QUONTIC BANK
DEFINING THE CULTURE OF A TRULY DIGITAL BANK
IN ASSOCIATION WITH
DIGITAL REPORT 2020
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QUONTIC BANK: DEFINING THE CULTURE OF A TRULY DIGITAL BANK
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www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
QUONTIC BANK
Patrick Sells, CIO, explains why innovation shouldn’t stop at technology and why getting the right culture is essential in modern finance
2020
has been a difficult but transformative year for finance: COVID-19
has led to a shift away from old paradigms, remote working has been validated as a valuable tool and digital transformation is redrawing the industry’s roadmap for the future. Emblematic of this brave 04
new world, Quontic Bank is a disruptive banking platform which transcends the bank-FinTech divide and harnesses the best of both worlds to deliver best-in-class customer outcomes. Founded in 2009 and headquartered in New York, the bank is a self-proclaimed champion of “underdogs, entrepreneurs, gig-economy workers, immigrants,” and all others currently not best served by the ‘legacy banking’ establishment. Quontic Bank believes in empowering its customers to take control of their finances, recognising that no person’s circumstances are the same as others and proving that better solutions are available to those who seek out innovation. Leading this aspect of Quontic Bank’s business is Patrick Sells, Chief Innovation Officer. A true disruptive digital banking executive, Sells initially got
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www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
Successful companies. Cohesive teams. Engaged employees. We can help you get there. The Table Group is changing the world of work so more organizations can be more effective and less dysfunctional, and employees can be more fulfilled and less miserable. Our approach is based on Pat Lencioni’s best-seller, The Advantage, which introduces four practical disciplines: build a cohesive leadership teams, create clarity, overcommunicate clarity, and reinforce clarity. We help leaders master these disciplines resulting in healthy organizations that are marked by reduced politics, confusion and unwanted turnover.
Create cultural competitive advantages
The Table Group: creating cultural competitive advantages Rick Van Arnam, Principle Consultant at The Table Group, describes how he has helped Quontic Bank to unify its culture and focus its corporate vision “People today want to make a difference. They want to know that the company they’re working for has a unique purpose to which they can contribute,” states Rick Van Arnam, Principle Consultant with The Table Group. In 1997, this is exactly what the company set out to do: help executives and teams cohere, define their corporate vision, establish a unified identity, and encourage innovation through outstanding culture. With a diverse set of skills under his belt, Van Arnam found that The Table Group presented him with an interesting new challenge: “In addition to the consulting arm, the company is actually more of an idea factory around all things related to organisational health. It’s improving the world of work.” Helping leaders across several industries, The Table Group’s consultants engage with them to master four core disciplines: build a cohesive leadership team, create organisational clarity, over-communicate that clarity and reinforce clarity through simpler and less bureaucratic systems and processes. Markedly a culture-focused approach instead of technological, Van Arnam says that there is a good reason for this: “ During the 2008 recession, we discovered that companies were investing a lot of time and effort in the ‘smart side’ of the business. However, everybody actually has access to a lot of the same technology. Therefore, if you’re going to win, you’re going to have to do more; you need to transform the organisation itself and operate differently.”
One company which has truly taken this advice to heart is Quontic Bank. Having known Patrick Sells, CIO, for a decade, Van Arnam states that the company is uniquely positioned as an organisation attempting a method of operating which breaks away from industry preconceptions. “We helped Quontic Bank answer six simple but critically important questions: ‘Why do we exist?’ ‘How are we going to behave?’ ‘What do we do?’ ‘How are we going to succeed?’ ‘What’s most important right now?’ and finally ‘What are our roles and responsibilities?’” Van Arnam believes that Quontic Bank’s wholehearted receptiveness to The Table Group’s ideas has distinguished it as one of its closest collaborations. “Quontic’s emphasis on culture is going to be really important,” he concludes. “I think it’s going to help them attract talent on the heels of what has been a war on talent. Continually revisiting the six critical questions, maintaining core values and onboarding people the correct way will help position it to meet the upcoming challenges.”
