About 10 years ago, Les Biller, then a newly retired former chief operating officer at Wells Fargo & Co., thought there was a way his old career could help people in challenging circumstances climb out of them. He figured there must be a job in banking that requires a skill set that could be taught quickly, was transferrable among banks and had real upside.
The answer: the bank teller. And that led him to team with the Jewish Vocational Service of Los Angeles to launch the BankWork$ training program, which last month graduated its 50th class. It’s an eight-week crash course that prepares job seekers, mostly the unemployed and people from poor neighborhoods, for teller positions – and maybe beyond.
“It was a career that had a ladder,” said Claudia Finkel, the chief operating officer of Jewish Vocational Service of Los Angeles. “It did not require a college degree. It was with large institutions where people could advance throughout their career and move in any direction. And there are lots of banks in the city, so people didn’t have to move.”
Finkel and Biller brought Lisa Meadows, a former high school instructor and Union Bank executive, on board as the program’s associate director. Meadows wrote the curriculum, and BankWork$ got its start.
The first classes were small, with only about 12 to 15 students taking part. Today, there are two sessions, each with 30 to 60 students. More than 75 percent of BankWork$ alumni are still employed at the bank that hired them a year after graduating. That’s higher than the overall retention rate for bank employees in those jobs.
Next up for BankWork$: taking the program national through a franchise model. They plan to be in Seattle, San Francisco and Phoenix by the end of the year.
And it’s not just aspiring tellers that are benefiting. The partner banks, which include L.A.-area institutions such as City National Bank, are using BankWork$ as a sort of employee training program.
“Someone walks in and says, ‘How do I get a job?’ and they’re being referred to our program,” Meadows said.
– Matt Pressberg
