Q. How can leaders be more in touch with people so it’s not just what they like as opposed to what customers want to see?
I think the best way to do that is to have people that are on the front lines communicating with people that are making the decisions. Not all decision-makers come in daily contact with their audience, and therefore, you have to have dependable, insightful people who you are able to communicate with who can bring back to you what they’re seeing and hearing.
The good news is many relevant things can be learned from statistics. You can figure out a good deal of what’s going on based on what products are being chosen, based on what locations are being utilized, based on what the statistics tell you about the relevance of great change or the other things you can learn from the statistics, but you also have to go face to face with people.
Q. How does rebranding affect your expansion?
It should be positive. … We will expand the bank dramatically through acquisition — that’s how the bank has grown. In the last decade, we’ve grown the franchise by over 34 percent — compounded annual growth rates of over 34 percent — that’s huge. Very few banks have grown like that.
We do that by the acquisition of banks. This is our business model. So we acquired AmTrust. AmTrust had branches in Arizona. We just completed a couple weeks ago another acquisition in Arizona to add to that franchise, so that’s the way we will grow the bank. In Cleveland, it is far more likely that this bank will grow dramatically as a result of us buying another bank in this market.
Q. What tips can you offer for those looking to do acquisitions?
This is not a time to be doing acquisitions where you’re assuming asset risks. The uncertainties of this period are many and the risks in the future are many.
Caution. This is a time to be more cautious and choose paths that you have a better sense of the outcomes rather than just be hypothetically assuming that things are going to be better and I want to jump out there in front of the improvement. You can get run over by jumping out in front of the improvement.
How to reach: New York Community Bancorp Inc., (888) 550-9888 or www.mynycb.com; Ohio Savings Bank, (888) 346-9249 or www.amtrust.com
