In spite of the loss of over 6 million souls worldwide, the COVID-19 pandemic did produce some positive outcomes. A few examples are:

• The ability to work from home, especially for those with disabilities or who need to be available for child or elder care.
• The greatly enhanced ability for those at home to have food, medicine and a host of goods and services delivered quickly.
• A myriad of technological solutions to connect people by audio and video for professional as well as personal purposes. This was especially important for families who were separated geographically or where physical location might bring risks (hospitals, senior care facilities or those who are immunocompromised).
• The ability to extend health care to those where travel is difficult or impossible.
• An enhanced array of educational options, especially for those where attention span and technology are not a challenge.

While I’ve never seen a scientific study, my gut tells me, as corroborated by the opinions of many others, that one of the negative outcomes of the pandemic is an increase in “ghosting.” According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the definition of ghosting is “the practice of ending a personal relationship with someone by suddenly and without explanation withdrawing from all communication.” To be clear, for ghosting to occur, there has to be at least a modicum of a relationship that has been established between two people. For instance, if a random telemarketer leaves a message, not responding to that message would not be considered ghosting.

Assuming my suspicion is correct, one possible explanation is that because so much of our communication today is not face-to-face, perhaps it’s easier to ghost someone without feeling guilty. It would be a bit like the little boy who hides from his parents by sticking his head and upper torso under the couch with his legs sticking out into the living room. He thinks that because he can’t see them, they can’t see him.

Another explanation might be the general decline in civility that seems to be one of the byproducts of the pandemic. A very concerning manifestation of this trend is the increase in violence against teachers by students, police officers, fellow air travelers and citizens in general, with whom one doesn’t agree politically or philosophically.

So the next question is, are bankers more likely to engage in ghosting than others in business? I would say, without a doubt, yes. This is based on a combination of personal experience and countless conversations with others.

For 30 years, my firm has made appointments for commercial bankers to meet with small- to mid-size businesses. We primarily interact with owners and chief financial officers. Through our process, we often get a very clear picture of how the prospect feels about his or her current financial institution. One of the regular complaints is a lack of responsiveness on the part of their banker.

As a service provider to banks, we talk with our peers in the industry. One of the universal complaints is how often our collective clients don’t return phone calls in spite of what can often be a lengthy relationship.

What could explain these bankers’ proclivity to ghost? It may be that portfolios have expanded, as have other nonproductive demands on their time. It may be a throwback to when bankers truly held the “keys to the kingdom,” a time before the repeal of Glass-Steagall, the rise of the internet and new competition from large retailers, affinity groups, fintechs and others. Those times would have allowed for some arrogance, but they are long gone.

A fundamental issue that I have observed is that some bankers, especially of the younger persuasion, seem enamored of virtual/electronic communication and somewhat oblivious to the fact that, in commercial banking, relationships are built on trust and credibility, not products or technology. Trust is not engendered by advertising, taglines, mailers and, most especially, not by social media. Trust is built by people building relationships with other people, and those relationships are heavily influenced by seemingly mundane acts like returning phone calls.

The real irony here is that bankers, of all people, should be attuned to the fact that virtually everybody they know or interact with can be a customer or a referral source. Every individual and business needs banking services, whether they get them from a bank or an alternative provider. This fact should stimulate bankers to treat everyone with respect. Ghosting may be the ultimate act of disrespect and really says to the ghostee, by deed, not word, that they are unimportant and unworthy of the most basic act of courtesy. And there is no more effective relationship killer than telling a person through one’s deeds that he or she is unimportant and unworthy.

In the business world, ghosting can have the multiple effects of damaging both the individual’s as well as the institution’s reputation. In our business, this is evidenced in conversations with prospects who say something like, “I have no interest in meeting with XYZ Bank. A few years ago, I met with one of their bankers who, in spite of his promise to do so, never got back to me and never returned my calls.” In that scenario, perhaps a banker, not wanting to be the bearer of bad news, took the coward’s way out and just ghosted the prospect. This scenario also underscores the importance of a great adage: “How you say ‘no’ is far more important than how you say ‘yes.’” The point is the ghosted prospect is far more likely to remember the institution, not the individual.

If I were the CEO of a bank, I would make ghosting a dismissible offense, if nothing else than to deliver a strong message: “If you are going to ruin your reputation, don’t take our institution’s reputation down with it.” Most banks are obsessed with reputation, as they well should be. But reputation is a lot like a house of cards; it takes a lot more time and effort to build it than it does to destroy it. As challenging as it will be to build relationships, ghosting will surely be the path to destroying them.

For more information, contact Ted Rosen at tarosen@expertbizdev.com or (610) 937-2199.