Head of Savings
The Role:
Bath Building Society
The Client:
The Client
Bath Building Society is a trading name of the Bath Investment & Building Society, headquartered in a beautiful iconic building in central Bath.
Although they operate throughout Britain, they enjoy great support from the City of Bath and its surrounding areas. The Society can trace its origins back to 1904, when it was set-up originally as a Friendly Society. It used Members’ investments to buy property to rent, becoming a Building Society in the 1950s, lending money for people in the City to buy their own homes.
As one of the smaller Building Societies offering mortgages, savings and investments, Bath Building Society are passionate about giving their members and customers something special, something they find difficult to get elsewhere. They offer a range of business and personal savings accounts and investment products, mortgages and financial advice.
The Society’s growth follows the increase in property ownership in Britain, and in 2017 the Society’s assets rose by 4.4% to £311.7m with an 11.9% increase in its reserves from £29.9m to £33m year on year.
The Campaign
Moon Executive Search was approached to conduct a detailed and specific search for a Head of Savings to join the Society’s leadership team.
Reporting to the CEO, the Head of Savings role required an experienced and commercially minded individual who wanted to join an organisation which differentiates itself through the service they offer their members and customers. In conducting this search, we were conscious of the need to identify someone with a thorough knowledge of the deposits and lending markets and possessing the ability to operate strategically and appraise business initiatives.
They had to bring gravitas and leadership, evidencing experience of managing and maintaining a logically coherent product range and service proposition in each of the channels, to meet the needs of savers.
We adopted a thorough search and screening process to enable us to fully assess each candidate’s experience, background, and soft and hard skills against the search criteria.
Once we had agreed a detailed timeline for the search with the Chief Executive, we approached candidates, ensuring that they had requisite skills and knowledge of the market via initial screening calls, prior to meeting face to face for a more in-depth interview. At this interview, we considered factors such as whether the candidates had researched effectively and could evidence their relevant experience and also how they communicated their own motivations and career ambitions, before selecting our final shortlist for interview with the Board.
Finally, for this unique search, we were mindful of presenting a shortlist of candidates who brought strong regulatory and governance knowledge and fully appreciated the high-profile and unique position of Bath Building Society in the local market. In doing so, they needed to act in an ambassadorial role, upholding the Society’s values and cultural heritage within the local Community.
The Challenge
Both roles required strategic leadership at Board level with strong and effective stakeholder management. The ideal candidates had to have experience of operating in a regulated environment and a career with international exposure to different markets, ideally with a knowledge of tier one supply chain scenarios, including bids and tenders.
The Solution
Having conducted a detailed search of the market, Moon presented a candidate shortlist which resulted in 5 candidates being interviewed at first stage. This resulted in two candidates being selected for second stage interviews and Moon then administered psychometric assessment reports to further assist with the final stage decision-making process.
Following the second stage interviews which involved meeting members of the Senior Management Team and a presentation stage, we were delighted that Bath Building Society were able to appoint to the position.
Kevin Gray, Chief Executive, commented, ‘We have known Moon for several years and so were confident in their ability to complete this detailed search. They displayed attention to detail, communicated throughout and provided useful market insights that were immensely invaluable.’
Simon Quinn, Director of Search said ‘Bath Building Society are a unique business with an impressive standing both within Bath and the surrounding areas and it was a pleasure to work with the leadership team on this search. What struck me most was their motto, ‘We’re different because you are’ which guided us when assessing the appropriate candidate fit for the organisation.’
News, Insights and Trends
Find out more about Moon Executive Search and the articles, roles and thought-leadership from the business and non-profit landscape.