Clearing the Bull

Book excerpt: The financial crisis shows that the banking industry requires a transformation, as its business model and practices are no longer sustainable. Even so, such transformation cannot be made without Clearing the Bull moving beyond old and tired orthodoxies in order to properly diagnose the problem. Drawing on more than twenty years of experience in banking, author Jonathan Ledwidge shows how the financial crisis exposed the industry's poor system of values, leaving it mired in conflict with its human environment. Specifically, this includes how poor leadership, virtually unmanageable organizations, dysfunctional suppliers, infuriated customers, alienated employees, and dissatisfied communities all arise from the inability of banks to understand that values are more important than valuations. As a result there is now a total disconnect between banks and their human environment. That disconnect cannot be fully addressed by conventional solutions involving more regulations, more governance, and more controls. Banks have a very human problem, and thus by definition what they require is a human transformation. Clearing the Bull provides both a clear diagnosis as well as a detailed and comprehensive roadmap for the banking industry's human transformation and while doing so it remains totally engaging and accessible to bankers and non-bankers alike.