The timing of First Bank's decision to build a new headquarters presented an unusual opportunity to the company's executives. Planning for the building, located in the St. Louis suburbs, started in the fall of 2020, shortly after working from home had become the norm.
As the construction project took shape, it became clear that many companies would never again require their employees to convene from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, like they did before the pandemic.
"The design is definitely influenced by the move towards hybrid work," First Bank Chairman Mike Dierberg said in a recent interview.
The headquarters building, which opened in May, is about 20% to 30% smaller than it might have been had it been designed before the rise of hybrid workplaces, since many First Bank employees are coming into the office fewer than five days per week.
The LEED-certified building also features outdoor work spaces that are meant to appeal to employees who have comfortable offices in their homes. The weather in St. Louis can be unpredictable, and the summer months are often hot and humid, but there are also plenty of beautiful days.
"Working outdoors, even in St. Louis, can be nice," Dierberg said.
Four years after the pandemic upended the way that many Americans work, the pros and cons of those new arrangements are coming into sharper focus, and banks are finding ways to adapt to their employees' altered expectations.
Some 57% of financial services firms now operate on a hybrid basis, either temporarily or permanently, according to new research from Arizent, which is American Banker's parent company. Another 15% of companies in the sector have fully remote workforces, at least for now, the research found.
The research, which was based on interviews of 550 financial services employees, highlights some of the downsides of remote and hybrid work.
For example, 56% of the respondents either strongly agreed, or agreed somewhat, with the idea that remote/hybrid work has made it harder for managers to provide the feedback and coaching that employees need for the development of skills.
Even more survey participants — 62% — agreed at least to some degree that the new work patterns have impacted the development of employees' interpersonal skills. And 69% of them either strongly agreed, or agreed somewhat, with the idea that remote/hybrid work has made it harder for employees who are in the early or mid stages of their careers to build relationships that are important for growth.
One C-level executive at a financial services firm who was interviewed for the Arizent research said that accountability and self-motivation are necessary traits for anyone who works on a remote basis in any capacity. This executive's company is operating permanently in a hybrid work format.
"Not all are equipped to work well in a hybrid setting," the executive said.
Executives at certain other companies that operate on a hybrid or remote basis pointed to positive effects of the new workplace culture. Those upsides include the opportunity to draw from a larger pool of talent and positive impacts on employee satisfaction.
The reverse also appears to be true at firms that have returned to the office full-time. A marketing executive at one such company pointed to certain negative impacts.
"I still think this hinders us from a workforce-sourcing standpoint," this executive said, referring to challenges both in hiring new employees and keeping current workers happy.
The Arizent research, published in a report titled "Skills for the Workforce of the Future in Financial Services," aligns with recent survey findings by the Risk Management Association, a membership organization for banks, credit unions and their employees.
That survey of bank executives, published in March, found that remote work can delay employees' development of skills. Some 82% of the respondents agreed with the idea that new entrants to the banking industry need more support than they did before the pandemic in building so-called soft skills. And 75% of those surveyed said the same thing about hard skills.
On the other hand, 90% of respondents to the Risk Management Association survey agreed that allowing hybrid work is a useful tool for allowing community banks to compete for talent.
Small community banks haven't typically been able to draw from large labor pools, but remote work can change that equation, said Steven Martin, head of membership at the Risk Management Association.
He pointed to the example of a Maine bank that hired a seasoned underwriter who lives in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. "In fact, she's never even met her team in person," Martin said. "That would just never have happened pre-pandemic."
Martin said that some banking jobs, such as tellers and other branch employees, will remain fully in-person, while other roles, including those in information technology and other areas that don't relate to customers, will likely be mostly remote.
"And then in between, I think it's really going to be a lot of discretion," he said.
At First Bank, policies about how often employees should come into the office vary by department. But employees who live in the St. Louis region are generally expected to come into the office on certain days, alongside other members of their departments, according to First Bank CEO Mikel Williamson.
Some 420 employees — or roughly half of the bank's total workforce — are assigned to the new headquarters building in Creve Coeur, Missouri.
Executives at the $6.6 billion-asset bank pointed to some of the same downsides of a fully remote work environment that were highlighted in Arizent's research.
"I do think that, over time, the culture is impacted if it's all remote," said Dierberg, the chairman of the bank.
First Bank's new headquarters building features lots of meeting space — part of an effort to foster collaboration when employees are in the office.
"If you're working part of the time at home, that's a great place to do heads-down work," Dierberg said. "But you want to have a place where you come together and be social."
One goal of the new headquarters' open design is to spur more inter-departmental meetings, said Williamson, who joined First Bank last year from Happy State Bank & Trust in Texas.
"Banks have a tendency to silo their lines of business," he said. "We've got to start breaking down the silos of all the different departments in the bank."
Among larger banks, Stamford, Connecticut-based Synchrony Financial has emerged as a leading proponent of hybrid and remote work. In late 2021, the $121 billion-asset company surveyed its employees and found that 85% of them wanted some kind of work-from-home option.
Today, Synchrony assigns its roughly 18,000 employees to various "hubs." On certain days, workers are encouraged to work from these hubs, many of which have been re-designed to be more conducive to hybrid work, said Rebekah Raimo, senior vice president of human resources at Synchrony.
"We have people come together when it makes sense," Raimo said.
Synchrony has re-designed workplaces to have more green space, offering employees a place to go for a walk. Its headquarters now has a bocce court and a coffee bar. Free lunches are available on certain days.
"We've really made sure that employees can work where they want, how they want," Raimo said.
