‘Leadership development is key to surviving emerging competition in banking’

Chief Executive Officer of Wema Bank Nigeria Plc, Ademola Adebise, has charged financial institutions to take the task of human capital and leadership development seriously as it is key to surviving the emerging competition in the sector.

Adebise made the call at the lunch of the bank’s Purple Academy at the weekend. He stressed that the growth of financial technologies (fintech) has increased the depth and breadth of competition in the system, which imposes enormous challenges on banks.

According to him, growing and developing leaders is important for driving performance and business growth. He added that performance and leadership are positively correlated, with institutions left with the option of “buying, borrowing or building leaders”.

The chief executive said Wema, an institution that started operation 77 years ago, has chosen to continue to build its cutting-edge leadership as it looks forward to decades of growth and exceptional services.

The decision, he said, led to the re-development of its academy, which has secured re-accreditation from the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN).

“We have new generations of customers with very diverse behaviour and expectations of service delivery that have been defined by new digital culture… Organaisations must continue to drive performance to achieve their objectives and deliver benefits for all.

The major question is how to empower our people to do more. In answering the question, we have discovered that there is a strong correlation between business performance and leadership,” he said, adding that Wema needs strong leaders to oversee its next phase of growth.

Adebise also disclosed that the institution was investing in a data warehouse as part of its effort to enhance data integrity and hedge against theft. He noted that an excellent data governance structure was a necessity for banks that want to remain competitive in the face of threatening fintech, stressing that data optimisation is an emerging winning strategy.

The Head of the Academy, Oluwaferanmi Owolabi, noticed that the value of continuous learning had become an essential component of efficient organisation, noting that Purple Academy would drive the succession of Wema in the coming decades.

The academy, she said, has built partnerships across the world to make it a leading business and leadership training centre.