Want banking innovation? Stop hiring bankers!

The shifting landscape of providers offering banking services is likely to force the (till date) in-bred banking sector to make acquisitions outside, bringing in leaders with techno-business backgrounds at the helm of bread-and-butter businesses divisions rather than just at the fringes (e.g. "Head of Mobile Banking") as has been the case so far.

From being the "electronic data processing" department, technology in banks has come a long way.

Bank branches are being increasingly replaced with online / mobile channels, while those that remain are being transformed to become futuristic retail spaces, a la Apple.

The traditional lending business with complicated credit decisioning and paperwork is now clearly bypassed by online and direct banks, and now Crowd-lending is set to take lending "social". 

The payments business, first disrupted by cards, ATMs and phone banking, is facing competition from newborn digital counterparts.

Considering that most of the above transformations are being driven by the Web, mobile, and social IT, it is time to re-think the kind of leaders needed to run tomorrow's bank.

In five years, will there be ANY such thing as a traditional "banking" career path? With IT-savvy business heads calling the shots, what would remain of the IT department and the CIO?