Rick.vanarnam@tablegroupconsulting.com
QUONTIC BANK
“ I sold most of my company (Sells Group Holdings) and went all-in on this idea of re-imagining what a bank could be - a digital bank of the future” — Patrick Sells, CIO, Quontic Bank 08
his start working on digital marketing for small companies whilst attending Taylor University. “This was right after the recession and it was an interesting time to get into business,” he recalls. “I thought banking was ripe to be done differently, especially community banks.” Sells’ connection to Quontic Bank started when he met CEO Steven Schnall, with whom he shares a mutual interest in the evolving cryptocurrency market. The two quickly established a friendship and developed some projects together and it was in late 2018 that Sells finally joined the team. “We had a lot of mutual interest: I had been wanting to get into the banking industry to try something new and Quontic needed to become a digital bank. I sold most of my company (Sells Group Holdings) and went all-in on this idea of re-imagining what a bank could be - the digital bank of the future.” Recognised as 2020’s ‘Digital Banker of the Year’ by American Banker and also one of ICBA Independent Banker’s ‘40 Under 40’, Sells has managed to carve out a formidable reputation in the industry. Possessing a talent for and enduring
E X E C U T I V E P R O FILE :
Patrick Sells Title: CIO
Company: Quontic Bank
Industry: Online Banking
Location: New York
Patrick Sells is a serial entrepreneur with a passion for helping transform community banking through culture and technology. As the Chief Innovation Officer at Quontic, Patrick is focused on drawing a new generation of talent to the banking industry and elevating Quontic as a destination employer. Sells blends together the desire to use technology to make the world a better place and change the perception of banking. He is an award-winning leader who has been recognised for digital innovation in banking earning American Banker’s Digital Banker of the Year Award and also named in Independent Bankers 40 under 40 list for emerging community banking leaders in 2020. The bank is headquartered in New York City and has earned the U.S. Department of Treasury certification as a CDFI. Currently, Patrick is an advisor of the Mizen Group and is on the faculty at the first ever graduate program for Digital Banking at the University of Wisconsin. Prior to joining Quontic, Sells served as the CEO/Owner of the Sells Group, a marketing and technology agency based in Indianapolis that helps clients with digital customer acquisition. In addition, Sells is active in the not-forprofit space helping lead and advise several different organisations. He helped start and build the Super Service Challenge into a national program that raised and gave away over $30,000,000 alongside their national spokesperson, Drew Brees. He currently resides in New York City and graduated from Taylor University with a degree in Political Science. www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
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Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP Congratulates Quontic’s Chief Innovation Officer Patrick Sells on being named American Banker’s “Digital Banker of the Year.”
Hunton Andrews Kurth’s fintech team is recognized as a leading law firm in Chambers & Partners 2020 FinTech guide. Our firm’s reputation as a financial services powerhouse, combined with our world-class capabilities in matters of technology and privacy give us a distinctive advance in the fintech market. According to Chambers, “Hunton Andrews Kurth is at the pinnacle of data privacy and data security within the fintech space.” In addition to advising nearly a quarter of all BaaS banks, we also represent start-ups and established fintech companies, banks, investors, loan servicers and securitization sponsors. We also represent private equity firms, hedge funds and purchasers of marketplace loans, retailers, software companies, payment processors and other vendors in connection with lending, financing and purchasing activities with respect to loans and fintech products and services. For more information, visit HuntonAK.com or follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn or YouTube.
HUNTON ANDREWS KURTH: NAVIGATING DIGITAL FINANCE Peter Weinstock, Partner, describes the law firm’s close collaboration with Quontic Bank as is it attempts to re-define digital banking. Originally founded in 1901 as Hunton & Williams and then subsequently rebranded following a 2018 merger with Andrews Kurth Kenyon, Hunton Andrews Kurth is an international law firm with more than 1,000 lawyers in 20 offices spread around the world, including the US, Asia, Europe and the Middle East. “Approximately 30% of our revenue derives from financial services,” Peter Weinstock, Partner, explains. “We provide services to fintech companies, as well as to what we think of as partner banks and those advancing towards digital transformation. Hunton Andrews Kurth tends to think of these banks as being more like technology companies with banking ‘wrapping around’ them.” Although he considers his interest to lie with finance first and technology second, it is really the interaction between the two that stokes Weinstock’s passion for digitally-enhanced banking, “I can’t think of any aspect of the economy that experiences more change; financial services are such a big part of the economy and they’re forever evolving.” Although change in the legal sector is generally (and necessarily) a slow process, he acknowledges that COVID-19 has been a catalyst for accelerated, unprecedented developments. In this climate, Hunton Andrews Kurth strives to exemplify the same high-quality service it has maintained for over a century. According to Weinstock, this rests on two key pillars: responsiveness to the client’s needs and a creative approach that often ‘reverse engineers’ a particular need and then forms an actionable framework through analysis. This attitude, in combination with the firm’s far-reaching experience in the industry, has stood it in good stead for helping Quontic Bank as it attempts to re-define digital banking. Working closely together on a daily basis has led to a strong
Hunton Andrews Kurth
mutual understanding between the two companies, “Part of helping the bank achieve its goals has been to think of Quontic Bank as friends and family,” Weinstock says. “Patrick Sells (CIO at Quontic Bank) has got a lot of energy and ideas. Our job is to help him channel those into the most productive avenues available.” In an industry which is becoming increasingly digital in its outlook, Quontic Bank, in Weinstock’s view, is on a sure course of not just joining the trend but actually leading it. “It’s pushing the envelope on what’s doable from a digital standpoint and what it means to be a digital bank. Hunton Andrews Kurth doesn’t consider that the pace of digital transformation will slow down; we foresee it continuing to accelerate.” The company is proud to be a true partner to Quontic Bank as it pioneers this exciting change and praises the integrity, intelligence and savvy of the executive’s leadership. “They’re wonderful at including us at an early stage,” Weinstock concludes. “In the legal field, it’s much more expensive to correct a problem than to avoid it in the first place. Quontic Bank is very wise in that regard: it’s happier spending an ounce on prevention than a pound on cure.”
