September 30, 2025 • 59 mins
As employers know, finding the right employee for a role can be difficult even during the best of times. Meanwhile, many workers with the right experience are locked out entirely because they lack the prescribed degrees or traditional academic credentials. Skills-based talent development brings these two together, benefiting both job seekers and organizations.
Framing talent development around defined skills, rather than only degrees, can reduce disparities in career opportunities while increasing productivity and agility in business operations. Forward-looking organizations — for-profit, nonprofit, and public — are increasingly adopting practices that are characteristic of this approach, such as: defining job qualifications by skills and knowledge, sourcing candidates beyond customary channels, eliminating biases in hiring and selection, and maintaining a culture that reflects an organization-wide commitment to inclusion, job quality, and mobility.
So what does it take for a business to walk the talk in skills-based talent development? It takes collaboration, internal systems change, and commitment to equity. BMO Bank partnered with Cara Collective, a comprehensive workforce development nonprofit, to get qualified talent through the door and on the path to economic mobility.
In this event — hosted by the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program on September 26, 2025 — we hear their story and learn practical tips for removing barriers to opportunity for workers. Our speakers include Liana Bran (Cara Plus), LaKeita Burns (BMO Bank), Paris Roney (BMO Bank), and Dee Wallace (The Aspen Institute).
For more information about this event, including a transcript, speaker bios, and additional resources, visit our event page.
For highlights from this discussion, subscribe to our YouTube channel.
Or subscribe to our podcast to listen on the go.
This event draws on insights from our Workforce Leadership Academies.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:05):
Hello and welcome. I'm Dee Wallace, a senior Fellow
with the Economic Opportunities Program at the Aspen Institute.
We are so happy you're here to join us today for our webinar
called Banking on Skills Care Collective and BMO Bank Partner
for Change. Our conversation today is part
of the Workforce Leadership Academy Network, which brings
(00:27):
together leaders of local workforce development ecosystems
to learn and work together to advance economic opportunity.
Before we get started, some tech.
All attendees are muted. Please use the Q&A button at the
bottom of your screen to submit questions and upvote questions.
And please use the chat throughout our time together to
(00:48):
share resources, ideas, experiences related to today's
topic. We encourage you to post about
this conversation on the social media platform of your choice,
and you can find us on all platforms at at at Aspen EOP.
If you have any technical issuesduring the webinar, please
(01:08):
message us in the chat or e-mailus at
eop.program@aspeninstitute.org. This event is being recorded and
it will be posted on our websiteand sent out via e-mail.
And finally, closed captions areavailable for your use.
Click the CC button at the bottom of your screen to
(01:28):
activate them. So let's get started.
So the Aspen Aspen Institute's Economic Opportunities Program
has long recognized the power ofcross sector leadership to
advance change. And our Workforce Leadership
Academy has supported cohorts offellows in 20 communities across
the country to learn and share together across the for profit,
(01:52):
nonprofit and public institutions that make make up
our workforce ecosystems. These leaders work at the
intersection of personal leadership, organizational
practice, equity and inclusion, and systems change in order to
open doors to economic opportunity.
Skills based talent development holds promise to open more doors
(02:16):
to good jobs and build ladders for good careers.
Skills based or skills First approaches broaden the ways in
which talent supply meets business demand by expanding
sourcing of candidates, definingjobs qualifications in terms of
specific skills and meaningful skills, and supporting employees
(02:38):
that are ongoing development andskill building to advance
economic mobility. Today, we are so pleased to
welcome a wonderful panel of leaders to share their
experiences advancing these skills based practices.
I'm so excited to welcome LeannaBrown, senior director of
(03:00):
community and employment strategies at Cara Collective,
Paris Romy of BMO Bank, and Lakita Burns of BMO Bank.
We're also very grateful to haveLyanna Braun moderating this
event. Lyanna is a senior director at
Cara Collective, which is a workforce development agency and
(03:23):
social enterprise that works to break the cycle of poverty for
the power and purpose of work inChicago.
Leon is focused on building sustainable employment
partnerships to promote skills based talent ecosystems to
increase access to opportunity for these individuals.
(03:45):
And she's also an alumni of the Chicago Land Workforce
Leadership Academy. So thank you all for being here
to share these experiences. We're so excited for the
conversation. Over to you, Leanna.
Thanks, Dee. And I just have to say I am such
a proud alumna of this fellowship network I have for
(04:06):
those fellow fellows out there. I have sat where you sat and I'm
so excited by this opportunity to share a little bit about the
work. So first, when it comes to
skills based hiring or skills based practices, I think one of
the biggest questions I hear from people is how do you make
it real? And when I say how do you make
(04:27):
it real, it's supposed to what what are those specific
practices? What are the specific processes
you need to change in an organization to have it take
hold? But beyond that, you know, we've
all heard about the best practice of removing degree
requirements when it's got when it comes to skills based hiring.
But how does that actually change to real outcomes?
(04:48):
When do we start to see organizations hiring
differently, seeing different hiring outcomes?
So it's for all of those reasonsI'm very excited to host this
conversation with two incrediblepeople and to highlight the work
of an incredible partner, BMO Bank, who's figured out how to
bring this to life. So I also want to share before
(05:11):
we get started, just for a little bit of perspective, Cara
has also a really unique vantagepoint in the story because our
team, Cara Plus works every day with employers to think about
their practices, to think about how they have an impact and
ability to reach untapped talent.
And as a workforce organization,we get to see what happens when
(05:32):
those organizations make practice changes, when they
change their practices. And so at this point, working
with BMO, not only have we seen those skills based practices
taking hold, we've also seen theresults.
We've seen and worked with BMO to hire more than 50 people from
our talent pool. So again, this story really
(05:52):
plays out with all of us here and with an our incredible
alumna, Lakita Burns, who's going to be able to share the
story from all of our perspectives.
So with that, Paris, I'm going to start with you and I just
want to ask this this this question of where did the story
(06:13):
begin at BMO, right. So we have this excellent case
study that we Co produced together, which we'll be sharing
in the in the chat later in the program.
And it highlights this new associate banker role that you
created and how you eliminated requirements as a barrier to
banking and to to entering this industry.
So tell us a little bit about how BMO was able to embrace
(06:36):
skills based hiring and tell us a little bit again about where
the story started. Sure.
So this story really kind of started and BMO really started
as like a back of the napkin idea.
It was something that one of my wonderful colleagues thought
about because he had had experience within the workforce
development world. So it was really Bmo's
(06:57):
opportunity to think differentlyabout how we impact the
communities we serve and how we can we combine our business
objectives with our social goalsand simultaneously do that
through a new approach and hiring.
We knew that by leveraging community partnerships, we could
develop a really strong pipelineof talent based on the work that
(07:18):
they do every single day. Then we were able to bring the
idea to some of our executive leaders and that really started
to get things to and put it in place because we needed the
support of our, you know, our executive leaders in order to
make this work and in order to make it move forward.
(07:40):
They saw the value in creating access to better paying jobs and
High Road careers through these community organizations and that
was able to spark some sustainable community impact.
We also knew that for something like this to be successful, we
would need to challenge the perspective of a lot of the
stakeholders that are involved in the hiring process.
(08:01):
So, you know, bank managers, some of our hiring specialists,
we needed to make sure that theyunderstood, you know, what can
what do these skills really looklike?
What does transferable skills look like at its core and how do
we morph them and understand them in a way where we can make
people successful in these roles?
And that's kind of where we started.
(08:22):
We looked at our entry level roles, so our associate banker.
So I think someone is going to pull up a slide and we'll kind
of take a look at what we did from a skill perspective.
So with Cara, we took a look at the role descriptions.
We wanted to make sure that theywere accessible to everyone.
If you could look at the job description, sometimes they're
really intimidating. I've looked at job descriptions
(08:45):
and they're really intimidating.So we wanted to make sure that
we outlined this so that it madesense and that people could, you
know, see themselves in these roles.
And by doing this with Cara, we were able to make sure that they
understood the core competenciesthat we were looking for, for
these roles and then being able to outline what type of skills
(09:05):
they were going to look for in their program participants.
This was kind of the result of that.
So what you're seeing is we looked at 3 really core areas of
how we assess skills. The existing skills that people
have from either prior job experience or life experience,
the ability to learn with our training and support, and the
openness and adaptability to change because we all know that
(09:28):
everything changes all the time.So how were these individuals
going to continue that process? Yeah, and, and Paris, you know,
something that I, I so appreciate because this is now
kind of a, a legend at Kara in terms of how this process
unfolded, because Bimo had already done the work right for
(09:49):
that job posting. The, the before state, you all
had already made the decision that you are thinking about
skills differently and thinking about what was most important in
terms of the talent you wanted to hire.
And then as the story goes, fromwhat I've heard at Cara is we
were able to bring that originaljob posting to some of our
participants who we knew would be successful.
(10:10):
We knew they had those skills. And we said, hey, you read this
job posting. What do you see, right?
And they said, well, there is these words like attestations in
the in the job posting. And I don't really don't know
what that means. And I don't know if I would
apply for a job like this. And so it was through some of
that partnership that it we've really saw not only the power of
(10:31):
the skills based practice and the internal decision to hire
differently, but then how do youtranslate that into a job
posting, right. And So what I so appreciate
about that after state of that job posting is as an
organization, you make so clear not only what people need coming
into the organization, but that you're willing to help people
(10:52):
and are going to invest in building their skills over time.
So that for us is just really exciting to see our feedback
come to life and what you're alldoing.
And BMO and Lakita, I'm going togo to you in in just a moment.
But Paris, I want to stay for just another second and, and
just double click on your, your call out about the work that had
(11:14):
to be done internally to build support for change.
So tell me a little bit more about that process, because we
know that the story starts in one place.
There's all this interest and desire to make a change, but
then it has to flow through different levels of, of
leadership and, and the folks onthe ground that are making it
happen. So tell us a little bit more
about how that unfolded and how you're able to get some support
(11:36):
for those changes. Yeah.
So when this idea was brought forth to our executive
leadership, it wasn't fully baked out.
It was literally just an idea. How do we hire differently?
How do we leverage the communitypartnerships?
Because we did that intentionally to make sure that
we could get broad perspectives on how we can make this work.
Because for something like this to really take hold and and
(11:58):
plant roots within our organization, we needed
stakeholders within different lines of businesses within, you
know, different realms of thought in order to push this
forward. So that's really how it started.
You know, be more is something that continues to evolve.
We continue to see, you know, opinions and thoughts from not
only our community partners, butour stakeholders.
(12:20):
And you know, one of the biggestpieces that you know, something
I will continue to reiterate throughout this conversation is
multi layers, whether it's support, whether it's ideas,
whether it's collaboration. This can't come from one source,
it has to come from multiple leaders.
And the way that it's continued to evolve over the last five
years is that we've kept all of those individuals, those initial
(12:42):
stakeholders involved and then we've been able to bring in
more. And you know, again, it's across
multiple lines of businesses. So we have executive leadership,
we have our retail branches, we have community giving, we have
legal, we have communications PRI mean there's really not a
line of business that be more doesn't have someone being able
(13:02):
to voice their opinion and theirthoughts for us to make, you
know, real progress and real change.
