Jenius Bank · SMBC
Building a research team from zero
Jenius grew from 20 to 500 people in four years. I built a research function from scratch: a team I hired and grew, and an operating model that moved research from validating answers to shaping the questions.
This case study is about how I led. For the research itself, see Defining a new digital bank →
- Director, Research & Innovation
- Team of 6
- 4 years
- Strategy & operations
At a glance
From a team of one to a trusted function
- People
Hired for curiosity and empathy, reshaped the team each year around its gaps, and grew three people into new roles.
- Operating model
Moved the business through awareness, momentum and structure, until research sat upstream in planning.
- Influence
An impact tracker turned research value into evidence, and that evidence won headcount and better tools.
- AI
Led the team through adoption together, moving work to AI only as fast as it earned trust.
The challenge
A new bank with no research function
My role
SMBC launched Jenius Bank as its entry into U.S. consumer banking: a digital bank built inside a large, regulated enterprise. Research started with me and one contractor. Requests arrived late, already focused on a solution, with timelines that left no room for discovery.
As Director of Research and Innovation, I owned both the team and the function: hiring and developing researchers, setting up how the business worked with us, managing vendors and outside consultants, and showing leadership what research was worth.
The research behind the launch →
A note on visuals: Jenius wound down quickly, which left little time to collect artifacts. The screenshots here are the ones I was able to keep.
The research team
- Drew HopkinsDirector, Research & Innovation
- Researchers managed6 in total, up to 4 at once
- ContractorYear 1
- Research consultantsAs needed
Areas covered
- Savings & loans
- Credit card
- Brand
- Social & storefront
- Web & mobile
- Innovation
Building the team
Hiring for the gaps, not the titles
Each year the team's biggest problem changed, so how I hired and organized it evolved too.
Year 1 · Founding
Two people and a bank to launch
- +Research function started
- ▲1 contractor
Before
Year 1
Challenge
A brand-new bank, no research function, and a launch date.
Strategy
Put everything into the work that would define the bank: the target customer and the MVP features.
Outcome
- Research shaped the launch and gave us our first proof of value. See the case study →
Year 2 · Expansion
Expanding on a tight budget
- ★I was promoted to Director
- +Marketing coverage
- +Banking products coverage
- ▲2 researchers hired
- ▼Contractor replaced
Year 1
Year 2
Challenge
Demand flooded in from banking products and marketing, without the budget for senior hires.
Strategy
One hire per area, chosen for curiosity, empathy and unconventional thinking: a designer with a master's in UX and marketing experience, and a former Latin teacher with a master's in linguistics and experience in investments and forecasting.
Outcome
- Both areas covered at early-career cost, by people who questioned how banking usually works.
Year 3 · Restructure
Restructure around the gaps
- ⇄1 moved to a new product
- +Senior voice
- +Quant depth
- ▲3 researchers hired
- ▼1 left the team
Year 2
Year 3
Challenge
Too many strong owners for me to be in every room, and marketing wanted more quant depth.
Strategy
Hired a senior researcher comfortable pushing back, and a quant researcher who liked to experiment. Split marketing between brand and creative, and moved our UX design researcher to a new product at their request. When our financial researcher moved into a role in investment management, I brought in a versatile generalist to cover the gaps, as business needs had grown more diverse.
Outcome
- Every assignment met a business need and a direction someone wanted to grow in.
Year 4 · Delegation
Giving away territory
- +Customer community
- +Mentorship program
- +Vendor ownership handed off
- ★1 approved for promotion
- ★2 promotions
Year 3
Year 4
Challenge
The team was strong enough that I was becoming the bottleneck.
Strategy
Handed off real parts of my role: account servicing on Web/Mobile 2.0, vendor management, and a team mentorship program. I gave senior researchers more license to run projects independently.
Outcome
- Two promotions, and a third approved for the following February.
- I moved to setting direction, and stood up a customer community for closer, deeper learning from our customers over time.
Year 5 · Wind-down
The bank closes
- ▼Jenius Bank wound down
- ★Approved promotion carried into a Senior role elsewhere
What happened
SMBC decided to wind down Jenius Bank. The regulatory standards the parent company needed for its reputation were more than a startup-style bank could sustain, and expectations on both sides never fully aligned.
For the team
The bank closed before our third promotion took effect. That researcher had every approval in place, and they stepped straight into a Senior Researcher role at another company.
Outcome
- In four years, research went from one person and a contractor to a trusted function with its own operating model.
How I hire
Skills can be taught. Character can't.
I hire for the qualities that are hardest to teach, as well as the skills to cover the gaps the business needs to fill.
What I look for
- CuriosityAbout people, and why they do what they do.
- Emotional intelligenceEmpathy for participants and stakeholders alike, and the awareness to read a room and adjust.
- Growth mindsetA clear wish to grow, and the humility to learn from feedback. It tells me where to stretch them.