QUONTIC BANK
“ So many companies have ‘core values’ that are simply, what I call, ‘permission to play values’. They’re not unique to them and so they don’t become a shared language” — Patrick Sells, CIO, Quontic Bank 12
interest in innovation which befits his
itself; it was recently ranked as one of
role at Quontic Bank, he states that
Bankrate’s 2020 ‘Top Online Banks’.
early experiences taught him the value
When asked what he attributes this
of trying to imagine operations from
success to, Sells claims that Quontic
different perspectives. “When you’re
Bank’s culture and mission to redefine
in the middle of doing something it’s
what a ‘digital bank’ is has been pivotal
really hard to reimagine things. But,
to its acclaim with customers and the
when you are able to truly step back
wider industry.
and reframe the world around you,
Corporate culture could be Quontic
you can easily find innovation. A lot of
Bank’s most important quality. Based
what I’ve done at Quontic Bank has
on a four-pillar philosophy, Sells
been saying, ‘Okay, what if we thought
makes a clear distinction between his
about it very differently?’” Indeed,
organisation’s approach to culture
the Bank is no stranger to accolades
and others: “So many companies have
Navigating the Home Loan Process with Quontic Bank CLICK TO WATCH
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‘core values’ that are simply, what I call,
Know the goal: before embarking on a
‘permission to play values’. They’re
new direction or endeavour, the Bank
not unique to them and so they don’t
coordinates with its teams to establish
become a shared language.” Instead,
a singular vision; and 4) Say cheese:
Quontic Bank allows the following
Sells explains, “When someone puts
principles to guide its daily operations:
a camera up in front of you and says,
1) Progress not perfect: a steady state
‘Say cheese!’, what happens? You
of constant improvement is favoured
smile and the person taking the picture
over rapid quests for unattainable
smiles too. Imagine a bank that you
perfection; 2) Try it on: emphasis-
actually smiled when you talked to.”
ing a fast-paced decision-making
Sells adds that the need for remote
process, Quontic Bank is willing to
working as a result of the pandemic
try new ideas, retain the ones that
has indirectly added to the Bank’s
work and discard those that don’t; 3)
culture too: “Before COVID-19, we’d www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
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MANTL: enabling a digital vision of community banking
MA NTL Mike Bosserman, VP of Growth at MANTL, explains how the company is empowering Quontic Bank and other financial institutions through technology
Founded in 2016, MANTL is an enterprise Software as a Service company based in New York with a singular mission: ‘empowering financial ecosystems through technology’. It does this by modernising core back-office tasks like account opening with an integrated, omnichannel platform. “MANTL serves community and regional banks and credit unions exclusively,” says Mike Bosserman, VP of Growth. “The reason we’re here is because these organisations haven’t had the tools to grow online.”