Yeah, absolutely, Paris. And we will come back to this
theme about all these different layers that reinforce this work,
right? Because it's not just about
where you start, it's how you sustain those changes.
Lakita, I want to go over to youbecause we've heard from the
(13:24):
employer side of the equation interms of how they were thinking
about bringing more people in into the banking industry.
But I want to hear about your own journey to get to BMO.
So tell us a little bit about what were some of your career
prospects or aspirations before you started at BMO and that
what, what were some of the biggest barriers or things that
maybe were preventing you from getting into an industry like
(13:47):
banking before? Yeah, sure.
So some issues that I had like, well, I'm gonna say issue of a
perceived barrier. So I had taken some time off
from, you know, the marketplace to focus on raising my family,
raising my children at the time.And I, as admirable as that was,
(14:10):
I didn't realize how much of a challenge I would have going
back into the marketplace when Iwas ready, right?
So I, I applied to all the jobs I have my excel sheet.
It was quite extensive. And when I did get, you know,
call that it, I just wasn't getting the, the return on my
(14:31):
investment that I thought I should, considering how much I
have, how much time and effort Ihave put into it.
So I'm through just some non traditional methods.
I came across Cara and I was like, you know, maybe I should
consider it. But then I saw that they did
karaoke there and it really was a major turn off.
(14:54):
So a month later it came back around again.
I was like, you know what, let me consider Cara.
I think this may be the right space for me considering all
this work that I'm putting into it and not getting much of
return back. And I am so glad I did because I
wasn't having that success on myown.
But Cara really helped connect the dots for me when I went
(15:17):
through the cohort. They helped me realize and, you
know, relate that things that I was already naturally good at
help fine to some things that were there, but just probably,
you know, needed some work on and allow me to see that I was
already naturally good at finances numbers.
I already ran my household like to AT was a well oiled machine
(15:38):
and these are some transferable skills that I can use not only
in the marketplace, but in a career in banking and which is
something I did not consider. I didn't think of banking at
all. But after some, you know,
coaching and you know, some conversations, I, I really
understood that this could be a,a good career move for me.
(16:00):
And also I have some background from, you know, running my own
small business and I use those skills all the time and helping
my customers out on a regular business on a regular basis here
at BMO. Yeah.
Thank you so much for sharing the start of your journey into
banking For everyone who's not familiar with Cara, when Lakita
(16:23):
talks about karaoke at Cara, which is actually sounds like an
event we should do, we have a tradition at Cara called
motivations, which is about celebration building confidence.
So we, we challenge our participants to literally be at
the center of a, of a circle, answer a topic of the day and
lead the group in song. And that builds a number of
skills, including public speaking and including building
(16:47):
confidence and being able to command a A room.
And so Speaking of our morning motivations, Lakita, can you
share about your morning motivations experience that was
part of your hiring journey at BMO?
And yeah, just fill us in, in terms of how BMO also
participated at the back half ofyour your hiring experience and
(17:09):
and saw some of those skills on display.
Yes. So you know, I can only avoid
getting in the circle of motivations for so long.
Well, lo and behold, the time that I had to get in the circle,
BMO was actually in the room with us.
So they were able to see me, my whole just me and hope like the
(17:33):
holistic version of Lakita, not just me just showing up as a
representative. They were able to see the real
me. So I was able to showcase my
public speaking skills and just be myself.
I they were able to see areas ofme that you wouldn't necessarily
let's necessarily see on a resume you wouldn't see and
possibly in a one-on-one conversation.
(17:55):
Because Cara just has this special sauce about it that it
just, it brings it, it, it really, you guys have a great
curriculum there because it really just fine tunes and kind
of dig out those things that whether you, you may want to
hide them and think there may not be something people want to
see. And so when you're when I was in
the circle, I was in the for themotivations and I'm telling my
(18:16):
story, I answered the question of the day.
They were able to see things. I mean, they probably will never
seen. And it worked out because the
market president for BMO, well, I'm currently employed now.
She was there and in that momentshe told me after she's like,
you know what? I knew I wanted to hire you.
I knew you had to come on board with us during motivation.
(18:39):
She's like, we're just doing this because, you know, we have
to, right? But I already knew you were on
the team. This is during the interview,
and I was really stumped. I was like, wow, I was really
taken aback, but in the best waypossible because the one thing I
was running from is the very thing that solidified my seat
here against all of the other competition.
Nikita, I love that. And so do you know a couple of
(19:03):
things I, I want to point out from, from the stories you
shared and, and, and both sides of the story, you know, Paris,
in terms of, of FEMA, what I'm hearing was the start of this
journey was really just an openness and curiosity to really
examine the skills required to be successful in banking, right?
Like, so we talked about this, this role, some of, of what it
(19:25):
might look like is a lot of cashhandling, but in reality, it's
some of those skills can be taught on the job.
So what are we looking for? And then on the other side of of
the story, Lakita, you showed all of those skills and BMO
could recognize them when they were full, when they were on
full display in that motivation circle, right?
(19:46):
So it's both the ability and theopenness for a, a, a company to
consider different skills and what's needed to be successful,
but then also a space for a, a candidate like yourself to be
able to demonstrate those skills.
So. It's been exciting to see a
little bit about a little bit ofthat play out on both sides.
(20:07):
So this conversation on skills based often starts in hiring,
but we don't always pull it through to just what happens
beyond someone coming into an organization coming in the door.
So Paris, I want to go back to you to tell us a little bit
about beyond the hiring process.How is BMO thinking about
(20:27):
helping new hires be successful to continue to belong?
What are some of the shifts you've also made in terms of
thinking about what comes next after hiring?
Sure. So many of the individuals that
we welcome through the Be More program have never previously
considered a a career in banking.
I've actually talked to a lot ofleaders across the organization
(20:49):
and we all kind of consider ourselves accidental bankers
because we kind of just ended uphere based on some of the skills
we had, myself included. So, you know, you begin this
journey with some hesitation andsome limited confidence around
interacting with more tenured colleagues and trying to figure
out where you fit and how you utilize those skills that you're
(21:09):
coming in with. And so from the outset, we
really see that individual's first day as the starting point.
Yes, we want to hire people, butwe want to retain people.
It, you know, it's the beginningof a much longer journey in
order for us to create lasting change.
You know, through BMAR, our goalwas not to simply just fill
(21:31):
positions, but to really, you know, invest in people who
could, you know, help meet future organizational needs
through growing in their career.You know, in the retail
leadership and branch environment, you know that
that's the foundation of where all of this starts.
So for us, and you know, for, you know, the Be More program
(21:51):
management piece, it's importantto make sure we're engaging
those leaders before that first day.
Because we are not just giving support to the Be More
colleague. We're giving our support to the
leaders that are getting ready to take in the talent to make
sure that they understand, you know, the training that these
individuals went through the time that they put in, because
it is important for them to recognize that these individuals
(22:15):
are coming in with, you know, additional skills based on the
community partner that they thatthey came from.
And, you know, this dual focus approach really allows us to
have stronger relationships withthe managers, but also with the
employees. And it also builds like that
mutual groundwork and understanding of these
individuals in there and where they're coming from.
(22:36):
And then this is my favorite part.
So after about 90 days we start be more bound, which is a very,
you know, structured post employment programming that, you
know, they're very small groups,basically 10 individuals.
And this allows for us to learn more about them, their skills,
their strengths, their weaknesses.
(22:59):
It allows us to help teach them how to action plan and then also
give them a bigger view about what's available at BMO from a
career standpoint. That's how actually How I Met
Lakita was through leading AB more band group.
And you know, this program I, I take a lot of pride in and every
time I have one of these sessions with these individuals,
I walk away with a new understanding or a new
(23:20):
appreciation for my job. And then also everything that
these individuals have got had to go through, whether you're
coming through a traditional channel or whether you're coming
through B more, everybody's got stuff with them.
But how do we use it and how do we bring it forth in the work?
So between be more bound and then making sure that we're
(23:40):
working closely with our leaders, that's, that's two
parts of it, right? The other piece is continued
involvement with the community partner.
So every time we take on a new partner or we expanded to a new
footprint, we are asking these partners to stay engaged with
the individuals for at least 12 months because it allows us to
(24:01):
make sure that the retention piece is top of mind.
You never know what's going on in somebody's life and sometimes
you just need somebody else's voice, potentially an external
voice to help put things back ontrack.
An example is if somebody's having some issues with
attendance or tardiness, we're able to reach out to the
community partner and say, hey, based off your relationship, can
(24:22):
you reach out and see what's going on so we can better
support the individual. We've seen this happen time and
time again and being able to rely on that community partner
allows for both internal and external support for each one of
these individuals. And I think it is appreciated by
everybody coming through the Be More program like, hey, I'm not
(24:43):
on this island by myself. No career is built by yourself,
You know, using your external and internal resources are
important for everybody's growth.
So we continue to monitor and and align with our Be More Bound
process, but also everything that goes into those first few
months, that first year we're very focused on because we want
(25:04):
to keep each one of these individuals that we're bringing
into the organization. Thanks, Paris.
You know when we were talking about this, you know, it's
something that I realized that, you know, from a an employer
business perspective, a lot of what you shared in terms of what
that leads to is retention, which is so top of mind for
employers. So you know, you can bring that
(25:26):
lens to all the different piecesof being more is focused on
hiring and then supporting retention.
If you layer on this kind of skills based strategy that we'd
all been talking about or kind of how we started this
conversation, what seems so important or kind of core to
what makes retention happen is you're investing in the skill
building of the individuals coming through the program,
(25:49):
right? So not just helping with the
cash handling or the other technical aspects of the role,
but you're helping people build skill to navigate their own
careers, to advocate for themselves.
So that's happening on one hand.And then I, I also heard you
talk about how you're building leadership skills and management
(26:09):
skills of, of those in the branches as well, right?
Helping them understand what it takes to be a leader and to
support talent and, and, and allthat means.
So really appreciate, appreciateyou sharing that, Lakita.
Now I want to go in and hear from your perspective since you
started at BMO, how have you seen your own skills evolve and
(26:34):
and how has BMO been helpful in that process?
What resources supports have helped you be successful in
banking? OK, I'll keep it short.
You don't. Know do we want to hear it?
So BMO I, I work in the largest branch in our market here is a
(26:54):
Lakeshore market within BMO and our the level of traffic that we
see on a day-to-day basis can beoverwhelming at the it's an
understatement. So being that I get to it, it's
it's, it's I see the blessing inthat, right?
(27:16):
Because since I work in the largest branch, there's never a
dull day. It's always something that is
the new exciting fun. And then in that I get to reach
a very large population of people that I probably would
have never been able to even have a conversation to or
nothing at that personal level. And I get to fine tune those
(27:36):
relations, relationship buildingskills that I already have.
But each customer I get the reset.
So someone else comes in front of me and maybe I, you know, I
felt I'm mentally thinking like,how could I have made that
interaction better? And if something comes to mind,
the next person, I'm actively working on that with the next
customer. And considering we're in a large
branch, I don't have time to sitand like wallow in that that oh,
(28:01):
I made a mistake or this thing goes so well.
