2026 Strategic Planning Retreat Takeaways

The Strategic Planning Retreat surfaced several clear areas where members see opportunities for deeper collaboration, resources and programming. Across the conversations, three themes consistently rose to the top: data, training and talent.

Data: Turning Information into Action

Members are looking for more actionable data and benchmarking that can help inform strategic and operational decisions. The retreat's data session explored benchmarking trends, KPIs, peer comparisons, bank ratios and opportunities to incorporate data more directly into strategic planning and board reporting.

Key areas of interest included:

• Call report data and peer benchmarking to better understand how individual institutions compare and where opportunities for improvement exist.

• Data-driven benchmarking that goes beyond reporting numbers and helps banks identify meaningful performance trends and opportunities.

• AI-enabled dashboards and analysis. Anthony walked members through NBA's AI tools and dashboard prompts, demonstrating how banks can use AI to interact with their data, surface insights and make information more accessible and actionable for their teams. The session also gave members an opportunity to think about how these tools could be customized for their own institutions.

• Balance sheet optimization and using data to inform decisions around growth, liquidity and profitability.

• Foreign exchange and other fee-income opportunities as banks look for ways to diversify and grow non-interest revenue.

• Operationalizing KPIs so that performance measures become part of management culture, accountability and decision-making—not simply metrics that are reported.

What we heard: Members want NBA to continue helping translate data into practical insights they can use to make decisions, benchmark performance and identify new growth opportunities—including exploring how AI can make that data easier to access, analyze and operationalize.

AI Training & Implementation: Start Practical, Then Scale

The AI conversations reinforced that members are interested in moving from simply talking about AI to actually using it. At the same time, there was recognition that banks don't need to begin with complex, enterprise-wide implementations. There is significant value in first helping employees become comfortable with practical tools and establishing the right governance foundation.

Members expressed particular interest in:

• Copilot and individual productivity tools that employees can begin using in their day-to-day work before banks consider broader organizational deployment.

• Hands-on AI tools and dashboards. Our Director of Research and Impact, Anthony Barr, unveiled NBA's AI toolkit and dashboard prompts that helped demonstrate what practical implementation can look like; from analyzing information and generating insights to creating customized workflows for individual bank needs.

• Practical training that helps teams understand how to use AI effectively and responsibly, with real-world banking applications rather than purely theoretical education.

• AI governance and risk management, including policies, cybersecurity, data privacy and appropriate oversight. Members were particularly engaged in the governance discussion and how banks can create the appropriate guardrails before scaling adoption.

• Determining who “owns” AI within the bank and how responsibility should be divided among leadership, technology, risk/compliance and the board.

• Creating a pathway from individual adoption to organizational adoption—building employee comfort and practical use cases first, then expanding implementation as governance, skills and institutional readiness mature.

What we heard: Members want to move from AI education to practical application. There is an opportunity for NBA to support that progression—from individual tools like Copilot and the AI dashboards demonstrated at the retreat, to governance frameworks and, ultimately, broader institutional implementation.

Talent: Building the Next Generation of Bank Leaders

Talent remains both an immediate operational challenge and a long-term strategic priority. Members were especially engaged in conversations around succession planning and building stronger leadership pipelines.

Key areas of discussion included:

• Succession planning, including how banks can prepare future leaders and ensure continuity at both the executive and board levels. The retreat's dedicated talent session focused on executive succession, recruitment and retention, future-leader development, compensation and continuity.

• Early-career talent pipelines, including the Year Up talent model and opportunities to connect banks with emerging professionals.

• Internship programs, including Carver State Bank's Catalyst Connect program, as models that could potentially be replicated or expanded across member institutions.

• Developing talent internally rather than relying exclusively on external recruitment.

• Creating more opportunities for members to share successful talent, internship and succession models with one another.

What we heard: Members need support on both ends of the talent pipeline—from bringing new people into banking to preparing the next generation of executives to lead their institutions.

Where We Go Next

The retreat reinforced an opportunity for NBA to build future programming around these three areas, not simply through one-time conversations, but through practical tools, training, benchmarking and peer learning that members can take back and operationalize within their institutions.

The common thread across data, AI and talent was clear: members are looking for actionable support that helps them move from insight to implementation.