Bank of the West’s Hisham Salama was hired in 2018 as Head of Digital Channels to help the bank reshape their digital offering; what he encountered was a workforce that was not very engaged and so first on his mission was the reshape the culture; free snacks to enable more interaction between employees, ask me anything and changing how they viewed technology were just some of the changes Salama implemented; Bank of the West’s mobile app jumped 47 points in J.D. Power’s ratings in 2019 and they released ten updates for mobile and online, compared to four in 2018; “His is one of the most energetic and passionate teams that wants to make change,” said Ryan Bailey, Head of the Retail Banking Group, to American Banker. “The new team figures out what customer problems we need to solve, not just from a sales standpoint but a service standpoint. Customer input is paramount in making decisions about design.”; he also led the hiring of non banking talent from across the San Francisco Bay Area to bring in fresh perspectives from fintech, e-commerce and entertainment. American Banker
