2024 Journal of Community Bank Case Studies

2024 COMMUNITY BANK CASE STUDY COMPETITION

discussions about the business globally. Notably, according to Crosman, uncontrolled rumors on X were reported to be a significant factor in the 2023 bank failures. Thus, we believe it is important for FCCB to maintain an X account to effectively monitor and address such risks, as discussed further in the following section. Part III.3: Reputational Risk and Communication Strategy Social media can be a great advantage to modern banks’ operations, but, as seen with the SVB collapse (discussed in Part III.1), it does not come without risks. According to Sargent, “There’s a reputational risk with social media because you can’t control what people will do online. Part of the way we mitigate that is by making sure we are monitoring the comments that we get, actively responding to them, researching any customer issues.” FCCB also monitors developing trends in its social media communications to identify problems and resolve them through broader communication. These actions help to avoid a situation where individual customer concerns rapidly develop into a social wildfire, as seen with SVB. Such reactive measures are important, but proactive measures are equally, if not more, important. For example, Sargent explains that FCCB runs all its advertising through its compliance department before posting to ensure it complies with regulatory requirements, thus avoiding potential trouble. The bank’s marketing team members, along with the advertising agencies it collaborates with, are also trained in compliance. Moreover, FCCB has maintained a disaster recovery committee since before

The bank uses a LinkedIn profile to connect with

businesses, recruit new employees, and build camaraderie with its current employees.

the 2023 closures, including members from all areas of the bank. Their responsibility is to simulate emergency scenarios, discuss response strategies, and prepare messaging in advance, ensuring the bank’s readiness to act immediately should such scenarios arise. Tied in with social media’s reputational risk is general cybersecurity risk. In a world full of scams and fraud, FCCB takes every precaution to ensure that its data and communications are secure. FCCB’s Information Security Officer, Wendy Southard, manages the bank’s cybersecurity efforts (Gephart). This includes disaster recovery and employee training, thereby ensuring that everyone remains up to date on security threats present in the industry. The bank also uses the KnowBe4 platform to conduct additional employee compliance education and security awareness training. Sargent says that FCCB is careful to monitor and limit access to any accounts that could potentially be sensitive. For example, the bank requires multifactor authentication for employees to access its social

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