It's happening real time real fast at the reset and it just,
yes, it can be overwhelming. It can be a lot, but it's also
fine tuning what I already have to make it something that's good
to great. And I'm really thankful for that
opportunity because there aren'ta lot of branches that have the
(28:23):
level of traffic that we have. So I get real time and feedback
multiple times in the day to seehow I'm progressing, not just
for the things that can be measured, you know, on my
scorecard, like, you know, it's the quantitative and
qualitative. I get both of those at on a
regular basis daily. Yeah, it sounds overwhelming.
(28:46):
I mean, me, I know if I were trying to count and handle money
while people are talking, that'sthat's not me.
I don't know if I I could be successful or accidental banker.
You know, one thing you shared with me, Lakita, you, you talked
a little bit about your experience and be more bound and
that how that was a safe landingspace to kind of digest some of
(29:08):
what was happening. And maybe without having that
space, you or others may not have persisted.
You may have said, OK, I tried banking, we're done.
So I'm curious if you can tell me a little bit more about how
that be more bound those those those sessions together, how how
did that help you be successful in your role and help you have
(29:28):
that support? Well, I am truly thankful for
the V more program. I highly recommend every
employer company not-for-profit,however you are to please
emulate something of that sort because that was a home away
from home within my workplace. So we had Paris was there.
(29:52):
We she had also a Co host and other men and women who were
sharing a similar position knew to BMO that we can just come and
just be ourselves right. However that looked in that
moment. If you were having a bad day, if
you had some Paris mentioned it earlier, like if some things
outside of work that were reallynegatively impacting you, what's
(30:16):
going on? Let's talk about it.
OK, Now, how can we what can we do to ensure that this isn't
affecting your worth or how can we best support you?
And that is priceless because you don't get that in a lot of
different places. You just kind of just have to
suck it up, buttercup and you know, show up and perform and
you're almost like a puppet, right?
(30:38):
And people don't get the whole authentic you.
They get your representative in that moment, right.
But I cannot for. Like.
It's difficult to show up and bemy best self when I don't feel
my best self. But I had a place where I can
like, I'm not feeling great, guys, this is what's going on.
Here's why. And then I had a whole team that
was able to pour back into me tomake sure that when I was back
(31:01):
customer facing or with my colleagues or management, Lakita
was able to present her best self.
And for that I, it's amazing. It's, it's awesome.
It's great. I have.
I don't think I have enough adjectives to explain how
amazing the B1 program. Is yeah.
(31:23):
And that's, that's so that's so real because, you know, in in
this particular role, you have like a really unique opportunity
where you're getting live feedback every day.
I heard you say like, yeah, you're refining, refining
because you get immediate feedback from dozens of people
every day. And in the kind of spirit of
(31:45):
kind of developing skills, building skills, sometimes you
have this kind of maybe soundtrack in your head.
If it was just you getting that feedback and figuring out what
to do with that, that's that's challenging.
But having the space really seems like it was it was an
opportunity to process and and kind of reinforce maybe some of
that scale building that was happening.
(32:07):
So just awesome to hear about that.
Yes, if I had to coin a term forit, I would probably say
productive therapy. I think.
We could all use a little. Bit more of that just productive
therapy. Sign me up.
I had one more question though here because you know something
(32:27):
else I, I heard from you, Lakita, in terms of what has
been helpful in your, in your career in banking and BMO is
the, the support that reinforcement and then also
exposure to different career pathways and to being encouraged
to talk to your leadership aboutyour interest.
So tell us a little bit more about what that has looked like
(32:50):
and, and what impact you've seenthat have on yourself, but also
it sounds like maybe that's impacted other colleagues or
managers. Absolutely.
So yes, Be More was amazing. Well, is amazing for having
those real conversations when weneeded it most, but it also
shined a light on where we what's next.
Like, OK, this is where we are, but where do we want to go and
(33:10):
how do we get there? Here's the path.
So in that we did skills strength training, strength
skills assessment. Yeah.
I can't even think of the name of it.
Please forgive me. Strange Finder.
Thank you. There we go.
So we did that. We did.
And just to figure out, maybe uncover some things that you had
and maybe you weren't aware of or maybe some things that you
(33:32):
thought you had that you really aren't that strong in.
And let's focus on the things that can get you where you need
to be. And in that process, I learned
where it was 2 paths I wanted togo.
Like, OK, so how, which, where, where can I get to like the
fastest, right? Which which works best for me?
Paris is really instrumental andit's ensuring that I stayed on
(33:58):
task and she's like, all right, come on, let it out.
Now this is what we're going to do.
Here's the fact. She's like, whatever you want to
do, I'll support you. I'm like, OK, I, I, I hear, I
hear her in my, in my, myself talk also includes Paris in my
ear with that right? And in that I found that, yes, I
(34:18):
have some skills like retail, maybe the the route that I need
to stay in and how and where do I want to be in retail and how
do I get there? How long is that going to take?
Because when you're going through these day-to-day, you
know, challenges, it's easy to just get lost in it and not
realize that we have a bigger picture at stake here, right?
(34:38):
So just shake it off for just a day, just one day at a time.
You know, you eat an elephant one bite at a time, Same, same
thing, right? So if we're going to jungle, of
course, right. But in that.
So I figured out the the career path that I wanted.
So I brought it to my managers and they were just blown away.
They were taken aback. They're like, you know, Lakita,
no one else is having these conversations.
(35:00):
No one else is talking to us about what next steps are.
We have several, well, colleagues of mine that have
been in the same role for several years and they did not
even consider something else. They were just completely
comfortable where they are. And yet you have me, I'm only in
there a few months and I'm talking about what my, you know,
(35:20):
to short term, you know, mid, mid term and then long term
goals and where exactly where I wanted to be.
And they really didn't know where to take it.
They're like, OK, well, give us some.
We'll, we'll get back to you andgive us a few days.
We'll circle back. And it, it, it prompted a
conversation with my market president.
She got involved. She was really excited because
(35:41):
she was able to connect me with some people in within the
company that's actually in thoseroles.
I can get real time information like, OK, what's good, You know,
what works out great? How did I get, how did you get
to where you are? And how do I get to where I want
to be? Right.
Finding out how to whether it works for me because their path
may not be my path, but we gave me some different options.
(36:03):
And in doing so, I've made some real great connections with
other people who aren't in my branch.
So I have a dish. It's just, you know, the
branches of like people who I can reach out to to and have
access to really broaden. And in me doing that, I'm now
hearing conversations from my colleagues about where they want
to go. They're one of they've heard
(36:24):
about no one was speaking about the program about, you know,
that that I brought from the be more, you know, community.
And now they're signing up for the same things that I've
inquired about that, you know, that I've had conversations with
my managers. No one was doing that.
Now everyone's doing it now. So I hear and I see that I of
(36:44):
course, I just keep it to myself, but I'm like, OK, I'm
making some positive change here.
And that definitely is because of the B More program.
That's so exciting to hear, Lakita.
And something that I and then I'm noticing is it's like it's
this growth, right? It's it's how big changes within
organizations happen, right? First it starts maybe with an
(37:05):
individual impact, but then other people start to feel it
and see it and it grows. So with that, Paris, I want to
go back to you to talk about where BMO is now, because
there's been AI don't want to steal your Thunder, but there's
been some growth. And and before you answer, I
also just want to name that we're in such a different moment
(37:27):
than where we were when B most the B more program started right
now. Every day I hear someone talking
about AI, how I need to use it more, which, you know, that's a
whole other story. But of course, we're in a very
different economic and politicalcontext.
So tell us a little bit more about not only where the program
(37:49):
is at, but how you know you and,and your team have really
thought about what to grow, whatto change and, and, and you
know, how you've been able to persist or why you've persisted
given everything that has has happened around us.
Absolutely. You know, I'm really lucky to
work for an organization that embraced this idea and continue
(38:13):
to push it forward. That hasn't changed.
The support hasn't lessened for B more.
If anything, it's grown just like the program itself.
So we started in Chicago, we're now in Milwaukee, Madison,
Denver, Indianapolis, Fremont, CA, Phoenix and Los Angeles.
I had to think about all the cities because there is so many
(38:35):
and we are launching in one of our final retail regions within
the within the next couple of weeks.
And then notably last year we had our highest retention in the
program yet, so 74% which is extremely strong for one year
retention when we're talking about creating pipelines through
our community partners. And I think, you know, a lot of
(38:55):
what Lakita said about be more bound is that we try to make
sure we continue to stay engagedbecause I think where we start
to lose people is when we lose connection with individuals,
especially within those small groups, people start to feel a
little bit lost because BMO is so big.
So we continue to see that evolution of retention and
(39:16):
growth. We've had multiple promotions,
people being put into development pathways.
We've seen retail relationship bankers happen, virtual connect,
also a wealth analyst all from this program.
And you know, while the world isalways changing, we are always
going to need to hire. Talent acquisition is not
(39:38):
something that's going away. It's something that we need to
continue to get better at meeting the needs of our
communities and all of these applicants and all of the
candidates. And the way that we do that is
we continue to evolve. The world is changing, talent
acquisition is not. And we need to make sure that
we're continuing to meet people,you know, where they are and you
(39:59):
know. Again, I, I have to boast about
the, the organization that I work for because we have this
mission statement boldly grow the good in business and life.
And to me the Be More program does that in every single way.
We're not just, you know, it's, it's not necessarily about what
we're getting from a return on investment standpoint.
(40:20):
It's about what are we doing to impact the communities we serve
and how are we ensuring that thebranches and customers that we
serve are reflected in our colleagues.
People want to go into a branch where they see themselves.
People want to go into a branch where they feel like they can
have conversations with individuals with similar
backgrounds with them. And I think Be More is one of
(40:41):
those really key ways of doing that.
And so the work will continue. The investment is there because
I have a job and I love my job. I get to lead programs like this
and continue to make sure that we continue to put the impact in
our communities side by side with our business objectives and
continue to, you know, grow the good.
(41:02):
Yeah, Paris, it's so powerful because I remember, you know
where when we were talking aboutwhere the story began, you know,
sometimes new business or, or talent strategies come from a
really clear business need. And, and, and, and what you
described there was just this commitment to thinking about
(41:22):
your engagement and community. And, and now I see where we are
here and how the program is grown.
And I see two things. I see that continued investment
and just the clear business value, right?
So now we're looking at the, like you said, the in the, the
good in, in say it again for me,Paris, say it, say it again for
all of us. What is Bmo's motto?
(41:45):
Growing the good in business andin life, and it progresses.
Where it is. Where we've hired over 200
individuals through this program.
I can't believe I didn't mentionthat number, but over 200
individuals across our retail footprint.
Absolutely. So it is not only a community
engagement strategy, but also talent acquisition and as we
heard retention mobility strategy for for BMO.
(42:08):
So that's so exciting to hear. For those of you who have been
following along in the chat, we've been dropping in some
resources. So I'll invite you to take A to
keep an eye on that because you'll see a couple of different
opportunities and articles that are going to give you the double
click on this BMO story, not only in terms of where it where
(42:30):
it started, but again, this incredible growth.
So just keep an eye on, on the chat for that.
And with that, I'm going to ask my, my panelists one more
question and then we'll go to questions from the audience.
Lakita simple question, what what advice do you have for for
people in the audience, knowing that there are other educators,
(42:52):
training providers, practitioners, What advice do
you have for them in terms of helping their job seekers pursue
new careers or or growth in new industries, just like you had it
at in your experience with with BMO and Cara?
Sure. Well, I will.
I will highly recommend for themto look for ways that to find
(43:14):
things that will reflect those individuals in ways that best
support the company. But you can't really find
through your AI search engine, right Those keywords or what's
on their resume or whoever it was that referred them.
There's so much more to a personthat makes who they are like me,
(43:37):
like be more program allows me to show up as me in my most
holistic way, in my most authentic way.
And I believe other companies, they can implement something
like that or work with people who implement something like
that, like Kara, because that was the first, you know, for me,
they helped, they started the fine tuning process, right?
(43:59):
And just having the keeping the open mind for looking for
different things that may not beas traditional to help support
their teams. And you might find some of your
best talent right there. Love that.
Paris, what? What advice would you have for
the audience knowing that they are both employers themselves,
but also maybe nonprofits or other groups trying to connect
(44:20):
with with employers? I think it's important to know
that this is not a short term. This is not a short term goal.
It can't be one thing. It has to continuously evolve
and you know, making sure that there is some accountability to
not only the individuals that are going through the program,
but to our partners and to our internal stakeholders.
(44:42):
We need to make sure that we're looking at this on a regular
basis to figure out how we evaluate and how we continue to
push everything forward. You know, BMO embraced this idea
because it made sense, because it aligned with what we wanted
to do from a social and community aspect.
And that's what we've continued to do as we find new partners,
as we continue to move forward, we're having regular
(45:06):
conversations with RB, more participants, with our community
partners, with our leaders to figure out what more do we need
to do in order to take this fromprogram to practice.
That's always been my goal as I got into this role.
How do we make sure that our community partners are seen as,
hey, they have a pipeline full of talent that's ready to go for
(45:29):
us? We have more information about
these individuals because we know where they're coming from.
And I think that has continued to shift for us.
That's what we're able to tell managers like, hey, this
individual went through eight weeks of training specifically
around, you know, financial and banking.
How much do we know about traditional candidates that are
(45:50):
coming through our pipeline? Not as much.
So it gives us an opportunity tosay we trust our partner, we
trust the work that they've done.
And that trust has to continue to build, which means there's
ongoing collaboration. And one of the things I will
continue to mention is multi layered.
You have to look at things from multiple perspectives.
You have to gain multiple multiple perspectives all at
(46:12):
once in order to get the resultsand then also continue to make
the impact. Thanks, Paris.
I think this is the point in ourprogram.
We get to open it up to the audience.
So, Dee, what questions are bubbling to the surface?
So I think we've been keeping aneye on the questions and this is
(46:34):
one for for you to start with. I think Layana, a big question
broadly about skills based strategies.
I know you've worked with a number of industries and the
question is how, how do you see the some criticism that skills
based strategies might devalue traditional degrees and
(46:58):
traditional credentials? How do you how do you see that
working in the field? Oh, it is such a good question
and something that comes up a lot.
I would say from, from my perspective, number one, I think
it's important to have as Paris just talked about different
perspectives, different people in the room really talking about
(47:18):
what we mean by skills based hiring, right.
So kind of how I've understood it and how I, I talk about it is
we're really focused on skills, no matter where they come from
and being able to more equally value that someone may have
gotten skills from a, you know, four year institution, They may
(47:40):
have gotten those skills from work experience, They may have
gotten those those skills from life experience.
And so how can we work with employers to really focus on
skills and understanding and assessing the skills themselves
versus where they got them? And if you come at it from that
approach, then it's really again, seeing that universities,
(48:03):
colleges, all kinds of institutions are important
partners in building skills, right?
There are certain pathways careers that are going to
require that level of education and, and, and those partners are
best positioned to provide it. So it's really, we're all in
this together. It's just trying to figure out
the different ways, as Lakita said, how do we figure out what
(48:27):
skills someone has outside of how they're showing up on a
piece of paper or how AI is ableto process that information,
right? So that's kind of how I've I've
come at it and how I understand that.
And one question that just really fundamental is how can
(48:49):
organizations get started with skills based hiring and skills
based strategies, both culturally and technically?
What advice would you have? Great question, Paris.
I wonder if you might start us off with that question.
Yeah. If I think about where Be More
started, it again was just an idea.
(49:09):
It wasn't fully baked yet. So I think in order to really
start something like this, it's organizational change.
So it's not something that's just going to impact one aspect
of our business. It's multiple aspects.
You have to be able to take thisidea or this thought and gain
other perspectives in order to move it forward.
Because then you're going to have the buy in of every
(49:31):
individual that you sought advice from or thoughts from in
order to move it forward and in order to make it work for your
organization. What we do at B MO is
incredible. And you know, not every
organization is the exact same, but something like this,
focusing on the individuals and the skills they're bringing to
the table is important. And multiple people within, you
(49:55):
know, the world of banking, myself included, I could have
very easily been AB more participant.
I didn't come from a financial banking background.
I, you know, was on the lower income side of things.
Sometimes, you know, you just need help getting to that next
place. And a lot of the time when we
talk about B more, we talk aboutit as the village.
(50:15):
That kind of helps get you there.
They're the the link to, you know, for Lakita, but Cara was
the link to BMO in order for us to to get her.
And, you know, making sure that you have trust with your
community partners is another piece of that.
Make sure you trust the curriculum and what they do with
their participants. And then also focusing beyond
(50:36):
that first day. How do we continue to keep these
individuals engaged and keep them retained and then help them
grow? I think one thing I would add is
with, with skills based practices, I think Paris, I
think you called this out. There's kind of like 2 parts of
this. There's the technical
challenges, but I think more often when we're starting, it's
(50:58):
the people, it's the getting thebuy in, right.
That's where I see time and timeagain, people often get caught
up the most when they're starting skills based strategies
is it's less the technical solveand just figuring out how to get
people on board and do things pretty differently, right?
Hiring managers will say, well, my best candidates are the ones
(51:19):
that might have XY and Z degree.If I'm trying to fill a role and
our productivity business outcomes are on the line and I
have a million other things, howam I going to get that hire
manager to do something different, right?
Do something differently. And kind of with that in mind, I
would say start small, start with one role and have really
(51:42):
deep and genuine conversations. You know, what are the skills
that we think someone needs to be successful in this role?
Do they have to have those skills when they come in?
Can we play a role like like BMOdid and helping to build those
skills and provide the training?And if you need to start that
process with one role, I think it's, it's helping to build that
organizational muscle and just then holding yourselves
(52:06):
accountable, right? You can have all those great
hiring practices, updating the job descriptions and, and, and,
and if it doesn't flow through all the way through the hiring
process and engaging a hiring managers, you're just not going
to see the outcome. So start small is is probably my
biggest tip. Great.
Another question and related to something that you brought up is
(52:31):
the question about the partnership between BMO and
Cara. And the question is, what was
BMO looking for in a community partner that led them to Cara as
we, as we. Look at I'm sorry, sorry, I,
(52:52):
I'm, I'm, I have my, my ideas ofwhy you might like to partner
with an organization like Cara, but Paris would love to hear
your thoughts on this. We knew the level of investment
that CARE took with each one of their participants.
We knew that there was an in depth learning about each one of
these individuals and that again, that engagement passed
(53:15):
day one. And that engagement, you know,
as long as the CARE participant wanted to be engaged, they were
there. I've heard multiple stories
about Cara, about, you know, howindividuals can walk in and feel
cared for and feel seen and feelheard.
And I think for us, you know, selecting and, and working with
Kara as our flagship partner made the most sense.
(53:36):
We knew the impact to not only the community, but the
individuals that were going through the program.
They were able to be open and, and you know, we're willing to
hear us out and then also being able to work and collaborate
with, you know, the job descriptions, what we were kind
of looking for. And they continue to do that to
this day. We continuously have
(53:56):
conversations with Kara and withall of our partners about how do
we help support you and then howdo they help support us?
And because there's been such anopen line of communication and
collaboration since the onset, you know, we chose the right
partner 1st and it's really helped us lay the groundwork and
how we continue to choose partners as we move forward.
(54:22):
Before we close out Leona, I'll leave it to you if you have any,
any, any closing comments with Lakita or Paris.
Yeah. I think the the last thing I'll
share because I've really had this opportunity Care Plus has
had this opportunity to kind of sit between employer partners
(54:43):
and practitioners and training providers.
And I think it's exactly Paris what you said, it's being able
to have those conversations and for both sides to understand the
needs. I think as, as you know,
workforce development practitioner, one of the things
that have served as best is justreally building that
relationship and understanding how we can provide value.
(55:06):
So I think that starts with having a good relationship and
having a good communication. And as Lakita has said over and
over again, like we're just so grateful for BMO as well for
just that willingness to engage.I think it takes a a special
organization to to do that as well.
And I in in our conversations leading up to this time, I was
(55:29):
telling Lakita, I was just writing down beautiful snippets
of what the kind of advice that she had for organizations and
companies to increase opportunity and ladders for
folks. Lakita, is there anything that
you would say to close out your comments?
Well, I would just say, you know, culture is major, culture
(55:51):
is key. And I would strongly encourage
those who are in the position ofhiring to really focused on that
because people feel it immediately.
You can, you can give all the, you know, accolades and the warm
welcomes and things of that nature.
But when you can walk into a room and you can feel the
tension or you can feel like thelove, you can feel the teamwork,
(56:13):
you can feel whatever it is, positive, negative, you can feel
it. And it's also one of the hardest
things to change. Culture is really difficult to
explain. It's really difficult to write
down. It's really difficult to change,
but it's really easy to, to feelright.
So I, I really believe if they, if the companies focus as much
as on retention as they do with hiring, you can invest into your
(56:36):
employees that way and then create those safe spaces like
the be more program. It goes so much more beyond just
an affinity group or employee resource group.
It really hones into that holistic person, right, that
whole person and gives them those safe spaces.
So if they're having a bad day, especially in industries that
have high turnover, you know, you really want to focus on your
(56:59):
key players that you already have there.
It costs so much to hire. It takes so much energy,
resources, time to bring on new talent, which is good to have
new talent. But if you've also just pour in
to the ones you already have, you may not have to expend so
much of those dollars on bringing in new people.
Thank you so much. Thank you so much for your
(57:21):
advice and thank you all for joining us today and thank you
to our amazing panel for so generously giving of your
experience and insights. And, and take your time with us.
If you want to learn more about Bmo's skills based hiring
strategy and skills based mobility strategies, you can
(57:41):
access a case study that was jointly produced by Acara Plus
and BMO and we're push on putting that in the chat.
We'll also be providing some additional resources as a follow
up to this recording. We are so grateful to the team
at the Economic Opportunities program for this event,
(58:02):
including Hayley Glover, the head of Upskill America and a
key leader in the skills based movement who helped shape
today's event. Big thanks as always to our
wonderful comms team, Francis, Nora and Tony, and to architects
for production of today's event.We hope you will join us for our
(58:23):
next event coming up on Thursday, October 9th for our
Job Quality and Practices webinar.
Big impact, big challenges, Lessons from collaborating with
large businesses to improve job quality.
Certainly relevant to today's conversation where we've been
talking about opening doors and building ladders to continue
(58:44):
this conversation about raising the floor of jobs that can
advance economic mobility. Thank you again, Lakita, Paris,
Liana, and we hope to see you again soon.
Hello and welcome. I'm Dee Wallace, a senior Fellow
with the Economic Opportunities Program at the Aspen Institute.
We are so happy you're here to join us today for our webinar
called Banking on Skills Care Collective and BMO Bank Partner
for Change. Our conversation today is part
of the Workforce Leadership Academy Network, which brings
(00:27):
together leaders of local workforce development ecosystems
to learn and work together to advance economic opportunity.
Before we get started, some tech.
All attendees are muted. Please use the Q&A button at the
bottom of your screen to submit questions and upvote questions.
And please use the chat throughout our time together to
(00:48):
share resources, ideas, experiences related to today's
topic. We encourage you to post about
this conversation on the social media platform of your choice,
and you can find us on all platforms at at at Aspen EOP.
If you have any technical issuesduring the webinar, please
(01:08):
message us in the chat or e-mailus at
eop.program@aspeninstitute.org. This event is being recorded and
it will be posted on our websiteand sent out via e-mail.
And finally, closed captions areavailable for your use.
Click the CC button at the bottom of your screen to
(01:28):
activate them. So let's get started.
So the Aspen Aspen Institute's Economic Opportunities Program
has long recognized the power ofcross sector leadership to
advance change. And our Workforce Leadership
Academy has supported cohorts offellows in 20 communities across
the country to learn and share together across the for profit,
(01:52):
nonprofit and public institutions that make make up
our workforce ecosystems. These leaders work at the
intersection of personal leadership, organizational
practice, equity and inclusion, and systems change in order to
open doors to economic opportunity.
Skills based talent development holds promise to open more doors
(02:16):
to good jobs and build ladders for good careers.
Skills based or skills First approaches broaden the ways in
which talent supply meets business demand by expanding
sourcing of candidates, definingjobs qualifications in terms of
specific skills and meaningful skills, and supporting employees
(02:38):
that are ongoing development andskill building to advance
economic mobility. Today, we are so pleased to
welcome a wonderful panel of leaders to share their
experiences advancing these skills based practices.
I'm so excited to welcome LeannaBrown, senior director of
(03:00):
community and employment strategies at Cara Collective,
Paris Romy of BMO Bank, and Lakita Burns of BMO Bank.
We're also very grateful to haveLyanna Braun moderating this
event. Lyanna is a senior director at
Cara Collective, which is a workforce development agency and
(03:23):
social enterprise that works to break the cycle of poverty for
the power and purpose of work inChicago.
Leon is focused on building sustainable employment
partnerships to promote skills based talent ecosystems to
increase access to opportunity for these individuals.
(03:45):
And she's also an alumni of the Chicago Land Workforce
Leadership Academy. So thank you all for being here
to share these experiences. We're so excited for the
conversation. Over to you, Leanna.
Thanks, Dee. And I just have to say I am such
a proud alumna of this fellowship network I have for
(04:06):
those fellow fellows out there. I have sat where you sat and I'm
so excited by this opportunity to share a little bit about the
work. So first, when it comes to
skills based hiring or skills based practices, I think one of
the biggest questions I hear from people is how do you make
it real? And when I say how do you make
(04:27):
it real, it's supposed to what what are those specific
practices? What are the specific processes
you need to change in an organization to have it take
hold? But beyond that, you know, we've
all heard about the best practice of removing degree
requirements when it's got when it comes to skills based hiring.
But how does that actually change to real outcomes?
(04:48):
When do we start to see organizations hiring
differently, seeing different hiring outcomes?
So it's for all of those reasonsI'm very excited to host this
conversation with two incrediblepeople and to highlight the work
of an incredible partner, BMO Bank, who's figured out how to
bring this to life. So I also want to share before
(05:11):
we get started, just for a little bit of perspective, Cara
has also a really unique vantagepoint in the story because our
team, Cara Plus works every day with employers to think about
their practices, to think about how they have an impact and
ability to reach untapped talent.
And as a workforce organization,we get to see what happens when
(05:32):
those organizations make practice changes, when they
change their practices. And so at this point, working
with BMO, not only have we seen those skills based practices
taking hold, we've also seen theresults.
We've seen and worked with BMO to hire more than 50 people from
our talent pool. So again, this story really
(05:52):
plays out with all of us here and with an our incredible
alumna, Lakita Burns, who's going to be able to share the
story from all of our perspectives.
So with that, Paris, I'm going to start with you and I just
want to ask this this this question of where did the story
(06:13):
begin at BMO, right. So we have this excellent case
study that we Co produced together, which we'll be sharing
in the in the chat later in the program.
And it highlights this new associate banker role that you
created and how you eliminated requirements as a barrier to
banking and to to entering this industry.
So tell us a little bit about how BMO was able to embrace
(06:36):
skills based hiring and tell us a little bit again about where
the story started. Sure.
So this story really kind of started and BMO really started
as like a back of the napkin idea.
It was something that one of my wonderful colleagues thought
about because he had had experience within the workforce
development world. So it was really Bmo's
(06:57):
opportunity to think differentlyabout how we impact the
communities we serve and how we can we combine our business
objectives with our social goalsand simultaneously do that
through a new approach and hiring.
We knew that by leveraging community partnerships, we could
develop a really strong pipelineof talent based on the work that
(07:18):
they do every single day. Then we were able to bring the
idea to some of our executive leaders and that really started
to get things to and put it in place because we needed the
support of our, you know, our executive leaders in order to
make this work and in order to make it move forward.
(07:40):
They saw the value in creating access to better paying jobs and
High Road careers through these community organizations and that
was able to spark some sustainable community impact.
We also knew that for something like this to be successful, we
would need to challenge the perspective of a lot of the
stakeholders that are involved in the hiring process.
(08:01):
So, you know, bank managers, some of our hiring specialists,
we needed to make sure that theyunderstood, you know, what can
what do these skills really looklike?
What does transferable skills look like at its core and how do
we morph them and understand them in a way where we can make
people successful in these roles?
And that's kind of where we started.
(08:22):
We looked at our entry level roles, so our associate banker.
So I think someone is going to pull up a slide and we'll kind
of take a look at what we did from a skill perspective.
So with Cara, we took a look at the role descriptions.
We wanted to make sure that theywere accessible to everyone.
If you could look at the job description, sometimes they're
really intimidating. I've looked at job descriptions
(08:45):
and they're really intimidating.So we wanted to make sure that
we outlined this so that it madesense and that people could, you
know, see themselves in these roles.
And by doing this with Cara, we were able to make sure that they
understood the core competenciesthat we were looking for, for
these roles and then being able to outline what type of skills
(09:05):
they were going to look for in their program participants.
This was kind of the result of that.
So what you're seeing is we looked at 3 really core areas of
how we assess skills. The existing skills that people
have from either prior job experience or life experience,
the ability to learn with our training and support, and the
openness and adaptability to change because we all know that
(09:28):
everything changes all the time.So how were these individuals
going to continue that process? Yeah, and, and Paris, you know,
something that I, I so appreciate because this is now
kind of a, a legend at Kara in terms of how this process
unfolded, because Bimo had already done the work right for
(09:49):
that job posting. The, the before state, you all
had already made the decision that you are thinking about
skills differently and thinking about what was most important in
terms of the talent you wanted to hire.
And then as the story goes, fromwhat I've heard at Cara is we
were able to bring that originaljob posting to some of our
participants who we knew would be successful.
(10:10):
We knew they had those skills. And we said, hey, you read this
job posting. What do you see, right?
And they said, well, there is these words like attestations in
the in the job posting. And I don't really don't know
what that means. And I don't know if I would
apply for a job like this. And so it was through some of
that partnership that it we've really saw not only the power of
(10:31):
the skills based practice and the internal decision to hire
differently, but then how do youtranslate that into a job
posting, right. And So what I so appreciate
about that after state of that job posting is as an
organization, you make so clear not only what people need coming
into the organization, but that you're willing to help people
(10:52):
and are going to invest in building their skills over time.
So that for us is just really exciting to see our feedback
come to life and what you're alldoing.
And BMO and Lakita, I'm going togo to you in in just a moment.
But Paris, I want to stay for just another second and, and
just double click on your, your call out about the work that had
(11:14):
to be done internally to build support for change.
So tell me a little bit more about that process, because we
know that the story starts in one place.
There's all this interest and desire to make a change, but
then it has to flow through different levels of, of
leadership and, and the folks onthe ground that are making it
happen. So tell us a little bit more
about how that unfolded and how you're able to get some support
(11:36):
for those changes. Yeah.
So when this idea was brought forth to our executive
leadership, it wasn't fully baked out.
It was literally just an idea. How do we hire differently?
How do we leverage the communitypartnerships?
Because we did that intentionally to make sure that
we could get broad perspectives on how we can make this work.
Because for something like this to really take hold and and
(11:58):
plant roots within our organization, we needed
stakeholders within different lines of businesses within, you
know, different realms of thought in order to push this
forward. So that's really how it started.
You know, be more is something that continues to evolve.
We continue to see, you know, opinions and thoughts from not
only our community partners, butour stakeholders.
(12:20):
And you know, one of the biggestpieces that you know, something
I will continue to reiterate throughout this conversation is
multi layers, whether it's support, whether it's ideas,
whether it's collaboration. This can't come from one source,
it has to come from multiple leaders.
And the way that it's continued to evolve over the last five
years is that we've kept all of those individuals, those initial
(12:42):
stakeholders involved and then we've been able to bring in
more. And you know, again, it's across
multiple lines of businesses. So we have executive leadership,
we have our retail branches, we have community giving, we have
legal, we have communications PRI mean there's really not a
line of business that be more doesn't have someone being able
(13:02):
to voice their opinion and theirthoughts for us to make, you
know, real progress and real change.
Yeah, absolutely, Paris. And we will come back to this
theme about all these different layers that reinforce this work,
right? Because it's not just about
where you start, it's how you sustain those changes.
Lakita, I want to go over to youbecause we've heard from the
(13:24):
employer side of the equation interms of how they were thinking
about bringing more people in into the banking industry.
But I want to hear about your own journey to get to BMO.
So tell us a little bit about what were some of your career
prospects or aspirations before you started at BMO and that
what, what were some of the biggest barriers or things that
maybe were preventing you from getting into an industry like
(13:47):
banking before? Yeah, sure.
So some issues that I had like, well, I'm gonna say issue of a
perceived barrier. So I had taken some time off
from, you know, the marketplace to focus on raising my family,
raising my children at the time.And I, as admirable as that was,
(14:10):
I didn't realize how much of a challenge I would have going
back into the marketplace when Iwas ready, right?
So I, I applied to all the jobs I have my excel sheet.
It was quite extensive. And when I did get, you know,
call that it, I just wasn't getting the, the return on my
(14:31):
investment that I thought I should, considering how much I
have, how much time and effort Ihave put into it.
So I'm through just some non traditional methods.