Balancing the team
- 1Cover the domainsBanking products and marketing was first, because that's where demand was.
- 2Fill the skill gapsA senior voice to push back, and quant depth for brand and segmentation.
- 3Share the strengthsPeer-led workshops spread each person's strengths across the team.
How I grew people
Three promotions, three different paths
I started from where each person was and what they wanted, then gave them the kind of support that fit. Slide along the scale to see each path.
New researcher → Senior
From taking notes to running the room
They went on to lead research strategy for our new credit card.
Where they started
A designer with marketing experience, new to research, unsure of themselves presenting, and mostly reacting to requests.
Growth strategy
I helped them build research fundamentals with direct feedback, starting on marketing content they already knew. Then I moved them to a brand-new product to challenge them, with mixed-methods research from the ground up, and mentored them closely. They watched how I handled stakeholders, challenged assumptions, and weighed the pros and cons of methods. Then they started doing it themselves.
What changed
They began running sessions and leading strategy instead of responding to requests.
Associate → Senior
A license to be entrepreneurial
They rebuilt our relationship with marketing and taught the whole team quant.
Where they started
A sharp quant researcher who challenged conventions with tact. They were very independent, with a go-getter attitude, and joined while marketing was frustrated about missing quant data.
Growth strategy
I placed them with the innovation team to match their strong curiosity, and gave them brand and segmentation, our most quant-heavy work. I found opportunities for them to lead and teach a series of quantitative workshops to upskill the team. I helped them set strategic direction, then gave them space to lead projects independently.
What changed
- They ran our long-term brand study, tracking brand performance against a key competitor over time.
- They reset marketing's expectations and earned their trust.
- They led a workshop series on SQL, survey methods and quant best practices for the team.
Approved for promotion to Senior the following February. The bank closed before it took effect, and they stepped into a Senior Researcher role at another company.
Senior → VP
Handing over real territory
They took on parts of my role and saved us about $20K on a better vendor.
Where they started
Seasoned, and more a strategic partner than a direct report.
Growth strategy
I gave them our most cross-functional project, vendor management, the team's mentorship program, and part of running the impact tracker. I encouraged them to be creative and to break conventions I had set wherever they saw an opportunity, and I reassured them when they doubted their approach or progress. We became a sounding board for each other on complex, competing priorities.
What changed
They built mentorship plans tailored to each researcher's goals. Together we made the case for a competitive-intelligence vendor that cost about $20K less and covered thousands more financial-institution experiences, with analytics.
At Jenius, VP sat closer to a staff or principal level than at most companies.
Navigating team dynamics
Resolving friction through understanding
Most conflict has an underlying need that no one has said out loud. I looked for it first, de-escalated, and built confidence between teams through shared understanding.
Stepping up for my researcher
We protected research rigor and found an alternative strategy.Read the storyClose
Tension
- Regulatory limits meant we couldn't contact customers yet.
- An innovation product lead wanted to recruit from NPS respondents.
- My senior researcher objected: a skewed sample, compliance risk, no incentives, and an overloaded VoC team.
- They were being overruled and felt like they were failing.
The call
I reassured them that they were handling it correctly and joined their next scoping call as an observer. When the product lead cut them off, I acknowledged the product lead's concern, backed my researcher's reasoning, and said we couldn't move forward without escalating, with research's disagreement on record. When the call grew tense, I paused it and brought in leadership from both sides.
What changed
- We protected research rigor and found an alternative strategy.
- The innovation team received reliable research insights that didn't skew them in the wrong direction.
Turning a micromanaged relationship into a partnership
Marketing took a stronger story to leadership, with our clips alongside their numbers.Read the storyClose
Tension
- Marketing relied heavily on quant, and its leader wanted to be hands-on in research.
- My researchers felt micromanaged and wanted room for qualitative work.
- Marketing felt they weren't getting the quant depth they needed.
The call
I started with a retro for just my team, which surfaced the micromanaging and real gaps on our side in capturing expectations up front. A joint retro and workshop with marketing turned that into a shared plan: expectations up front, clear touchpoints and realistic timelines. I split coverage so our quant specialist took their quant needs and a dedicated researcher took social and storefront. Then we explained the trade-offs of qualitative research, and marketing agreed to a qualitative pilot on their social media.
What changed
- Marketing paired our recordings and quotes with their statistics for leadership.
- They felt much better supported, on both qual and quant.
Teaching the team to handle friction themselves
Researchers began leading workshops of their own.Read the storyClose
Tension
- Stakeholders with strong opinions came up across the team.
- Each researcher was handling them alone.
The call
I ran a workshop where each person brought a situation that had frustrated or confused them. We reflected on each one, and everyone shared how they'd handle it, so the team learned from each other instead of only from me.
What changed
- It started a habit of peer-led workshops.
- