Maine Bank: Analysis of Financial Rewards and Strategies

This report provides an in-depth analysis of Maine Bank's financial performance and employee reward strategies, focusing on the impact of declining revenue and employee morale. It examines the bank's structure, including its subsidiaries and central support functions, and identifies key issues within departments like retail, head office, call centers, and investment banking. The report delves into financial rewards such as bonuses, pensions, and incentives, and also investigates common issues such as pay structure, pension schemes, and appraisal processes. The report offers recommendations, including best practices from other financial institutions like Deutsche Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland, Goldman Sachs, and Lloyds Bank, and suggests strategies for cost reduction, employee retention, and improved performance. The report also discusses the implications of Brexit and the need for flexible reward systems to attract and retain employees, and ultimately proposes strategies to improve employee morale and financial performance.

Running Head: Maine Bank
Maine Bank
Name of Student:
Student ID:
Name of University:
Author’s Note:

Maine Bank
Executive Summary
The bank which is impacted by the changes in profitability of the company is Maine bank which
has 5 subsidiary departments such as business banking, corporate banking, retail, and investment
banking. Also, it includes Central Support functions such as Finance, Marketing, and compliance
departments, IT and human resource departments. This report also includes the different sides of
financial rewards which contribute towards each department. This report has stated the recent
declines in the revenue which adversely impacted by the lack of confidence of employees and
poor culture of the company.
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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................................. 4
Analysis/discussion/best practice................................................................................................................ 4
Analysis for individual business/department:.............................................................................................. 4
Retail/Business........................................................................................................................................ 7
Head Office............................................................................................................................................. 8
Call Centres........................................................................................................................................... 10
Investment Banking............................................................................................................................... 10
Analysis of best practice that apply across the whole company............................................................11
Recommendations..................................................................................................................................... 12
Implications............................................................................................................................................... 13
Conclusion................................................................................................................................................. 13
References................................................................................................................................................. 15
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Maine Bank
Introduction
This report is all about the Maine Bank issues within the organizations as the company is
focusing on the investment banking sector. This report also recommended the MB reduce the
cost and focuses on the profit increment. Another big issue from o the MB is that when the UK
leaves Europe and becomes difficult to focuses on investment banking. This report includes
some major and common issues and also the best practices of the other company which needs to
be followed by the MB for their benefits. This report also suggested some impletions of plan and
reward strategies.
Analysis/discussion/best practice
There are many best practices which need to be followed by Maine bank. However, some apply
on whole business and other applies to particular departments such as retail, head office, call
centre and investment bank.
Analysis for individual business/department:
Below are the best practices which can vary from department to department. Such as financial
rewards which include bonus, gifts and pensions etc. Also, below are some common and special
issues has been discussed which involve in individual business like retail, head office and call
centre and after anglicising these issues company needs to follow some best practices which are
financial and non financial in order to motivates employees and for their retention as well.
Financial Rewards and recognition
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A reward strategy is aligning with the reward practices and the policies within the organization
and also, human resource strategies that ensure that these rewards can fit within the
organization's environment and culture. It provides the set of goals and intent which needs to be
fulfilled to receive the rewards and recognition. Below are some reward strategies which needs
to be followed:
 Rewards need to align as per the business strategies
 Drives the employee behavior such as encouragement and performance
 The employee gets a proper rate of investment
All the awards have some monetary value and can add to the total remuneration of the employee.
In MB total rewards include below:
 Bonus
 Contingent pay
 Incentives both long and short term
 Pension and health care schemes
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Figure 1: Types of Rewards
Source: (Created by Author)
Rewards have two types such as extrinsic and intrinsic(Richards et al. 2019). Extrinsic awards
are those which include some monetary values such as bonus, pension plan and other rewards
which are in monetary nature on the other hand Intrinsic are those which gives the emotional
satisfactions such as promotions and recognition.
Common Issues
There are few common issues that Maine Bank is facing within their organization includes every
department such as pay structure, pension Scheme, and appraisal issues as well which need to be
reviewed for cost reduction and effectiveness.
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REWARDSREWARDS
ExtrinsicExtrinsic
BonusBonus GiftsGifts Pension
Plans
Pension
Plans
IntrinsicIntrinsic
PraisesPraises Impressive
Job Title
Impressive
Job Title PromotionsPromotions

Maine Bank
Retail/Business
Shadow actual performance
Most of the time managers focus on the person and overshadow the other factors such as their
traits and knowledge or behavior of the employee. These factors play a vital role in the
employee’s performance.