I came across Cara and I was like, you know, maybe I should
consider it. But then I saw that they did
karaoke there and it really was a major turn off.
(14:54):
So a month later it came back around again.
I was like, you know what, let me consider Cara.
I think this may be the right space for me considering all
this work that I'm putting into it and not getting much of
return back. And I am so glad I did because I
wasn't having that success on myown.
But Cara really helped connect the dots for me when I went
(15:17):
through the cohort. They helped me realize and, you
know, relate that things that I was already naturally good at
help fine to some things that were there, but just probably,
you know, needed some work on and allow me to see that I was
already naturally good at finances numbers.
I already ran my household like to AT was a well oiled machine
(15:38):
and these are some transferable skills that I can use not only
in the marketplace, but in a career in banking and which is
something I did not consider. I didn't think of banking at
all. But after some, you know,
coaching and you know, some conversations, I, I really
understood that this could be a,a good career move for me.
(16:00):
And also I have some background from, you know, running my own
small business and I use those skills all the time and helping
my customers out on a regular business on a regular basis here
at BMO. Yeah.
Thank you so much for sharing the start of your journey into
banking For everyone who's not familiar with Cara, when Lakita
(16:23):
talks about karaoke at Cara, which is actually sounds like an
event we should do, we have a tradition at Cara called
motivations, which is about celebration building confidence.
So we, we challenge our participants to literally be at
the center of a, of a circle, answer a topic of the day and
lead the group in song. And that builds a number of
skills, including public speaking and including building
(16:47):
confidence and being able to command a A room.
And so Speaking of our morning motivations, Lakita, can you
share about your morning motivations experience that was
part of your hiring journey at BMO?
And yeah, just fill us in, in terms of how BMO also
participated at the back half ofyour your hiring experience and
(17:09):
and saw some of those skills on display.
Yes. So you know, I can only avoid
getting in the circle of motivations for so long.
Well, lo and behold, the time that I had to get in the circle,
BMO was actually in the room with us.
So they were able to see me, my whole just me and hope like the
(17:33):
holistic version of Lakita, not just me just showing up as a
representative. They were able to see the real
me. So I was able to showcase my
public speaking skills and just be myself.
I they were able to see areas ofme that you wouldn't necessarily
let's necessarily see on a resume you wouldn't see and
possibly in a one-on-one conversation.
(17:55):
Because Cara just has this special sauce about it that it
just, it brings it, it, it really, you guys have a great
curriculum there because it really just fine tunes and kind
of dig out those things that whether you, you may want to
hide them and think there may not be something people want to
see. And so when you're when I was in
the circle, I was in the for themotivations and I'm telling my
(18:16):
story, I answered the question of the day.
They were able to see things. I mean, they probably will never
seen. And it worked out because the
market president for BMO, well, I'm currently employed now.
She was there and in that momentshe told me after she's like,
you know what? I knew I wanted to hire you.
I knew you had to come on board with us during motivation.
(18:39):
She's like, we're just doing this because, you know, we have
to, right? But I already knew you were on
the team. This is during the interview,
and I was really stumped. I was like, wow, I was really
taken aback, but in the best waypossible because the one thing I
was running from is the very thing that solidified my seat
here against all of the other competition.
Nikita, I love that. And so do you know a couple of
(19:03):
things I, I want to point out from, from the stories you
shared and, and, and both sides of the story, you know, Paris,
in terms of, of FEMA, what I'm hearing was the start of this
journey was really just an openness and curiosity to really
examine the skills required to be successful in banking, right?
Like, so we talked about this, this role, some of, of what it
(19:25):
might look like is a lot of cashhandling, but in reality, it's
some of those skills can be taught on the job.
So what are we looking for? And then on the other side of of
the story, Lakita, you showed all of those skills and BMO
could recognize them when they were full, when they were on
full display in that motivation circle, right?
(19:46):
So it's both the ability and theopenness for a, a, a company to
consider different skills and what's needed to be successful,
but then also a space for a, a candidate like yourself to be
able to demonstrate those skills.
So. It's been exciting to see a
little bit about a little bit ofthat play out on both sides.
(20:07):
So this conversation on skills based often starts in hiring,
but we don't always pull it through to just what happens
beyond someone coming into an organization coming in the door.
So Paris, I want to go back to you to tell us a little bit
about beyond the hiring process.How is BMO thinking about
(20:27):
helping new hires be successful to continue to belong?
What are some of the shifts you've also made in terms of
thinking about what comes next after hiring?
Sure. So many of the individuals that
we welcome through the Be More program have never previously
considered a a career in banking.
I've actually talked to a lot ofleaders across the organization
(20:49):
and we all kind of consider ourselves accidental bankers
because we kind of just ended uphere based on some of the skills
we had, myself included. So, you know, you begin this
journey with some hesitation andsome limited confidence around
interacting with more tenured colleagues and trying to figure
out where you fit and how you utilize those skills that you're
(21:09):
coming in with. And so from the outset, we
really see that individual's first day as the starting point.
Yes, we want to hire people, butwe want to retain people.
It, you know, it's the beginningof a much longer journey in
order for us to create lasting change.
You know, through BMAR, our goalwas not to simply just fill
(21:31):
positions, but to really, you know, invest in people who
could, you know, help meet future organizational needs
through growing in their career.You know, in the retail
leadership and branch environment, you know that
that's the foundation of where all of this starts.
So for us, and you know, for, you know, the Be More program
(21:51):
management piece, it's importantto make sure we're engaging
those leaders before that first day.
Because we are not just giving support to the Be More
colleague. We're giving our support to the
leaders that are getting ready to take in the talent to make
sure that they understand, you know, the training that these
individuals went through the time that they put in, because
it is important for them to recognize that these individuals
(22:15):
are coming in with, you know, additional skills based on the
community partner that they thatthey came from.
And, you know, this dual focus approach really allows us to
have stronger relationships withthe managers, but also with the
employees. And it also builds like that
mutual groundwork and understanding of these
individuals in there and where they're coming from.
(22:36):
And then this is my favorite part.
So after about 90 days we start be more bound, which is a very,
you know, structured post employment programming that, you
know, they're very small groups,basically 10 individuals.
And this allows for us to learn more about them, their skills,
their strengths, their weaknesses.
(22:59):
It allows us to help teach them how to action plan and then also
give them a bigger view about what's available at BMO from a
career standpoint. That's how actually How I Met
Lakita was through leading AB more band group.
And you know, this program I, I take a lot of pride in and every
time I have one of these sessions with these individuals,
I walk away with a new understanding or a new
(23:20):
appreciation for my job. And then also everything that
these individuals have got had to go through, whether you're
coming through a traditional channel or whether you're coming
through B more, everybody's got stuff with them.
But how do we use it and how do we bring it forth in the work?
So between be more bound and then making sure that we're
(23:40):
working closely with our leaders, that's, that's two
parts of it, right? The other piece is continued
involvement with the community partner.
So every time we take on a new partner or we expanded to a new
footprint, we are asking these partners to stay engaged with
the individuals for at least 12 months because it allows us to
(24:01):
make sure that the retention piece is top of mind.
You never know what's going on in somebody's life and sometimes
you just need somebody else's voice, potentially an external
voice to help put things back ontrack.
An example is if somebody's having some issues with
attendance or tardiness, we're able to reach out to the
community partner and say, hey, based off your relationship, can
(24:22):
you reach out and see what's going on so we can better
support the individual. We've seen this happen time and
time again and being able to rely on that community partner
allows for both internal and external support for each one of
these individuals. And I think it is appreciated by
everybody coming through the Be More program like, hey, I'm not
(24:43):
on this island by myself. No career is built by yourself,
You know, using your external and internal resources are
important for everybody's growth.
So we continue to monitor and and align with our Be More Bound
process, but also everything that goes into those first few
months, that first year we're very focused on because we want
(25:04):
to keep each one of these individuals that we're bringing
into the organization. Thanks, Paris.
You know when we were talking about this, you know, it's
something that I realized that, you know, from a an employer
business perspective, a lot of what you shared in terms of what
that leads to is retention, which is so top of mind for
employers. So you know, you can bring that
(25:26):
lens to all the different piecesof being more is focused on
hiring and then supporting retention.
If you layer on this kind of skills based strategy that we'd
all been talking about or kind of how we started this
conversation, what seems so important or kind of core to
what makes retention happen is you're investing in the skill
building of the individuals coming through the program,
(25:49):
right? So not just helping with the
cash handling or the other technical aspects of the role,
but you're helping people build skill to navigate their own
careers, to advocate for themselves.
So that's happening on one hand.And then I, I also heard you
talk about how you're building leadership skills and management
(26:09):
skills of, of those in the branches as well, right?
Helping them understand what it takes to be a leader and to
support talent and, and, and allthat means.
So really appreciate, appreciateyou sharing that, Lakita.
Now I want to go in and hear from your perspective since you
started at BMO, how have you seen your own skills evolve and
(26:34):
and how has BMO been helpful in that process?
What resources supports have helped you be successful in
banking? OK, I'll keep it short.
You don't. Know do we want to hear it?
So BMO I, I work in the largest branch in our market here is a
(26:54):
Lakeshore market within BMO and our the level of traffic that we
see on a day-to-day basis can beoverwhelming at the it's an
understatement. So being that I get to it, it's
it's, it's I see the blessing inthat, right?
(27:16):
Because since I work in the largest branch, there's never a
dull day. It's always something that is
the new exciting fun. And then in that I get to reach
a very large population of people that I probably would
have never been able to even have a conversation to or
nothing at that personal level. And I get to fine tune those
(27:36):
relations, relationship buildingskills that I already have.
But each customer I get the reset.
So someone else comes in front of me and maybe I, you know, I
felt I'm mentally thinking like,how could I have made that
interaction better? And if something comes to mind,
the next person, I'm actively working on that with the next
customer. And considering we're in a large
branch, I don't have time to sitand like wallow in that that oh,
(28:01):
I made a mistake or this thing goes so well.
It's happening real time real fast at the reset and it just,
yes, it can be overwhelming. It can be a lot, but it's also
fine tuning what I already have to make it something that's good
to great. And I'm really thankful for that
opportunity because there aren'ta lot of branches that have the
(28:23):
level of traffic that we have. So I get real time and feedback
multiple times in the day to seehow I'm progressing, not just
for the things that can be measured, you know, on my
scorecard, like, you know, it's the quantitative and
qualitative. I get both of those at on a
regular basis daily. Yeah, it sounds overwhelming.
(28:46):
I mean, me, I know if I were trying to count and handle money
while people are talking, that'sthat's not me.
I don't know if I I could be successful or accidental banker.
You know, one thing you shared with me, Lakita, you, you talked
a little bit about your experience and be more bound and
that how that was a safe landingspace to kind of digest some of
(29:08):
what was happening. And maybe without having that
space, you or others may not have persisted.
You may have said, OK, I tried banking, we're done.
So I'm curious if you can tell me a little bit more about how
that be more bound those those those sessions together, how how
did that help you be successful in your role and help you have
(29:28):
that support? Well, I am truly thankful for
the V more program. I highly recommend every
employer company not-for-profit,however you are to please
emulate something of that sort because that was a home away
from home within my workplace. So we had Paris was there.
