An interview with the award winners
Mr Rattez, Ms Maréchal, you launched an impressive development program at your bank, Société Générale Private Banking (Suisse) SA, in 2021 with the "Trio gagnant". What do you think is special about this program?
The "Trio gagnant" is a support and training program offered to all employees of Société Générale Private Banking in Switzerland. It is based on three pillars:
- An assessment by means of a skills evaluation and a personality test. The corresponding results are then discussed with our partners, the ISFB and PDP.
- An individual coaching program that is accompanied by a self-assessment using the "skillaware" tool. This enables employees to identify their personal needs at competence development and provides them with guidance regarding their professional development
- Together with the HR department, employees draw up an individual plan for their further training and professional mobility
The program is special in that it takes a long-term perspective by focusing on the development needs of employees. These individual development plans can take many forms: they can be about strengthening skills in the context of the current position or expanding skills as part of an internal development towards a different role within the bank.
We are currently seeing clearly that digitisation is constantly increasing the demands placed on employees. The pace of work is increasing and you have to stay on the ball in order to have good chances on the job market in the future. An important topic of the skillaware campaign is the preservation of employability through continuous Competence training. A program like yours pretty much hits the nail on the head. What was the motivation behind your "Trio gagnant" program and what personal, but also bank-wide values and attitudes underlie this initiative?
Société Générale is a Group with a very strong digital culture, a topic that has been at the heart of our corporate strategy for many years. The digitisation is playing an increasingly important role in the banking sector and the Covid crisis has served as both an eye-opener and an accelerator in terms of how the digitisation will change the way we organize and operate in the coming years. Within this framework, numerous tools are being developed that will enable us to optimize our processes and work more efficiently, and in this constantly evolving ecosystem, we believe it is essential to give our employees the opportunity to strengthen their skills so that they can approach their development within the company with a long-term perspective.
Employees are often aware of the importance of continuous Competence training development. However, there often seems to be a lack of the necessary time and an excess of development opportunities leads to a kind of loss of activation. How do you give employees and managers guidance in such cases?
As the "Trio gagnant" program is organized on a purely voluntary basis, we ensure their motivation by asking them to apply for the program with the help of an application folder. In most cases, we also see that the participants already have an idea of the development they are aiming for.
Have you noticed that certain departments use the service more frequently than others, or are there also differences according to age or hierarchical level?
"Trio gagnat" is open to all employees of Société Générale Private Banking Switzerland. In other words, it is flexible and is aimed at all departments and functional levels. Originally, we thought that the program would mainly appeal to back office functions, as these are more affected by developments in the banking sector and new technologies than other areas, but we were pleasantly surprised to find that our program was very popular with employees in all functions (support, Front, cross-divisional functions) and all age groups. Participation in this program was greater than originally expected, which naturally made us very happy.
Finally, what advice would you give to employees in general, but also to other banks that would also like to address the topic of competence development ? In your experience, what good framework conditions, perspectives and values are promising?
In our opinion, a comprehensive talent policy is crucial for a bank. This policy must be part of a structured talent management and development process in which managers take stock of their team members. The "Trio gagnant" program is part of this comprehensive talent management system.
We also recommend that both the HR team and bank management take a sincere approach. Managers must "play along" with internal mobility by making it as easy as possible for their employees to move from one function to another. For example, the transfer to another area or function must take place within a reasonable period of time. The manager must be prepared to release the employee so that they can take on their new role.
HR managers should also have an open ear and be on site to take the pulse of the teams. This ensures that employees' individual development wishes are taken into account and recognized at an early stage.
In addition, we recommend that the HR department uses recognized local training providers and enters into a long-term partnership with them. In this way, development programs can be created that are precisely tailored to the needs of employees.
In terms of employees, we advise being proactive and fully committed to your own further training and development, as such a project requires not only time, but also a real personal commitment.
