In the Ghanaian banking sector, the FIND Interview System is a structured approach used in sales and customer service interactions to effectively uncover and address customer needs, aligning with the principles of relationship marketing and compliance under the Bank of Ghana’s Corporate Governance Directive 2018, which emphasizes ethical customer engagement. Drawing from my experience at Ecobank Ghana, where we implemented similar techniques during post-2019 banking cleanup to rebuild trust, this system ensures staff conduct interviews that balance customer satisfaction with bank profitability. It is particularly useful in competitive environments with fintech disruptions, allowing banks like GCB Bank to differentiate through personalized service.

The FIND Interview System is a customer-focused interviewing technique designed to systematically explore a customer’s situation, challenges, requirements, and aspirations during a sales or service conversation. It promotes active listening and probing to match financial products to needs, reducing mis-selling risks as per BoG’s consumer protection guidelines.

The letters in FIND stand for:

• F – Facts: This involves gathering factual information about the customer’s current situation, background, and circumstances. Staff ask open-ended questions to collect data such as account history, income sources, or existing financial products. For example, in a loan inquiry at Stanbic Bank Ghana, questions might include “What is your current monthly income and expenditure?” This step establishes a baseline, ensuring compliance with know-your-customer (KYC) requirements under Act 930.
• I – Issues (or Important Issues): Here, the staff identifies and explores the problems, challenges, or pain points the customer is facing. This could involve closed or probing questions to rank issues by importance, such as “What difficulties are you experiencing with your current savings plan?” In practice, during the 2022-2024 DDEP impacts, banks like Access Bank Ghana used this to uncover liquidity concerns from affected customers, aligning with BoG’s Liquidity Risk Management Guidelines.
• N – Needs: This step focuses on validating and articulating the customer’s explicit and implicit needs based on the facts and issues uncovered. Staff clarify requirements, e.g., “Based on your growing family, do you need a higher-yield investment for education funding?” This integrates with marketing mix elements, matching products like unit trusts or pensions, and supports cross-selling while adhering to ethical standards.
• D – Dreams (or Desires/Decisions): Finally, the staff delves into the customer’s long-term goals, aspirations, or desired outcomes, helping to formulate solutions. Questions might include “What financial security do you envision for retirement?” This leads to decision-making, closing the sale by proposing tailored solutions, such as insurance products. At Barclays (now Absa), this was key in relationship building post-global financial crises comparisons.

The main objective of the FIND Interview System is to create a comprehensive understanding of the customer’s profile, enabling the bank staff to provide personalized, benefit-oriented solutions that foster long-term relationships, enhance customer loyalty, and drive profitable sales. By structuring interviews this way, banks minimize risks, ensure regulatory compliance (e.g., avoiding aggressive selling under BoG directives), and improve service standards in a competitive landscape influenced by digital banking trends as of 2025. In my senior role, implementing FIND led to higher customer retention rates, proving its value for resilience and ethical practices.