Yesterday, I said that banks need to talk in the language of business and give clients the tools to be able to demonstrate the value that efficient financial operations and management delivers.

This blog related to the anticipation I had of last night’s session of the London-based Financial Services Club. The discussion had the interesting title: “What do corporates really want from their bank?” with four business managers talking about their banking needs.

Although the four gentlemen are heads of business and finance at firms of varying sizes and complexity, with varying needs for financial support, they all had a common thread: corporates want their banks to understand them; they want a relationship; they want good service. No more and no less.

Whether you are a pensioner with £75 in your account; or a small business with £75 million turnover per annum; or a major corporation turning over £75 billion a year; you want to be understood. You want to deal with banks that focus upon your business, understand it, pre-empt your requirements with appropriate offers and proactively advise you on how to get the best out of your banking services.

Strangely enough, none of the corporates at the table felt that banks did this very well, however… except one.

The small businesses for example, felt that bank advisory services and focus upon SME’s were sorely lacking something.

The first speaker is Managing Director of a call centre management firm.  He began by explaining how his firm had grown from nothing to a multi-million pound business. He felt that the banks were very poor at educating people like him on financial matters that are appropriate to SME’s. For example, he wants to go on the acquisition trail but has no idea how to do this and does not know who to talk with.

This is something that I have seen being addressed by websites such as Fortis’s Join2Grow but overall, yes, this is still weak across the banking sector generally.

Next was the Managing Director of a security and logistics organisation, who expanded upon this theme by saying that there was a distinct moment for him when the banking relationship changed from one of no interest to hard sell.

That moment was the first year his firm broke through the £50 million ($100 million) turnover level.

He felt that when his firm broke the £50 million a year turnover level, the banks moved from showing no interest in lending money to him, to one where they were falling over themselves trying to give the firm money.

His comment overall was that the banks were letting themselves down as he wants them to understand the business and its staff, and to show how the bank can make a difference, as they grow from an SME into a corporate; not just to turn up when they have grown up and become a corporate and then try to squeeze interest and fees out of them.

The Group Treasurer of a major airline spoke next.  He believed that FX management, currency risks and core cash management are the main requirements for a business of his size. Equally, they have a large volume of aircraft to manage, as well as complex leasing arrangements. These are the main managed services they are provided for through the bank, although they had found it incredibly difficult to get structured finance. All of these challenges he felt the banks were doing a good enough job with, but could do better.

Finally, the Head of Information Security for a major Satellite TV Network felt that his challenge was fraud, with identity theft being the key issue. The fact that more money is being made through cybercrime than from drug dealing is a major challenge for the industry, and specifically for his business, and he wanted to know that the bank holding the firm’s money is secure and not at risk of loss.

So, the overall themes of what corporates really want from the banks is advice on finance, security of their money, nurturing and supporting their business, and being proactive in identifying opportunities to be more efficient and profitable. All traits that they felt the industry is providing, but not as well as it could.

I thought the Airline Treasurer probably gave one of the best summaries of the overall situation, as he stated that the relationship is essential. “I need to know who to call and when and consumer call centre issues are the same as corporate call centre issues: we need to be able to talk to someone we know.”

This is so simple – the fact that banking is about service and service is based upon relationships between humans – and yet, it is so often forgotten.

He elaborated on this point by stating that he is continually being called by “banks that want to do business, especially as (the airline) requires a lot of FX dollar processing. The trouble is that once the banks are in there working with us, they always want to sell more”.

Now there’s a surprise.

He concluded by saying that “the banks that work are those who talk about our business and advise us. For example, we are now working with one bank that had no business with (the airline) a few years ago, but we now process over a third of our transactions with this bank because they do that.”

Oh, I bet we all wish we were that bank… and yet, we all could be that bank if we just remember that banking is about service, and service is based upon people having good relationships with people.

Relationships are based upon listening and caring, a bit like a marriage. Those that listen, care and respond the most attentively and appropriately on a consistent basis, will always win more business and have a longer-term relationship, than those who just want to have a one-night stand.