Making community banks competitive in the modern finance market is MANTL’s main task. It’s a service that the company has already rendered for some of the fastest-growing banks in the US, and Bosserman claims that the success it has reaped stems from a focused strategy combining technological sophistication with customer-centric ease-ofuse. “The average time to open an account on MANTL is approximately two minutes and 37 seconds,” he says. This is important in the context of contemporary customer expectations, which are heavily influenced by experiences not necessarily related to banking. “If you’re a community bank or credit union, customer expectations for bank onboarding flows are going to be influenced by other online platforms like Amazon, Netflix, or other fintech apps.” One client that has taken on this challenge is Quontic Bank. In an industry where opening an account takes an average of 30 clicks, Bosserman says, “Quontic Bank takes 24 clicks. When it comes to figuring out where
Mike Bosserman @ Mantl
MANTL fits into the ecosystem of modern tech products, we’re right there at the cutting edge.” The company’s tech-savvy is equalled by Quontic Bank’s ambition, which, even from its early stages, was to achieve nothing less than a new concept for digital banking. “Both Patrick (Sells, CIO) and Steven (Schnall, CEO) have been exceptional to work with and so has the team. Quontic Bank is a great example of what’s possible in community banking with the right attitude and the right technology paired together.” When asked what major trends will continue to affect and develop MANTL’s relationship with Quontic Bank, Bosserman believes that banking’s future will be determined by the acquisition of tech talent, increased automation and fraud prevention, enhanced regulatory compliance, and instant account verification. As mobile technology continues to proliferate and reshape customers’ everyday interactions with banks, MANTL will play an important role in levelling the terrain between the mobile and desktop experience.
QUONTIC BANK
usually only hire people from the New York area. However, during this time, we’ve hired 30 or 40 people from outside and it’s enabled us to work with and find great talent further afield.” When it comes to Quontic Bank’s ‘true digital bank’ concept, Sells states that a fallacious dichotomy between traditional banks and modern FinTechs has obscured the true vision for what the idea could achieve. “In many ways, when banks hear the term ‘digital bank’, they assume it means 16
empowering FinTechs and not playing an active role in their customers’ lives anymore. I don’t think that’s a good thing for the industry.” On the contrary, Sells argues, it is only by combining the best aspects of both that banking can meet the challenges of the postCOVID-19 ‘new normal’. “A true digital bank would actually use technology to provide a better experience and add meaningful value to the customer beyond just being a list of debits and credits behind the scenes,” he continues. “We should also be building technology that solves our problems, selling it to other banks and helping them become truly digital too. imagine
“ When banks hear the term ‘digital bank’, they assume it means empowering FinTechs and not playing an active role in their customers’ lives anymore. I don’t think that’s a good thing for the industry” — Patrick Sells, CIO, Quontic Bank
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building technology that actually helped our customers accomplish the things in life that they want; that’s at least partially what being a true digital bank means.” In fact, Quontic Bank receives daily enquiries from other banks seeking advice on how to adapt. Sells adds that the organisation is currently adapting this aspect of the business into a more scalable solution to help others across a wider scale. Quontic Bank’s approach to certain aspects of digital transformation, such as data utilisation, correlates with contemporary industry trends: “Data www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
STRONGER TOGETHER Alloy Labs is a consortium of community and mid-size banks working together to drive innovation. Working as a collective makes us more effective and more efficient in building partnerships. We also operate The Concept Lab for earlier stage companies to develop the business case and establish a commercial relationship with partner banks and a venture fund that invests in partners, graduates of The Concept Lab, and areas of strategic interest to banks and credit unions.
Learn more today
Alloy Labs: driving innovation within banking Jason Henrichs, CEO and Co-Founder of Alloy Labs, describes how the consortium is facilitating collaboration between banks through tech and innovation Formed in 2018, Alloy Labs is a consortium of over 40 leading community and mid-sized US banks working together to adopt new technology, drive innovation and shorten the path between the conception and implementation of ideas. Jason Henrichs, CEO and Co-Founder, informs us that, by combined assets, Alloy Labs ranks as one of the top 25 banks in the US. At the moment there is a digital arms race taking place, where the largest banks and some of the more specialised or most profitable banks are noticeably further ahead in their digital transformation,” he explains. “However, the small and medium sized banks are at a disadvantage: they haven’t raised hundreds of millions of dollars in venture capital to fund their development and they don’t have the balance sheet, tech teams and incubators like larger players do. By working together, they can be both more efficient and effective at what they do.” Digital transformation is taking hold in the banking sector; what was once viewed as a purely cosmetic process undertaken by a few now holds revolutionary potential. This is in no small part, Henrichs points out, because of the COVID-19 pandemic which illustrated how all-pervasive digital technology in finance could be. As the first wave focused on user interface gives way to a second phase overhauling back office processes, Alloy Labs is helping to foster the greater utilisation of data through AI (artificial intelligence) based automation
Jason Henrichs @ Alloy Labs
and embedded financial experiences. “If you look at even the challenger banks of today, they are mobile and technology first but they still look and feel a lot like traditional checking, savings and spending accounts,” he continues. “When we get to the third wave - business model transformation - we’re going to see some very interesting things.” Frequently working side-by-side with Quontic bank, members of Alloy Labs have been able to help Patrick Sells, CIO, navigate specific industry and technical requirements as Quontic Bank develops its ‘true digital bank’ concept. Conversely, Quontic Bank’s experience with APIs, contactless payments and cultural transformation adds significant value to Alloy Lab’s other members. The cornerstone of Alloy Labs’ approach is ‘understanding’: what are the challenges of the modern banking sector, what is the customer’s perspective and how can things be better?
