It's late Friday afternoon, and each lane of your drive-through is five cars deep. Inside the lobby, the line at the teller counter has tripled in the last five minutes, and more clients are walking through the door. Your tellers are hustling and bustling while your client service reps politely poll the lobby crowd to see if anyone needs assistance opening an account or applying for a loan.

When it comes to branch transformation, putting all the pieces together can be a lot like working a jigsaw puzzle. First, you start with a finished picture in mind. This is your organization’s strategic vision for branch transformation. It should answer the questions, “Why are we doing this, and what does success look like?” Secondly, you have a collection of pieces – each uniquely designed, yet equally important – that must fit together to complete the overall picture. These pieces include your customers’ needs, your talent pool and your physical assets (branch locations, hardware, and software).

From the Perspective of a Former Branch Operations Executive As the person in charge of branch operations, one of your goals may be branch automation by way of implementing teller cash recyclers (TCR) on your teller lines. However, before you are given the green light to purchase, you have also been tasked with providing the justification for the investment. Why should it be implemented? What are the benefits, cost savings, and operational improvements you will see with the implementation? So, from my perspective as a former branch operations leader, I am here to answer the looming “why” question.

We recently sat down with Suzanne Arno of the Maclean Group to get her perspective on branch transformation and how to align staffing and technology to allow a financial institution to deliver their unique customer experience. The first order of business was to clarify that the branch of the future is really the bank of right now and institutions must stay aligned with the needs of the consumer to stay viable.

"The more things change, the more they stay the same". That is one of my favorite quotes. I think it's because it speaks more to the heart of human nature than most things that people have the desire to be around like minded people.

Automation Avenue 013 – Creating a Great Branch Experience with Suzanne Arno - The Maclean Group In this podcast we dive into the key factors of making the experience in the branch a memorable one for your clients. We discuss the topics of staffing, design, and technology to make the new branch model successful.