In this episode
In this discussion, David Robinson, Director of Fintech Partnerships at Academy Bank, shares the company’s goals and various initiatives in the fintech space. He also goes through his personal story of getting into fintech. At Academy Bank, David focuses on growing their banking infrastructure and expanding their reach to serve small businesses and customers across the United States. David stresses that strong relationships and trust are key aspects of their approach, and emphasizes the importance of personal connections and open communication in establishing trust and restoring faith in the financial system. He also highlights the need for bank-fintech partnerships to better serve small businesses and improve access to banking services.
Key takeaways
- Academy Bank is focused on growing their banking infrastructure and expanding their reach to serve small businesses and customers across the United States
- Building strong relationships and trust are key aspects of Academy Bank’s approach.
- Fintech partnerships are important to better serve small businesses and improve access to banking services.
- Open communication and personal connections are crucial in establishing trust and restoring faith in the financial system.
Transcript
Rory Holland
Awesome, David Robinson. Good to see you.
David Robinson
Good to see you.
Rory Holland
Nice to have you here.
David Robinson
Nice to be here.
Rory Holland
SX. How’s it going?
David Robinson
The weather’s perfect. My sister said this is the weather that people think you get when you move here. So, she’s a little bit conflicted.
Rory Holland
It sucks you in, right? Because right now winter in Austin is fantastic, but summer in Austin is, if you like 100 degrees, it’s all good.
David Robinson
I met a gentleman that relocated from New York; he’s from South Africa. I go, “Why did you pick here?” He said, “Well, it’s similar in climate to South Africa.” I said, “Okay, I didn’t know that. What about June and July?” He’s like, “Well you can’t have everything.”
Rory Holland
Right. Yes, so trade offs. I grew up in Detroit, so I would trade the winter for a hot summer for sure. But I love Detroit, love Michigan and the Midwest, but yes, it’s nice. So this is beautiful, 60’s and sunny. Barbecue?
David Robinson
Oh yeah.
Rory Holland
You had some last night, I think you said.
David Robinson
I had my fill at Franklin’s, high regard for Texas barbecue, but I’m good for a little bit.
Rory Holland
So, tell us a little bit about Academy.
David Robinson
So, Academy Bank is a privately held company, Dickinson Financial Corporation. We have two bank brands, Academy Bank and Armed Forces Bank. Armed Forces Bank caters to the military, 15 installations across the U.S., and Academy Bank is a traditional commercial retail, primarily in Kansas City, Denver and Phoenix. So we have aspirations to grow to six billion across different segments and fintech will be one of those.
Rory Holland
Awesome, and did you grow up in Kansas? Is that where you are from, Kansas City?
David Robinson
I’m based in Kansas City. I’m an Army brat, so I always answer this way. I didn’t grow up in Kansas City, but I’ve been there for a long time, and moved around eight or nine times growing up and then settled in the Kansas City area.
Rory Holland
Mahomes?
David Robinson
Team Mahomes.
Rory Holland
Yes, okay, so you’re a Chiefs fan?
David Robinson
Chiefs fan, yep.
Rory Holland
So he went to Texas Tech, I believe.
David Robinson
Yup.
Rory Holland
So Lubbock, awesome. A little bit of your background, how did you get started in fintech?
David Robinson
Well, I started in banking, sort of institutional operations, money movement banking. So, I started with a company called State Street out of college. They were headquartered in Boston. My family, my dad was born in Boston, so I always had an affinity for that city. So I said I’ll work for that company based in Boston, I’ll get to work there. After a few years starting there, I did work there. Got married to a Kansas Citian and we relocated to Boston, loved it, moved there from 04-08 in the highlight of parades, all the championships. I was at States Street for a good while. We had our daughter and our family was in KC, so we moved back to Kansas City just to have a good tight-knit family relationship with our kid. I was an army brat, grew up where Christmas and Thanksgiving were four people, so I didn’t want that for my kids.
Rory Holland
Yeah, so you grew up moving around a lot, so Kansas City has been home for a long time?
David Robinson
Yeah.
Rory Holland
Relative to the rest of your life.
David Robinson
So my mom’s family is in Killeen, not too far North of here, so we came to Texas all the time.
Rory Holland
Oh, that’s great. And you have how many kids?
David Robinson
Three kids; one is a sophomore, an eighth grader, and a sixth grader … girl, boy, girl.
Rory Holland
Okay, so you’re busy. Your wife’s busy right now.
David Robinson
So after State Street, I was in Kansas City, working for a non-Kansas City company. And at some point, you’re creative, so you get limited in terms of your upside. And this is sort of pre-COVID, now everybody works from everywhere and no big deal, right? But not necessarily there. So I took an opportunity with UMB, sort of a blue blood KC institution. Had a good run there, got more into payments, working for broker dealers, high volume payments, interesting use cases, cash management sweep. We started to grow a fintech practice, but probably weren’t able to achieve what we wanted to and some of the opportunities we had, there were just other priorities at the organization. So, we had to back away from some interesting ones and Academy Bank was wanting to be active and we got connected and so I shifted over December of 2022.