QUONTIC BANK
Quontic Bank Partnerships Quontic Bank’s partners play a crucial role in its development of new tech, products, competitive advantages and more. Sells chose to highlight four for their particularly important contributions:
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Mantl: “When COVID-19 first happened, we wanted to roll out a new product called ‘Drawbridge Savings’ - an account to help people do social good wherein Quontic Bank will match the monthly interest credited for each account and donate it to the #BeTheDrawbridge relief fund. Mantl helped us build that product and launch it in three days, which would be unheard of with other providers. Mantl represents the type of true Fintech-bank partnerships that are needed. Banks need to move beyond treating partners as ‘vendors’ and have real relationships with them. It’s a great relationship and partner of ours.”
Table Group: “Table Group is focused on helping companies build a competitive advantage. It was critical in helping us refine our mission statement, who we are, what our core values are and how we make decisions. Table Group and our consultant there, Rick Van Arnam, have taught us and many other companies that the only true competitive advantage today is that of being healthy. That means the whole organisation needs to be aligned, clear on ‘who’ it is and working together seamlessly.”
Alloy Labs Alliance: “Alloy Labs is a new consortium of banks. There are probably between 40 and 50 banks in there, all with different stories than ours but similar objectives. The organisation provides a platform for us to work together and collaborate.”
can be used to help customers gain a better financial life and empower them financially. Every bank is trying to figure out how we can begin to harness and leverage data better.”
Hunton: “It’s a great law firm but it’s more than just a law firm advisor: they are friends that have helped us as we’ve started to do new and innovative things. Hunton helps us understand how we can do it in the safest and best way. Peter Weinstock has been our sherpa, if you will, guiding us every step of the way.”
However, Quontic Bank’s exceptional customer-centricity shines through in its philosophy towards tech innovation. “I think the most important thing to consider is the customer’s experience,” Sells explains. First and foremost, the bank tries to gain perspective on how its customers interact with it and learn what improvements can be made through first-hand experience. This could involve something relatively simple like app/website performance or the ease of opening an account, or it could be more
“ Banks need to move beyond treating partners as ‘vendors’ and have real relationships with them” — Patrick Sells, CIO, Quontic Bank
complex like the transactions process. Although considerations surrounding regulations, security and data integrity should always be paramount, Quontic Bank prides itself on delivering a quintessentially tech-optimised service designed with its users in mind. “If you look at our roadmap, we are going to be rolling out some new products that have never been seen before in the industry to provide a www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
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QUONTIC BANK
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new type of experience,” Sells states. “The reason why people need online
from the click of a button.” When he considers the progress
banking is because mobile apps
that Quontic Bank has managed to
aren’t good enough yet. Quontic
accomplish throughout 2020 despite
Bank wants to build a mobile app that
the difficulties of the pandemic, Sells
allows you to do everything easily
is proud to say that 2021 will not be a
2009
Year founded
$35M Revenue in US dollars
160
Number of employees
year no-one expected, but Quontic Bank has still managed to go from strength to strength. Indeed, with Sells’ visionary leadership and the bank’s celebrated conception of the ‘true digital bank’, why should it not have? Innovation courses through the organisation, yet it doesn’t stop where most companies would choose to leave it: technology. “The word ‘innovation’ has become synonymous with technology,” he says. “In doing that, the wider banking sector has failed to truly understand the other opportunities for innovation, from culture to training, recruiting and how
case of addressing ‘unfinished busi-
people work.” Quontic Bank is refus-
ness’. “We’ve kept up with what we
ing to fall in line with this trend, safe in
wanted to achieve in the sense of
the knowledge that cultural change,
overall progress towards our mis-
though difficult, is ultimately the only
sion and vision. We never would have
genuine way to usher in a new era for
guessed that, in partnership with
banking. “Innovation isn’t a problem
Intuit and other Fintech platforms,
that can be solved by buying some-
Quontic Bank would have facilitated
thing; you have to change who you
over one billion PPP (Paycheck
are and what you do.”
Protection Program) loans to small businesses.” It could be argued that the bank has actually managed to gain momentum during this time rather than lose it. 2020 might have been a www.quo nt i c ba n k. com
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QUONTIC BANK 1 ROCKEFELLER PLAZA 9TH FLOOR NEW YORK USA www.quonticbank.com
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