Latest / The Diversity Career Podcast with Fexingo: Inclusion, Equity, and Underrepresented Professionals / How a Bank Built a Career Ladder for Restaurant Workers
Transcript
- Lucas: There are about fifteen million people in the US working in restaurants. And most of them, at some point, want to leave. Luna: The turnover rate in that industry is brutal—around seventy percent annually, I think. Lucas: Yeah, pre-pandemic it was even higher. But here's the puzzle: those workers have cash-handling experience, they can multitask under pressure, they know how to de-escalate a customer who's upset. All of that is directly relevant to a job in retail banking. Luna: But banks rarely hire from that pool. They screen for a college degree, or they want previous financial services experience. Lucas: Exactly. So the workers stay in restaurants, or they bounce between low-wage jobs. Commerce Bancshares—that's a regional bank based in Kansas City with about thirty billion in assets—decided to test the assumption. They launched a formal apprenticeship program specifically for restaurant workers. Luna: Did they partner with anyone to find candidates? Lucas: They worked with local culinary unions and with restaurant associations in Missouri and Kansas. The bank's HR team went to union halls and said: 'Send us people who want out of the kitchen.' They recruited thirty people in the first cohort. Luna: And what did the apprenticeship look like? Was it a part-time thing? Lucas: Full-time, paid. Two years. The first three months are classroom training—banking regulations, basic accounting software, customer service protocols. Then they rotate through different branches. Each apprentice has a dedicated mentor who is a branch manager. At the end, they get a guaranteed job interview for a permanent role. Luna: So they aren't just thrown into a teller window on day one. There's real investment in training. Lucas: That's the key. Commerce Bancshares spends about fifteen thousand dollars per apprentice on training costs. But they track retention very carefully. Two years after graduation, eighty-nine percent of the apprentices are still working at the bank. Luna: Compared to what for traditional hires? Lucas: Their standard retention for tellers and loan processors hired through the normal channel is sixty-two percent at the two-year mark. So the apprenticeship group is almost thirty percentage points stickier. Luna: That's a massive difference. And it makes sense—if you invest in someone, they're more likely to stay. But I wonder about the career trajectory. Are these apprentices stuck as tellers, or do they move up? Lucas: That's the part I find most interesting. Of the first two cohorts, about forty percent have moved into management roles—assistant branch manager, loan officer. One person became a regional operations supervisor. The bank removed the degree requirement for those roles specifically for program graduates. Luna: So they created a parallel career ladder that bypasses the four-year degree. Lucas: Right. And that's significant because many banks still quietly require a bachelor's even for entry-level roles. Commerce Bancshares publicly said: if you complete the apprenticeship, you are eligible for any position where the apprenticeship experience is equivalent to the degree requirement. Luna: That's a policy change that goes beyond just one program. It signals that the bank trusts its own training over a credential. Lucas: Which is a pretty radical idea in banking. I spoke with a woman named Maria who was a line cook for twelve years before joining the program. She told me she applied to three banks before the apprenticeship and never got a call back. After the program, she was promoted to assistant branch manager within eighteen months. Luna: That's a great story, but I want to push on the numbers a bit. Thirty people in the first cohort—that's small. Has the bank scaled it? Lucas: They've expanded to sixty per year now, across three states. And they're starting a similar program for warehouse workers. The bank's CEO said in an investor call that the apprenticeship has a positive return on investment within the first year because of reduced turnover costs. Luna: So the business case is clear. But why don't more banks do this? Lucas: I think it comes down to inertia. Hiring with a degree filter is easy. Setting up a training curriculum, partnering with unions, managing mentors—that takes work. Commerce Bancshares had a champion in their head of HR who spent two years building the infrastructure. Luna: It also requires believing that someone who's been a server for ten years can learn banking. That's a bias that needs to be addressed. Lucas: Absolutely. And the data from this program suggests that bias is costing banks good talent. The apprentices actually had higher customer satisfaction scores than traditional hires in the first year—likely because they're used to high-pressure service environments. Luna: If today was actually useful to you, the way these stay ad-free is listener support. You can find us at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. Lucas: Yeah, it's a small way to keep the show independent. And we appreciate it. Luna: So back to the career ladder question—what about other industries? Could this work for retail workers moving into insurance, or hospitality into healthcare? Lucas: There are some examples. Aetna had a program for call center workers to become medical coders. But the Commerce Bancshares model is notable because it's a full apprenticeship with a guaranteed path, not just a training certificate. Luna: You need the employer to commit to hiring at the end. Otherwise it's just a class. Lucas: Exactly. And that commitment is what makes it a real career ladder. The Department of Labor actually certified the Commerce Bancshares program as a registered apprenticeship, which makes it eligible for federal funding. Luna: That's smart. So other banks could replicate it using some of that funding. Lucas: Right. The toolkit is publicly available on the bank's website—curriculum templates, mentor training guides, evaluation rubrics. They want other employers to copy it. Luna: Is there any criticism of the program? I could see someone arguing that it's just a way to pay below-market wages during the apprenticeship. Lucas: The apprentices start at eighteen dollars an hour, which in Kansas City is above the living wage. And they get raises every six months. After graduation, they move to the standard pay scale for their role. So it's not cheap labor. Luna: Good. Then it's a genuine investment. I think the big takeaway is that skills-based hiring works when you back it up with training and a real career path. Lucas: And when you remove the degree gate. That's the structural change. Commerce Bancshares didn't just create a program—they changed their hiring policy for everyone who completes it. Luna: That's the kind of move that can actually shift the labor market for millions of workers. Lucas: It's a start. And it's replicable. I'd love to see a grocery chain try something similar with banking, or a hotel chain with healthcare. Luna: Maybe we'll cover that in a future episode.