Irregular Feedbacks
The primary goal of MB is to resolve and identify the issues with the employees and examine
them annually is not the correct approach. These assessment needs to be followed on a regular
basis so that the feedback can be given regularly to the employees(Franco and Otley, 2018).
Less Effectiveness:
MB follows the policies to accept the goals that estimate the results and provide the appropriate
feedback about the training that are needed, weakness, and poor performance. However, this is
rarely followed among the organizations as per nature.
Less accountability:
Managers do not provide accurate feedback as if the employees are doing well that there are no
accountable rewards and also if somebody is doing less that there are no penalty systems within
the organization(Schleicheret al. 2018). The MB needs to award the best employee within the
organization and awarded them.
Pension Scheme
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Maine Bank
There are some drawbacks to the pension plans and these are as follows:
Loss for Beneficiaries:
Pension recipients need to choose the beneficiaries for their pension scheme for example: If they
choose their spouse to receive the benefit after they pass away, however, they choose 100%
benefits still their spouse faces some risk of loss of the income in case of beneficiaries death. If
the recipient is single when retires or both the beneficiaries have passed away in that case the
pension of the retiree got disappears and not benefit is provided to the heirs of that retiree(DeNisi
and Murphy, 2017).
Less investment control:
The penny employee is earning will go the pension scheme and the employee does not have the
right to invest that penny in some other pension scheme. In MB managers have the right to
manage that fund and no employee can track the invested amount (Khan, 2020). Also, the
employee cannot receive any benefit from that investment.
Risk of Inflation:
In MB most of the pension plan includes the cost of living of that employee. However, the cost
of living may increase as per the inflation and retirement fund remains same and future benefit
employee can receive.
Head Office
There are specific issues also involved in the MB investment policies and they are as follows:
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Productivity
The profit of the retail department of Maine bank has been declined due to the poor customer
services, competition, and cost of financial products. Suitable award strategies need to be
followed by the bank to avoid the wrong selling of the products such as incentives, bonuses, and
rewards as per the buyer's feedback and avoid the number of product selling which lead the
revenue to the company (Madhani, 2017).
Retention Plan
The Investment banking department of Maine bank is facing issues that are related to retaining
the staff. However, the staffs are generally hired by the other city-based investment banks and it
is essential to consider the market rate of the employees working as investment bankers to
provide them the attractive packages which also includes variable pay and rewards and If the
company can successfully retain the staffs they have the ability to reduce the cost of the
organization.
Accommodate progress Scheme
This scheme is developed by the Maine bank in order to provide that employees who do not have
any specific degree can become future managers, however; they do not have the specific
knowledge about investment banking (Rasiahet al. 2020). This scheme will affect the Investment
Banking Department so they eventually move into the subsidiaries company and it is stated that
the employees who are new to this organization and younger in age are fascinated with the
facility of housing ladder instead of the pension scheme. It is also advisory to introduce flexible
rewards so that employees can select benefits as per their choices.
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Maine Bank
Call Centres
Inflexible Income:
In MB employees do not have the choice as to whether they can receive the income. However,
while at the time of retirement you can choose to take the less or full amount of pension as per
the need. There is no benefit involved in pension and future benefits are there for the employee.
Lack of Staffs
The other departments such as finance, It and marketing department are facing the issue of lack
of staffs because of the pay scale and also, the demand of salary is increasing. MB also introduce
the Job structure of the family which also leading the salaries to be more competitive and salaries
scale also increase (Akbar et al. 2018). However, MB can also follow the outsourcing of the
work which can reduce the issue of lack of proper staff.For example, the employee cannot
choose more from the pension to pay medical bills and child's weeding.
Investment Banking
Salary Structure Decisions
Maine Bank has a low salary structure and has 20 grades within the organization based on the
employee's job evaluation. Job evaluation can establish fairness within the organization,
however; it is a costly process and not worth it for the employees who have specific knowledge
such as IT staff of the bank. This kind of structure is basically used by the public sector company
as the organization of this company has control over minimum pay and also popular among the
employees because they experience frequent promotions (Hegeret al. 2017). However, this is not
a flexible structure as this report is also stated that employees already have a top of the salary
scale and it is more costly to promote them on higher levels. Maine bank needs to analyse its
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Maine Bank
salary structure by giving the employee's reward packages. Market rates are following by the
Maine bank as it helps in the cost reduction and improves the revenue of the company as it
compares the current rewards which show the target areas for cost reduction. The recommended
pay structure is that as the Maine bank is the banking industry and has different department such
as cooperate, retail business, and investment banking and they pay according to the employee's
job levels and theses kind of structure is followed by the private sector that has fewer staffs such
as finance, compliance, and marketing (Schleicheret al. 2019). However, this structure cause
difficulty as well inequality between the employees of the company, and the structure become
more complex.
