Colin Powell at BAI '08

Colin Powell is speaking at the BAI Retail Delivery Conference. He’s a funny, poignant speaker with endless stories about life at the top…and the transition back to normal life. He’s done it twice: first as the head of our military, then as Secretary of State.

His message so far is about the need for optimism and to avoid being too fearful of threats. Sure, he’s referring to external threats like terrorism, but this seems like a great lesson for the financial services industry: Caution is good. But we can’t be so fearful that we freeze up and fail to take advantage of opportunities.

Powell also talks about the importance of purpose, from the people who clean the branch, so you can do business in a clean environment every morning, on up to the top. But he makes the point that it’s the leaders of the organization who need to provide and inspire a sense of purpose to the rest of the organization.

Update:

Additional pithy thoughts from Colin Powell:

• When you get home from work and see the bad news on TV, it’s important not to focus on all that’s going wrong, because so much is going right.
• On leadership: To be a leader, you have to know when and be able to prune the organization, fire people. “There, I said it,” he quips.
• Great Ronald Reagan impression!
• The world is no longer broken into opposing “poles.” The world is interconnected.
• Greatest driving source of power is economic, wealth creation.
• Second driving source of power is energy.
• Third powerful force: education.

All in all, I think Powell’s talk sets a great context for the conference and discussions on the future of retail banking. As he explained, it’s economics — and the desire of people around the world to create wealth — that is driving world events.