A Seat at the Wells Fargo Table

We also decided while functional product training should stay within each line of business, that we would aggregate all of that into one back office infrastructure for the entire enterprise, so we could do all the logistics, learning, Web development and design as well as metrics and analytics and vendor management in one location. It’s a big initiative, and we’re still evolving that. The aggregation of the back office will happen in the second quarter of this year. We’ll be complete with bringing all of the people processes together in one organization in late spring.

Why was leadership development and aggregating that training seen as so important?

We didn’t have a core and common language around our leadership approach and philosophy because we had 84 different businesses coming together through various different acquisitions. While Wachovia and Wells Fargo was obviously the most successful financial merger in history, we have had other acquisitions and mergers in both legacy businesses over the past decade, so there were a lot of people that were doing various different competency models. We also noted, as we took a look across our organization, that we didn’t have a lot of talent rotation, and we really wanted to start rotating talent more. To do that, it’s a lot easier if we had a core and common platform where we all focus on the same leadership competencies, behaviors and what we really want to accomplish. This is critically important for our future.

Personally, how did you work to get a seat at the proverbial table?

It was a decision made across the enterprise, so it has been pretty easy. The best way has been to make the business case for learning and development and why it’s critically important.

First of all, we’re an international company, so we’ve changed and transformed both organizations, and we have to look at that and say, “What are those implications?” It’s really important for us to continue being successful in places where we’ve been successful, which is to cross-sell. In order to cross-sell and really look at our customer and make sure we are customer-centric, we have to have a broader view of what we as an organization can deliver.