the company, but we also hired at the same time to continue to drive growth. Bringing those people in and retaining them was key to our success. Everybody needs to pull their weight to make the overall company successful.”
HOW TO REACH: First National Bank of Pennsylvania, (800) 555-5455 or www.fnb-online.com