(29:52):
We she had also a Co host and other men and women who were
sharing a similar position knew to BMO that we can just come and
just be ourselves right. However that looked in that
moment. If you were having a bad day, if
you had some Paris mentioned it earlier, like if some things
outside of work that were reallynegatively impacting you, what's
(30:16):
going on? Let's talk about it.
OK, Now, how can we what can we do to ensure that this isn't
affecting your worth or how can we best support you?
And that is priceless because you don't get that in a lot of
different places. You just kind of just have to
suck it up, buttercup and you know, show up and perform and
you're almost like a puppet, right?
(30:38):
And people don't get the whole authentic you.
They get your representative in that moment, right.
But I cannot for. Like.
It's difficult to show up and bemy best self when I don't feel
my best self. But I had a place where I can
like, I'm not feeling great, guys, this is what's going on.
Here's why. And then I had a whole team that
was able to pour back into me tomake sure that when I was back
(31:01):
customer facing or with my colleagues or management, Lakita
was able to present her best self.
And for that I, it's amazing. It's, it's awesome.
It's great. I have.
I don't think I have enough adjectives to explain how
amazing the B1 program. Is yeah.
(31:23):
And that's, that's so that's so real because, you know, in in
this particular role, you have like a really unique opportunity
where you're getting live feedback every day.
I heard you say like, yeah, you're refining, refining
because you get immediate feedback from dozens of people
every day. And in the kind of spirit of
(31:45):
kind of developing skills, building skills, sometimes you
have this kind of maybe soundtrack in your head.
If it was just you getting that feedback and figuring out what
to do with that, that's that's challenging.
But having the space really seems like it was it was an
opportunity to process and and kind of reinforce maybe some of
that scale building that was happening.
(32:07):
So just awesome to hear about that.
Yes, if I had to coin a term forit, I would probably say
productive therapy. I think.
We could all use a little. Bit more of that just productive
therapy. Sign me up.
I had one more question though here because you know something
(32:27):
else I, I heard from you, Lakita, in terms of what has
been helpful in your, in your career in banking and BMO is
the, the support that reinforcement and then also
exposure to different career pathways and to being encouraged
to talk to your leadership aboutyour interest.
So tell us a little bit more about what that has looked like
(32:50):
and, and what impact you've seenthat have on yourself, but also
it sounds like maybe that's impacted other colleagues or
managers. Absolutely.
So yes, Be More was amazing. Well, is amazing for having
those real conversations when weneeded it most, but it also
shined a light on where we what's next.
Like, OK, this is where we are, but where do we want to go and
(33:10):
how do we get there? Here's the path.
So in that we did skills strength training, strength
skills assessment. Yeah.
I can't even think of the name of it.
Please forgive me. Strange Finder.
Thank you. There we go.
So we did that. We did.
And just to figure out, maybe uncover some things that you had
and maybe you weren't aware of or maybe some things that you
(33:32):
thought you had that you really aren't that strong in.
And let's focus on the things that can get you where you need
to be. And in that process, I learned
where it was 2 paths I wanted togo.
Like, OK, so how, which, where, where can I get to like the
fastest, right? Which which works best for me?
Paris is really instrumental andit's ensuring that I stayed on
(33:58):
task and she's like, all right, come on, let it out.
Now this is what we're going to do.
Here's the fact. She's like, whatever you want to
do, I'll support you. I'm like, OK, I, I, I hear, I
hear her in my, in my, myself talk also includes Paris in my
ear with that right? And in that I found that, yes, I
(34:18):
have some skills like retail, maybe the the route that I need
to stay in and how and where do I want to be in retail and how
do I get there? How long is that going to take?
Because when you're going through these day-to-day, you
know, challenges, it's easy to just get lost in it and not
realize that we have a bigger picture at stake here, right?
(34:38):
So just shake it off for just a day, just one day at a time.
You know, you eat an elephant one bite at a time, Same, same
thing, right? So if we're going to jungle, of
course, right. But in that.
So I figured out the the career path that I wanted.
So I brought it to my managers and they were just blown away.
They were taken aback. They're like, you know, Lakita,
no one else is having these conversations.
(35:00):
No one else is talking to us about what next steps are.
We have several, well, colleagues of mine that have
been in the same role for several years and they did not
even consider something else. They were just completely
comfortable where they are. And yet you have me, I'm only in
there a few months and I'm talking about what my, you know,
(35:20):
to short term, you know, mid, mid term and then long term
goals and where exactly where I wanted to be.
And they really didn't know where to take it.
They're like, OK, well, give us some.
We'll, we'll get back to you andgive us a few days.
We'll circle back. And it, it, it prompted a
conversation with my market president.
She got involved. She was really excited because
(35:41):
she was able to connect me with some people in within the
company that's actually in thoseroles.
I can get real time information like, OK, what's good, You know,
what works out great? How did I get, how did you get
to where you are? And how do I get to where I want
to be? Right.
Finding out how to whether it works for me because their path
may not be my path, but we gave me some different options.
(36:03):
And in doing so, I've made some real great connections with
other people who aren't in my branch.
So I have a dish. It's just, you know, the
branches of like people who I can reach out to to and have
access to really broaden. And in me doing that, I'm now
hearing conversations from my colleagues about where they want
to go. They're one of they've heard
(36:24):
about no one was speaking about the program about, you know,
that that I brought from the be more, you know, community.
And now they're signing up for the same things that I've
inquired about that, you know, that I've had conversations with
my managers. No one was doing that.
Now everyone's doing it now. So I hear and I see that I of
(36:44):
course, I just keep it to myself, but I'm like, OK, I'm
making some positive change here.
And that definitely is because of the B More program.
That's so exciting to hear, Lakita.
And something that I and then I'm noticing is it's like it's
this growth, right? It's it's how big changes within
organizations happen, right? First it starts maybe with an
(37:05):
individual impact, but then other people start to feel it
and see it and it grows. So with that, Paris, I want to
go back to you to talk about where BMO is now, because
there's been AI don't want to steal your Thunder, but there's
been some growth. And and before you answer, I
also just want to name that we're in such a different moment
(37:27):
than where we were when B most the B more program started right
now. Every day I hear someone talking
about AI, how I need to use it more, which, you know, that's a
whole other story. But of course, we're in a very
different economic and politicalcontext.
So tell us a little bit more about not only where the program
(37:49):
is at, but how you know you and,and your team have really
thought about what to grow, whatto change and, and, and you
know, how you've been able to persist or why you've persisted
given everything that has has happened around us.
Absolutely. You know, I'm really lucky to
work for an organization that embraced this idea and continue
(38:13):
to push it forward. That hasn't changed.
The support hasn't lessened for B more.
If anything, it's grown just like the program itself.
So we started in Chicago, we're now in Milwaukee, Madison,
Denver, Indianapolis, Fremont, CA, Phoenix and Los Angeles.
I had to think about all the cities because there is so many
(38:35):
and we are launching in one of our final retail regions within
the within the next couple of weeks.
And then notably last year we had our highest retention in the
program yet, so 74% which is extremely strong for one year
retention when we're talking about creating pipelines through
our community partners. And I think, you know, a lot of
(38:55):
what Lakita said about be more bound is that we try to make
sure we continue to stay engagedbecause I think where we start
to lose people is when we lose connection with individuals,
especially within those small groups, people start to feel a
little bit lost because BMO is so big.
So we continue to see that evolution of retention and
(39:16):
growth. We've had multiple promotions,
people being put into development pathways.
We've seen retail relationship bankers happen, virtual connect,
also a wealth analyst all from this program.
And you know, while the world isalways changing, we are always
going to need to hire. Talent acquisition is not
(39:38):
something that's going away. It's something that we need to
continue to get better at meeting the needs of our
communities and all of these applicants and all of the
candidates. And the way that we do that is
we continue to evolve. The world is changing, talent
acquisition is not. And we need to make sure that
we're continuing to meet people,you know, where they are and you
(39:59):
know. Again, I, I have to boast about
the, the organization that I work for because we have this
mission statement boldly grow the good in business and life.
And to me the Be More program does that in every single way.
We're not just, you know, it's, it's not necessarily about what
we're getting from a return on investment standpoint.
(40:20):
It's about what are we doing to impact the communities we serve
and how are we ensuring that thebranches and customers that we
serve are reflected in our colleagues.
People want to go into a branch where they see themselves.
People want to go into a branch where they feel like they can
have conversations with individuals with similar
backgrounds with them. And I think Be More is one of
(40:41):
those really key ways of doing that.
And so the work will continue. The investment is there because
I have a job and I love my job. I get to lead programs like this
and continue to make sure that we continue to put the impact in
our communities side by side with our business objectives and
continue to, you know, grow the good.
(41:02):
Yeah, Paris, it's so powerful because I remember, you know
where when we were talking aboutwhere the story began, you know,
sometimes new business or, or talent strategies come from a
really clear business need. And, and, and, and what you
described there was just this commitment to thinking about
(41:22):
your engagement and community. And, and now I see where we are
here and how the program is grown.
And I see two things. I see that continued investment
and just the clear business value, right?
So now we're looking at the, like you said, the in the, the
good in, in say it again for me,Paris, say it, say it again for
all of us. What is Bmo's motto?
(41:45):
Growing the good in business andin life, and it progresses.
Where it is. Where we've hired over 200
individuals through this program.
I can't believe I didn't mentionthat number, but over 200
individuals across our retail footprint.
Absolutely. So it is not only a community
engagement strategy, but also talent acquisition and as we
heard retention mobility strategy for for BMO.
(42:08):
So that's so exciting to hear. For those of you who have been
following along in the chat, we've been dropping in some
resources. So I'll invite you to take A to
keep an eye on that because you'll see a couple of different
opportunities and articles that are going to give you the double
click on this BMO story, not only in terms of where it where
(42:30):
it started, but again, this incredible growth.
So just keep an eye on, on the chat for that.
And with that, I'm going to ask my, my panelists one more
question and then we'll go to questions from the audience.
Lakita simple question, what what advice do you have for for
people in the audience, knowing that there are other educators,
(42:52):
training providers, practitioners, What advice do
you have for them in terms of helping their job seekers pursue
new careers or or growth in new industries, just like you had it
at in your experience with with BMO and Cara?
Sure. Well, I will.
I will highly recommend for themto look for ways that to find
(43:14):
things that will reflect those individuals in ways that best
support the company. But you can't really find
through your AI search engine, right Those keywords or what's
on their resume or whoever it was that referred them.
There's so much more to a personthat makes who they are like me,
(43:37):
like be more program allows me to show up as me in my most
holistic way, in my most authentic way.
And I believe other companies, they can implement something
like that or work with people who implement something like
that, like Kara, because that was the first, you know, for me,
they helped, they started the fine tuning process, right?
(43:59):
And just having the keeping the open mind for looking for
different things that may not beas traditional to help support
their teams. And you might find some of your
best talent right there. Love that.
Paris, what? What advice would you have for
the audience knowing that they are both employers themselves,
but also maybe nonprofits or other groups trying to connect
(44:20):
with with employers? I think it's important to know
that this is not a short term. This is not a short term goal.
