Chief Administrative Officer
At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, UMB Financial formed a 70-plus-person task force to surface any issues that had to be addressed.
The thinking was that people from so many departments would be able to cover a lot of ground, so nothing would be missed. But the group’s size did not lend itself to making fast decisions in what was such a quickly evolving crisis.
Enter Shannon Johnson.
Johnson, the Kansas City, Missouri, bank’s chief administrative officer, tackled the problem by forming a higher-level steering group. She would elevate the issues shared by various department heads, and the members of the smaller group would collectively make decisions based on what was best for the company overall.
“We also found that, culturally, individual lines of business did not want the burden of owning certain decisions, such as a mask mandate, and wanted that decision to come from the corporate level,” said Johnson, who had been the chief human resources officer before getting promoted to her current role about two years ago.
After providing companywide guidelines, Johnson always circled back with the various departments to ensure that the plans worked and that all voices were heard.
Her process streamlined decision-making and improved communication — which is a pivotal part of her new role.
The mandate she has is to improve how the $36.6 billion-asset UMB executes corporate strategy and to guide projects that cut across multiple departments.
Some colleagues were skeptical at first about that mandate, questioning what value she could add if she wasn’t an expert in their field. But Johnson said she thinks the pandemic showed the need for what she does.
One of her tasks is to coordinate enterprisewide efforts around environmental, social and governance issues. She is working closely with the finance and investor relations team on the analytics for the ESG initiative.
She also led the charge over the past year to restructure UMB’s corporate legal team, aiming to improve processes to better serve various business lines and reduce spending on outside counsel. Results in the first half of the year indicate increased usage of the in-house team and more timely completion of projects.
Amy Moore Harris, UMB’s chief legal officer, is among those who are impressed with Johnson. “She is skilled at getting opposing minds to a reasonable and pragmatic consensus and she continually challenges our leaders to think creatively and strategically about issues,” Harris said.
