Progressive companies around the world are finding that talent development is a critical part of their business success. In fact, a lot of these forward-thinking companies are now driving conversations internally to ensure that employees advance their skills, competencies and overall careers deliberately and sometimes in a structured manner.
The reason for this approach is not farfetched: a company’s ability to attract, retain and grow employees’ competence is often driven by their talent development initiatives. Given the importance of quality talent in achieving business objectives, it therefore becomes imperative for companies to pay keen attention to their employees’ competence.
This is one of the reasons Fidelity Bank, in the past few months and under the guidance of its new Managing Director, Nneka Onyeali-Ikpe, has strategically positioned itself as a front runner in talent development within the country’s banking industry. The bank’s newly established talent development programs are intended to deepen the skills and competencies of staff, according to the leadership.
In March 2021, for instance, staff of the leading financial institution were enrolled under a capacity building project named the Policy Familiarisation Program. This profound program creatively tagged ‘Magic is You’ indicated that the leadership of the bank believes in the excellence of employees within its rank as it set out to build a knowledgeable and versatile staff network.
Within the same period, there was an announcement of separate capacity building projects – One Culture Project and Project Alpha – that were targeted at transforming the workplace for the bank’s staff. In particular, Project Alpha was created to help Fidelity Bank develop a robust and holistic learning and development framework for all staff while One Culture Project was formed to
reinforce the behaviour and value systems that will help the bank, as well as staff, achieve set goals.
The bank, in a commendable show of commitment, has wasted no time in executing these capacity building initiatives for all categories of staff, with huge successes recorded.
Explaining the importance of these talent development initiatives, Onyeali-Ikpe says, “We have always emphasised the point that our staff remain our greatest assets and the success of our business is largely dependent on the quality of talents they possess. Therefore, we have taken it upon ourselves to ensure that we not only attract the best talents but also up-skill them to meet with the challenges of the evolving operating environment.”
Employees everywhere across the seven continents in the world place high value on receiving motivation to remain in a workplace. And the provision of both professional and personal growth and development opportunities offer such motivation. Fidelity Bank, with these inclusive talent development programs, can beat its chest that it has presented such growth opportunities in abundance to its staff, even as it aims to do more.
In another show of care about the career opportunities presented to its workforce and to ensure effective knowledge transfer, the bank has also announced an applaudable extension of the age limit of retirees to 60 years. This decision mirrors the fast-growing tier 2 bank’s launch of a leadership program aimed at helping senior managers effectively build a community of change agents and become role models who influence exemplary behaviour within the bank.
Leading companies are known to provide clear, consistent, and relevant career development opportunities. And Fidelity Bank is showing it is one by demonstrating that talent development is at the forefront of its operations. While the display of responsibility towards the growth of employees within an organisation is not alien to the bank, the latest programs are proof that its leadership are indeed in a class of their own.