Rory Holland
Oh, so recently.
David Robinson
Yeah, 15 months or so.
Rory Holland
And fintech partnerships, what types of things are you doing for Academy?
David Robinson
So my main job is extending our banking infrastructure. So standing up a banking as a service platform, identifying deposit sources or fee revenue sources that are fintech brands that we could power. They need to fit our risk culture, we need to understand the business and believe in their business, and then we’ll power them with our banking infrastructure. In addition to that, we don’t have a big product organization, so I often times find myself the tip of the spear in a new capability that will benefit our associates or benefit our customers, and I’ll bring those back and vet those with our team and try to be a quick no or an interesting maybe and yes and just facilitate those conversations so they don’t die on the vine. And we’ve established some good relationships that way.
Rory Holland
So, how are you determining those needs or those wants?
David Robinson
I’m talking to our business team. So, we have sort of commercial leaders, we have retail leaders, we have military, and we have traditional. And prior to my arrival, we made great strides in a digital transformation and we want to continue that, and the initial benefits of that were probably our associates with transformation and the most recent benefits of that were our customers and their ability to self-serve and do the things that modern banking is meant to do.
Rory Holland
What kind of things stand out to you when you think about Academy and the work that you’re doing on the technical side to make life better for your customers? Are there any particular things that you guys are doing?
David Robinson
Well, we just want to be without borders and normalize the class of citizen that engages with us. I mean, previously, if you were in a certain market or city and you wanted to open up a CD account or money market account just because of your zip code, we would have blockers on that and make that experience incredibly difficult, even though there was a great business case to make you a new customer. And folks move all around, and if they have a relationship with Academy Bank, what’s to say they can’t have that just because of the zip code they’re in and some sort of rudimentary fraud protection? So we’re trying to normalize that and make it available to anybody that wants to bank with us wherever they are.
Rory Holland
Yeah. So what are some of the challenges that you think about where you guys are trying to solve for some of those problems? What are some of the challenges you guys are facing?
David Robinson
Well, I think some of it’s just name recognition in new markets. I mean, we’re primarily Kansas City. We have a good business in Denver and a growing business in Phoenix and just continue to broaden horizons there. And on the military side of things, Armed Forces Bank, you know, there are some large military installations where we don’t have a presence, or we haven’t historically had a presence, and we could serve those customers. So we’re thinking of going into those areas in a digital way.
Rory Holland
How are you solving for some of that on the awareness side? It sounds like awareness and people learning about Academy Bank, how are you all solving for that?
David Robinson
I think we’re just being a little bit more outward and strategic around marketing. We hired a new chief marketing officer last year, last May, and she’s really made a mark in our mortgage business and traditional banking business. And the work I’m doing in fintech, in 12 months, the network that we have, Academy has, and I have great sponsorships and our COO, Tom Kientz, and CEO, Paul Holewinski, when we go to an event outside of our backyard, people have heard of us, and that’s a great thing.
Rory Holland
Oh, that’s positive. Yeah, and so the network that you have, you’re playing a role in many ways, like a strategic consultant with the business heads to identify those needs, and then you have your business development, your networking, to identify those potential opportunities, and you have to bring them in. What’s the process, you have to bring them in and vet them somehow?
David Robinson
Yeah, so I typically, 90% of the time, take the first call on a, let’s call it a new product opportunity or a new fintech depositor or fee revenue opportunity, I’ll take that first call. Tom and or Paul will take the second call with me. “Do we understand the business? Do we like the business? Do we think it has a future?” And also, “what did they ask about us? Are we just, is a bank a commodity?” And some of the conversations we’ve had, there has not been enough focus on this, this was early on probably 10 months ago or so, but there weren’t a lot of questions around who the bank is. And we didn’t like that. We want you to know us, we’re gonna have you come to Kansas City, we’re gonna meet you in person if we’re gonna move forward.
Rory Holland
That’s one thing I’m hearing that’s so interesting is the relationship side of this business. I know it’s a little cliche, relationships are part of business in general and life, but in technology and in banking, I think the outside people wouldn’t recognize the fact that we’re standing on top of what, probably 50 or 100 people downstairs, talking about relationships or establishing relationships that all do different types of things that compliment the industry. But that’s a theme I’ve heard that I think is so interesting. It’s just the notion of relationship and really establishing those and having a good alignment.
David Robinson
Yeah, it’s absolutely personal. And an opportunity might not be a good fit for us, but if there’s positive in the use case, I will call a friend of mine at another bank or forward it along and it comes the other way as well.
Rory Holland
Yeah.
David Robinson
And meeting somebody that knows somebody that I know and they’ve either done business or had a positive interaction, that’s meaningful for us in terms of what could come with our relationship.
