American Banker Magazine - April 2017

Creative growth strategies are helping banks with $10B to $50B of assets — including Webster and TCF — improve profitability. These ‘tweeners’ deal with tougher regulations than smaller competitors without the scale larger ones have to absorb the expense.

Financial institutions of all sizes are overhauling benefits policies and promoting work-life balance to better compete for millennial recruits with the hipper tech sector. The big changes include longer periods of paid time off for new parents.

Banks are undergoing a digital transformation at the same time that hacker culture has taken off, escalating the security risks. Here is one strategy for protecting data where many banks need to improve.

From SoFi to Venmo, fintech competitors are creating a customer experience that is so fast and easy community bankers like Julieann Thurlow cannot help but worry.

The number of deals in early 2017 was similar to the same period last year, though the pricing has increased. Also see which M&A advisers were the most active for each region during 2016 in our annual ranking.