WATCH: Using Actionable Data to Drive Growth and Profitability

For most community banks, data is often stale, scattered, and difficult to interpret — focusing on past events and offering little actionable insight. But what if your bank could have a real-time, comprehensive view of all its relationships, accessible in one simple-to-use, integrated platform?

In the webinar, Raymond Goodrich, EVP and chief lending officer of Bank of Charles Town (BCT), discusses how KlariVis helped the bank realize and act on its growth potential with immediate access to data insights. This live, unified view has helped the bank shift its reactive, transactional-based approach to banking to a proactive, relationship-based one. Data has given BCT the ability to make pragmatic, informed decisions steeped in fact – no more are the days of gut feelings and “this is the way we’ve always done it” arguments.

Goodrich highlights six key benefits of KlariVis that have significantly impacted BCT:

1. Organizational conversation: KlariVis delivers uniformity in data, access, and communication, allowing all employees to work off of the same playbook to realize the same goals.
2. Trend analysis: The bank has clear visualization into deposit, loan, interest rate, and performance trends, facilitating more informed decision-making on pricing and strategy.
3. Situational awareness: Daily insights into deposit and loan portfolio movements allow for timely responses to market changes and customer behavior.
4. Faster decision-making: With real-time data access, the bank can quickly adjust strategies, particularly in margin management during rate fluctuations.
5. Enhanced credit risk management: KlariVis offers improved tracking of past due loans, concentration risks, and loan maturities, supporting better underwriting and portfolio management.
6. Performance tracking: The platform provides real-time scorecards for frontline staff, which has fostered healthy competition and knowledge sharing.

Goodrich emphasizes how, “KlariVis changed the conversations [BCT] were having,” now shifting to a more data-driven narrative at the executive level, frontline staff, and board of directors. The transparency provided by the platform has led to more informed discussions on margin management, pricing strategies, and overall bank performance.

After walking through a selection of the reports and trend analyses that KlariVis currently provides, Goodrich touched on some of the best practices that came out of BCT’s implementation process. BCT made it a priority to involve and appoint representatives from various parts of the bank as ambassadors, as well as to conduct regular feedback sessions to refine the tool and how it’s used at the bank. Goodrich noted that while initial resistance to change is common, employees quickly recognized the value of having data at their fingertips. He reports that KlariVis is now an instrumental part of not only his day-to-day, but his staff’s, too.

The platform has also improved interactions and knowledge sharing with BCT’s board of directors. KlariVis produces board-specific reports, which include granular and topically relevant data that management is then able to “slice and dice” with the board itself. Goodrich reports that KlariVis’s reports have helped elevate the strategic discussions that occur during these meetings.

“You don’t have to be a data geek to love this,” Goodrich says as he signs off. “If you just use three of the [reports] – the ones we showed you –it’s really going to change how you look at your bank. Your leadership style is going to evolve… once the platform is embraced, you will see change.”

Video Markers

00:00: Introduction and Bank of Charles Town overview

02:25: Comparison of bank operations before and after KlariVis

04:26: Bank Performance Executive Summary

05:48: Trend analysis (deposit & loan rates)

08:27: Situational awareness (understanding daily activity changes)

13:37: Margin management for deposits and loan

15:38: Credit risk management (enhanced trend capability, risk insights, concentrations, performance overview)

20:21: Goals tracking across the organization (real-time data scoreboard)

25:25: Cultural shifts from KlariVis implementation and suggested best practices