The trustworthy banking organization:Developing a sustainable strategy alignment for regaining and sustaining trust in banks

The global financial crisis presents a unique setting in which to examine the phenomena of trust, trust violation, and trust enhancement because trust can be regarded from the perspective of either an individual person or the... [ view full abstract ]

The global financial crisis presents a unique setting in which to examine the phenomena of trust, trust violation, and trust enhancement because trust can be regarded from the perspective of either an individual person or the organization as a whole. We therefore examine how to increase and sustain trust in a banking institution for both the employees and clients. Using critical incident methodology, we addressed individual trust levels and asked 100 employees and 62 clients of conventional and sustainable banks to recall a situation in which they experienced extreme trust. Thus, we combined the perspectives of four respondent groups within a two-dimensional perspective: employee–executive board, supervisor–subordinate, client–client adviser, and client–executive board. The aim of this study is to determine whether the perceived factors of trustworthiness influence the coherence between a sustainable strategy alignment of a banking organization and an individual’s trust level. Our initial results are highly significant. By analyzing 443 CI situations within the employee data set, we found that sustainability and trust constructs are positively correlated.