Australia's knowledge-based banking
working relations
Our team in Australia and New Zealand has long been winning kudos for their
tireless F&A focus. Their promotion of F&A knowledge-based banking could prove
to be a blueprint for other operations around the world.
Executive program
Share of mind
Club concept
Foremost commentators
Understanding imperatives
What's NewS Issue 10 December
Over the past 18
months, Rabo
Australia has grad-
ually been growing
ïts Agribusiness
Consulting and
Research Services
team (ACRS). 'We
are part of the FAR
network,' says senior manager Larissa
Taylor, 'with an additional external
consultancy brief.' The three strong
ACRS group is also developing F&A
non-financial knowledge based banking
services and products. Says Taylor, 'our
charter is to be an external provider of
consulting services and an internal service
provider for research and strategie mar
keting for both the corporate and retail
divisions.' In addition, the ACRS runs in-
novative 'knowledge programs' to posi-
tion the hank in the Australian and New
Zealand markets.
One of these programs, the Fixecutive De-
velopment Program for Primary Producers
(EDPPP), targets top commercial farmers.
Lasting two weeks over a two year period
with a management project in between,
this executive program takes the key ele-
ments of an MBA and tailors them to
agriculture. 'As far as we can teil,' says
Taylor, 'there is nothing like it in either
the Australian or New Zealand executive
education markets. Our vision is to create
an alumni network of leading edge farm
ers, farmers whose innovation is shaping
the global competitiveness of our rural in
dustries.' This year, the program will com-
prise 30 (fee-paying) participants, includ-
ing seven front New Zealand. 'These
people come from the whole gamut of
agriculture, including dairy, mixed farm-
ing, grains, cotton, live cattle, wool, horti-
culture, and beef and sheep genetics.'
Besides organizing this program, based on
a highly successful course offered by
Sharing knowledge - Larissa Taylor (left),
Anjo Kwakernaak and Sandy McEachern
Texas A&M University which attracts
150 of the leading IJS farmers every year,
the team has also sought out sponsors
within the industry. Involvement of big
F&A names such as Wesfarmers Ltd broa-
dens the appeal, as does the fact that the
course is accredited through the Univer
sity of Queensland. Another attraction is
the fact that participants do not necessar-
ily have to be Rabo/PIBA clients. 'Basi-
cally,' Taylor explains, 'we are looking to
earn a "share of mind" with top farmers
in both countries, while discovering what
ntakes best practice for them and inter-
preting that back into our rural lending
activities.'
Other knowledge building programs in-
clude a knowledge business plan and a
visiting experts program. 'The knowledge
plan involves working with our executives
and account managers to implement a
strategy for the development of non-finan
cial food and agri products for the retail
side of the bank - PIBA,' Taylor continues.
'These products or services may include
research materials on our Internet site,
best practice benchmarking case studies,
or a database of local staff expertise by
sector and functions, seminars.' In fact,
the team is working towards what could
be called the 'PIBA Club Concept'. 'The
idea we are testing here is like an airline
frequent flyer program. When a primary
producer first becomes our cliënt, s/he
would automatically be entitled to a basic
level of non-financial F&A knowledge
products. Ultimately, there might be two
or three tiers of customers in the "Club"
receiving knowledge products tailored to
their sector or particular business develop
ment needs, according to their value or
strategie importance to the bank.'
The visiting experts program has already
kicked off. This brings internal F&A spe-
cialists to talk with the Australia and New
Zealand staff and their clients, such as
Adrie Zwanenberg and Arend Heijbroek
of FAR and Charles Hallock, Rabobank's
US grain expert. Ir also brings external
industry, scientific or academie experts in
F&A, such as Professor Danny Klinefelter,
head of agribusiness at Texas A&M Uni
versity and Professor David Kohl, head of
agricultural economics and small business
entrepreneurship at the Virginia State
Tech and an authority on US agri-trends.
'This is an internal program designed to
share and transfer knowledge to our own
people,' Taylor says. 'We are working on
a strategie relationship with Australia's
peak scientific research body, the CSIRO,
in relation to commercializing agricultural
technology. It's all part of building our
national and international knowledge
network, and differentiating ourselves as
a specialist F&A bank.'
While building knowledge based banking
dentands a chunk of the team's resources,
they are also dedicated to expanding their
consultancy offering. According to Taylor,
ACRS offers fee based consulting services
to major agribusinesses. 'Part of our brief
is to service corporate clients directly, in
order to enhance our understanding of
strategie trends in agribusiness. We want
to understand the imperatives hehind
F&A companies, some of whom we don't
hank,' she says. The fee based consulting
capabilities meet a broad range of cus-
tomer requirements, including pre-M&A
strategie advice, value chain analysis and
modelling, corporate structure and orga-
nizational design, and global and local
marker research.
For more information on the team
and its activities, contact Larissa Taylor,
Anjo Kwakernaak or Sandy McEachern
hv e-mail.