Analysis of best practice that apply across the whole company
The above report focuses on the theoretical analysis however, the financial reward strategies are
also equally important for the company. In that case, Brexit has a plan to analyze the other
companies' best practice as well and they are as follows;
Deutsche Bank:
In the year 2015, this bank has revised the reward and recognition strategy in order to improve
the position of the employees and also, establish the connection between performance and pay.
The bank aims to sustain the development at all levels with the help of variable compensation
which has two components as individual and group. Hence Maine bank is facing the low pay and
morale of the employees so in that case, the bank needs to follow this scheme(Lindley, 2018).
Royal Bank of Scotland:
This bank has followed the strategy to broke the rewards into two groups such as basic and sum
of some rewards which employees can choose as cash or in benefits. These benefits are
retirement schemes, online discount vouchers, shopping vouchers, and insurance options.
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Goldman Sachs
This bank has more than 6000 employees which are currently working in the UK and because of
the decision made by the UK to leave Europe the bank is trying to increase their presence and
they can trade freely in the European Union.
Lloyds bank:
Employees of this bank have the authority to choose as per their and family needs. This bank
offers many options such as pension, car and cash allowances, and a shared plan as well. There
are many flexible benefits included such as cash or 4% additional benefit and the benefits can be
varied as vouchers, learning, and relief fund as well(Voorberget al. 2018).
Recommendations
 After analyzing the issue within the company being as a Reward Manager below
recommendations have been provided to reduce the cost, improve performance culture,
and also in order to improve the employee Morale. The last point of the company is
refreezing where the evaluations have been carried out and the changes which are made
become permanent.
 The company needs to follow another attitude to analyze the impact of their action plans.
This would help the company to understand the strategies which are following is working
effectively and the desired goal can be achieved which are cost reduction and improving
the performance of the company.
 Training and learning often boosts job efficiency, as it gives workers cause for more
efforts. The reason for this is that training and growth such as in service training,
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simulated exercises, seminar/conference/workshop, consultancy training, example
teaching, affect employee performance by enhancing the skills in banking operation,
improving the capacity of managers to handle activities.
Implications
The balance work life of the staff and nonfinancial reward in the investment banking culture has
the major issue of long working hours which can lead the employee's low morale especially
when the employees feel that they are paid less as compared to the other organization in the
industry. Maine bank needs to propose the initiative for working hours which are flexible for the
employees so that employees can manage their work and personal life equally. Since all the
employees do not have the knowledge about investment banking in the case company needs to
provide some learning and development training to provide the managers for the future of the
company as they must know about all the provided information within the departments. Also, in
order to enhance the performance of the employees Maine Bank needs to introduce learning and
development training that encourages the abilities and skills of the employees. For instance, the
retail department needs to provide training to its employees in order to put the customer first.
Investing efforts in employees will illustrate that Maine Bank is dedicated to its employees and
this will motivate the employees as well. Due to the less poor appraisal system, some of the
employees think that they are not recognising as per their skills. However, instead of enhancing
the appraisal system, Marine Bank needs to provide regular feedback to the workers and not just
wait for the annual appraisal. Rewards and Recognition need to be introduced which helps to
motivate the employees and especially those employees who are here to achieve self-
actualization. Also, because of the communication channel, employees think that their opinion
doesn't matter for the company for this Maine Bank needs to organize monthly team meetings
and huddles in order to make the employees that they are part of the organization's decision-
making process. MB also needs to encourage the transfers of the employees among the
departments as from this employees to gain the knowledge about other departments as well
which increase the loyalty and employees would like to stay in the company for a longer period.
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Conclusion
This report has been concluding that in order to focus on the investment banking sector MB
needs to change lots of on-going strategies in order to reduce the cost and enhance profitability.
However, Maine Bank is already focusing on the well-being of their employees through the
report has also recommended some of the best practices and reward strategies that encourage the
employees and increase their loyalty towards the organization.
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Madhani, P.M., 2017. Optimal mix of financial and nonfinancial rewards: Enhancing sales
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