Rory Holland
Yeah, so relationships is very important; alignment, chemistry, for sure. Okay.
David Robinson
And when I say no, I say no with detail. I don’t want to ghost people. I don’t want to say no with no context, and I will have a follow-up call on why our team didn’t feel we wanted to move forward with X, Y, or Z. And they appreciate that. They don’t mind hearing the truth, and we try to give it to them.
Rory Holland
That’s good. So Academy Bank is really about establishing good relationships and managing those. What’s one thing you wish more people knew about Academy Bank?
David Robinson
I think the family aspect of it gets lost. And maybe just because banking is transactional. And we’ve done a few “come to our offices”. We just moved offices in November and they’re very nice, you know, of the times, as you say. But when you walk in on the main floor, there’s a picture of Gary and Ann Dickinson in the lobby. So you see it up front and center, and I think that’s a good thing.
Rory Holland
Where do you see some opportunities ahead?
David Robinson
I think mainly serving small businesses. It’s too wide of a vertical, and that has caused it not to be able to find good footing in terms of how banks or fintech companies can support them. So we’d love to be able to find the right fintech partner to better serve the small business customers that bank with us today or small business customers across the U.S. that we can help that fintech brand power.
Rory Holland
How do you, can you describe some examples of better serving them, the particular areas or service offerings or experiences maybe?
David Robinson
Yeah, maybe just opening up access for whatever the use case is. It might be a certain region of the country, it might be a certain vertical within small business. And this is somebody’s blood, sweat, and tears. It could be a five-person shop, could be a family shop, could be a 50-person company. And maybe their experience with banking hasn’t been good. They’ve been turned down around every corner. But, here comes a fintech company that can help better serve them powered by Academy, and that’d be a good thing.
Rory Holland
Yeah, I love that. For someone that might want to enter this space, given all of your experience in it, what advice might you give to them?
David Robinson
We were talking last night, intestinal fortitude was the theme of Fintech Meetups.
Rory Holland
Intestinal fortitude. I love it, yeah.
David Robinson
I guess that. You know, just be aligned with your leadership. Be committed to it. And constantly assess your infrastructure. How are you ready for this? What improvements can be made to make you more ready for this? And don’t shy away from the bad news. Share all the news and get oriented on what’s happening in the market and how you can be better.
Rory Holland
Thanks for sharing that. That’s good. Last question. Trust in society, I don’t think, has ever been lower in my lifetime. And then trust in the financial systems, I think, is low as well. I don’t think it’s as high as we’d like it to be. In your view and thinking about, whether it’s Academy or it’s the industry itself, what are your thoughts on how we can better grow trust and restore faith in the financial system?
David Robinson
I just go back to, it’s a personal relationship to those who you do business with and leaning into that and asking the hard questions or sharing the bad news early and not avoiding it allows for a relationship to really have strong footing. You get stronger in relationships by working through the bad, the challenges as opposed to everything being perfect and hunky-dory. I started out in banking, and I shifted into a consultant role in best practices. There’s always people on the line, on the front line of servicing the customers and these people that are consultants just go to meetings. There was some comment around the folks on the front line not being able to, it’s not smooth and perfect all the time. And somebody made the comment to me, if it was smooth and perfect all the time, we wouldn’t have jobs. So, just being able to work through that with your customer, with your colleague, identify the issue, work through the issue, and trust each other.
Rory Holland
Yeah, that’s great. I lied. I’m going to ask you one more question. What do you love about what you do?
David Robinson
I just meet new people all the time. I love it. I mean, as I said, I grew up an army brat, moved places all the time. And I remember I probably cried every move saying, “I hate it here.” So establishing relationships, those that I’ve established at UMB or at State Street and still have today. And I’m establishing them with Academy Bank and I see them twice a year, five times a year, they come to KC, and when I’m in a city or market reconnecting with them. And it doesn’t need to be because we do business.
Rory Holland
What’s your experience been here, thinking about relationships? I’ve met a ton of people, it’s been fun. Some are renewed relationships or folks I see a couple times a year, others are brand new like you and I today. What’s your experience been at the Fintech House and SX?
David Robinson
Well, I’ve been wanting to come here for three years since I’ve heard about it, and I’m glad I came. The weather is helping. I just want to use it as another launching pad for a relationship. And it could be one thing, it could be many coming out of this week.
Rory Holland
Yeah, my experience has been that no matter who I’ve met, there’s a bond. I don’t know how they pair us all together; if it’s just serendipitous, I don’t know, but it’s really cool. I’ve certainly enjoyed chatting with you.
David Robinson
Yeah, people want to promote themselves and their organization, but they also want to promote others. So I’m down with that.
Rory Holland
David, it’s been awesome.
David Robinson
Yeah.
Rory Holland
Thanks, David Robinson, Academy Bank. Thanks for the time.
David Robinson
See ya. Bye, guys.
