President, Consumer and Commercial Banking Products, Ally Bank
Diane Morais happened to be reading a book that stressed focusing on “what really matters" shortly before the global pandemic forced much of the United States into a lockdown. It just may have put Morais in an ideal mindset to take on what she considers the most challenging time in her career.
With 34 years in banking, 13 at Detroit-based Ally Financial, Morais had the experience to understand the benefit a change of focus could bring to her role as president of consumer and commercial banking products, a position she has held since 2017.
Greg McKeown's book "Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less," which Morais read in January 2020, led her to "lean heavily on those concepts throughout the pandemic," she said.
"The essentialism approach forced a level of quick decision-making,” said Morais, who is based in Ally's Charlotte, North Carolina, office.
It also led to her remove “less important activities in both my personal and professional life,” including a lot of meetings, so she could focus on navigating the crisis with her leadership team.
"When we come out of this pandemic,” she said, “I plan to continue pushing a Lean Six Sigma culture at Ally,” embracing the management concept that calls for eliminating inefficiency at all levels of a business.
Ally Bank hit some milestones during the crisis, like a record $21 billion increase in retail deposits in 2020. The digital-only bank also eclipsed the 2 million mark in deposit customers — a 14% increase for the year.
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But, Morais said, a determination to stress her new "essentialism" paved the way for her 2,000 employees to help reach those milestones.
She is confident that approach will help Ally maintain its focus on innovation. This now goes beyond technology to the effort of integrating work and personal life to advance what she calls "a more holistic sense of employee well-being."
She intends to continue encouraging women to advance into senior positions, while pushing for flexible workplaces. "The companies that will win in the future, particularly in continuing to accelerate women into senior positions, will be those that value and respect the need for flexibility," Morais said.
Morais also has been an advocate for financial innovation and education, economic development and mobility, and affordable housing. She dedicates much of her free time to those causes in the Charlotte area, serving on the Junior Achievement of Central Carolinas board, as an executive in residence at the McColl School of Business at Queens University in Charlotte, and as the head of Ally's involvement with the Carolina Fintech Hub, a regional partnership of financial services firms, fintechs, universities and government agencies.