It can't be one thing. It has to continuously evolve
and you know, making sure that there is some accountability to
not only the individuals that are going through the program,
but to our partners and to our internal stakeholders.
(44:42):
We need to make sure that we're looking at this on a regular
basis to figure out how we evaluate and how we continue to
push everything forward. You know, BMO embraced this idea
because it made sense, because it aligned with what we wanted
to do from a social and community aspect.
And that's what we've continued to do as we find new partners,
as we continue to move forward, we're having regular
(45:06):
conversations with RB, more participants, with our community
partners, with our leaders to figure out what more do we need
to do in order to take this fromprogram to practice.
That's always been my goal as I got into this role.
How do we make sure that our community partners are seen as,
hey, they have a pipeline full of talent that's ready to go for
(45:29):
us? We have more information about
these individuals because we know where they're coming from.
And I think that has continued to shift for us.
That's what we're able to tell managers like, hey, this
individual went through eight weeks of training specifically
around, you know, financial and banking.
How much do we know about traditional candidates that are
(45:50):
coming through our pipeline? Not as much.
So it gives us an opportunity tosay we trust our partner, we
trust the work that they've done.
And that trust has to continue to build, which means there's
ongoing collaboration. And one of the things I will
continue to mention is multi layered.
You have to look at things from multiple perspectives.
You have to gain multiple multiple perspectives all at
(46:12):
once in order to get the resultsand then also continue to make
the impact. Thanks, Paris.
I think this is the point in ourprogram.
We get to open it up to the audience.
So, Dee, what questions are bubbling to the surface?
So I think we've been keeping aneye on the questions and this is
(46:34):
one for for you to start with. I think Layana, a big question
broadly about skills based strategies.
I know you've worked with a number of industries and the
question is how, how do you see the some criticism that skills
based strategies might devalue traditional degrees and
(46:58):
traditional credentials? How do you how do you see that
working in the field? Oh, it is such a good question
and something that comes up a lot.
I would say from, from my perspective, number one, I think
it's important to have as Paris just talked about different
perspectives, different people in the room really talking about
(47:18):
what we mean by skills based hiring, right.
So kind of how I've understood it and how I, I talk about it is
we're really focused on skills, no matter where they come from
and being able to more equally value that someone may have
gotten skills from a, you know, four year institution, They may
(47:40):
have gotten those skills from work experience, They may have
gotten those those skills from life experience.
And so how can we work with employers to really focus on
skills and understanding and assessing the skills themselves
versus where they got them? And if you come at it from that
approach, then it's really again, seeing that universities,
(48:03):
colleges, all kinds of institutions are important
partners in building skills, right?
There are certain pathways careers that are going to
require that level of education and, and, and those partners are
best positioned to provide it. So it's really, we're all in
this together. It's just trying to figure out
the different ways, as Lakita said, how do we figure out what
(48:27):
skills someone has outside of how they're showing up on a
piece of paper or how AI is ableto process that information,
right? So that's kind of how I've I've
come at it and how I understand that.
And one question that just really fundamental is how can
(48:49):
organizations get started with skills based hiring and skills
based strategies, both culturally and technically?
What advice would you have? Great question, Paris.
I wonder if you might start us off with that question.
Yeah. If I think about where Be More
started, it again was just an idea.
(49:09):
It wasn't fully baked yet. So I think in order to really
start something like this, it's organizational change.
So it's not something that's just going to impact one aspect
of our business. It's multiple aspects.
You have to be able to take thisidea or this thought and gain
other perspectives in order to move it forward.
Because then you're going to have the buy in of every
(49:31):
individual that you sought advice from or thoughts from in
order to move it forward and in order to make it work for your
organization. What we do at B MO is
incredible. And you know, not every
organization is the exact same, but something like this,
focusing on the individuals and the skills they're bringing to
the table is important. And multiple people within, you
(49:55):
know, the world of banking, myself included, I could have
very easily been AB more participant.
I didn't come from a financial banking background.
I, you know, was on the lower income side of things.
Sometimes, you know, you just need help getting to that next
place. And a lot of the time when we
talk about B more, we talk aboutit as the village.
(50:15):
That kind of helps get you there.
They're the the link to, you know, for Lakita, but Cara was
the link to BMO in order for us to to get her.
And, you know, making sure that you have trust with your
community partners is another piece of that.
Make sure you trust the curriculum and what they do with
their participants. And then also focusing beyond
(50:36):
that first day. How do we continue to keep these
individuals engaged and keep them retained and then help them
grow? I think one thing I would add is
with, with skills based practices, I think Paris, I
think you called this out. There's kind of like 2 parts of
this. There's the technical
challenges, but I think more often when we're starting, it's
(50:58):
the people, it's the getting thebuy in, right.
That's where I see time and timeagain, people often get caught
up the most when they're starting skills based strategies
is it's less the technical solveand just figuring out how to get
people on board and do things pretty differently, right?
Hiring managers will say, well, my best candidates are the ones
(51:19):
that might have XY and Z degree.If I'm trying to fill a role and
our productivity business outcomes are on the line and I
have a million other things, howam I going to get that hire
manager to do something different, right?
Do something differently. And kind of with that in mind, I
would say start small, start with one role and have really
(51:42):
deep and genuine conversations. You know, what are the skills
that we think someone needs to be successful in this role?
Do they have to have those skills when they come in?
Can we play a role like like BMOdid and helping to build those
skills and provide the training?And if you need to start that
process with one role, I think it's, it's helping to build that
organizational muscle and just then holding yourselves
(52:06):
accountable, right? You can have all those great
hiring practices, updating the job descriptions and, and, and,
and if it doesn't flow through all the way through the hiring
process and engaging a hiring managers, you're just not going
to see the outcome. So start small is is probably my
biggest tip. Great.
Another question and related to something that you brought up is
(52:31):
the question about the partnership between BMO and
Cara. And the question is, what was
BMO looking for in a community partner that led them to Cara as
we, as we. Look at I'm sorry, sorry, I,
(52:52):
I'm, I'm, I have my, my ideas ofwhy you might like to partner
with an organization like Cara, but Paris would love to hear
your thoughts on this. We knew the level of investment
that CARE took with each one of their participants.
We knew that there was an in depth learning about each one of
these individuals and that again, that engagement passed
(53:15):
day one. And that engagement, you know,
as long as the CARE participant wanted to be engaged, they were
there. I've heard multiple stories
about Cara, about, you know, howindividuals can walk in and feel
cared for and feel seen and feelheard.
And I think for us, you know, selecting and, and working with
Kara as our flagship partner made the most sense.
(53:36):
We knew the impact to not only the community, but the
individuals that were going through the program.
They were able to be open and, and you know, we're willing to
hear us out and then also being able to work and collaborate
with, you know, the job descriptions, what we were kind
of looking for. And they continue to do that to
this day. We continuously have
(53:56):
conversations with Kara and withall of our partners about how do
we help support you and then howdo they help support us?
And because there's been such anopen line of communication and
collaboration since the onset, you know, we chose the right
partner 1st and it's really helped us lay the groundwork and
how we continue to choose partners as we move forward.
(54:22):
Before we close out Leona, I'll leave it to you if you have any,
any, any closing comments with Lakita or Paris.
Yeah. I think the the last thing I'll
share because I've really had this opportunity Care Plus has
had this opportunity to kind of sit between employer partners
(54:43):
and practitioners and training providers.
And I think it's exactly Paris what you said, it's being able
to have those conversations and for both sides to understand the
needs. I think as, as you know,
workforce development practitioner, one of the things
that have served as best is justreally building that
relationship and understanding how we can provide value.
(55:06):
So I think that starts with having a good relationship and
having a good communication. And as Lakita has said over and
over again, like we're just so grateful for BMO as well for
just that willingness to engage.I think it takes a a special
organization to to do that as well.
And I in in our conversations leading up to this time, I was
(55:29):
telling Lakita, I was just writing down beautiful snippets
of what the kind of advice that she had for organizations and
companies to increase opportunity and ladders for
folks. Lakita, is there anything that
you would say to close out your comments?
Well, I would just say, you know, culture is major, culture
(55:51):
is key. And I would strongly encourage
those who are in the position ofhiring to really focused on that
because people feel it immediately.
You can, you can give all the, you know, accolades and the warm
welcomes and things of that nature.
But when you can walk into a room and you can feel the
tension or you can feel like thelove, you can feel the teamwork,
(56:13):
you can feel whatever it is, positive, negative, you can feel
it. And it's also one of the hardest
things to change. Culture is really difficult to
explain. It's really difficult to write
down. It's really difficult to change,
but it's really easy to, to feelright.
So I, I really believe if they, if the companies focus as much
as on retention as they do with hiring, you can invest into your
(56:36):
employees that way and then create those safe spaces like
the be more program. It goes so much more beyond just
an affinity group or employee resource group.
It really hones into that holistic person, right, that
whole person and gives them those safe spaces.
So if they're having a bad day, especially in industries that
have high turnover, you know, you really want to focus on your
(56:59):
key players that you already have there.
It costs so much to hire. It takes so much energy,
resources, time to bring on new talent, which is good to have
new talent. But if you've also just pour in
to the ones you already have, you may not have to expend so
much of those dollars on bringing in new people.
Thank you so much. Thank you so much for your
(57:21):
advice and thank you all for joining us today and thank you
to our amazing panel for so generously giving of your
experience and insights. And, and take your time with us.
If you want to learn more about Bmo's skills based hiring
strategy and skills based mobility strategies, you can
(57:41):
access a case study that was jointly produced by Acara Plus
and BMO and we're push on putting that in the chat.
We'll also be providing some additional resources as a follow
up to this recording. We are so grateful to the team
at the Economic Opportunities program for this event,
(58:02):
including Hayley Glover, the head of Upskill America and a
key leader in the skills based movement who helped shape
today's event. Big thanks as always to our
wonderful comms team, Francis, Nora and Tony, and to architects
for production of today's event.We hope you will join us for our
(58:23):
next event coming up on Thursday, October 9th for our
Job Quality and Practices webinar.
Big impact, big challenges, Lessons from collaborating with
large businesses to improve job quality.
Certainly relevant to today's conversation where we've been
talking about opening doors and building ladders to continue
(58:44):
this conversation about raising the floor of jobs that can
advance economic mobility. Thank you again, Lakita, Paris,
Liana, and we hope to see you again soon.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Cardiac Cowboys
The heart was always off-limits to surgeons. Cutting into it spelled instant death for the patient. That is, until a ragtag group of doctors scattered across the Midwest and Texas decided to throw out the rule book. Working in makeshift laboratories and home garages, using medical devices made from scavenged machine parts and beer tubes, these men and women invented the field of open heart surgery. Odds are, someone you know is alive because of them. So why has history left them behind? Presented by Chris Pine, CARDIAC COWBOYS tells the gripping true story behind the birth of heart surgery, and the young, Greatest Generation doctors who made it happen. For years, they competed and feuded, racing to be the first, the best, and the most prolific. Some appeared on the cover of Time Magazine, operated on kings and advised presidents. Others ended up disgraced, penniless, and convicted of felonies. Together, they ignited a revolution in medicine, and changed the world.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.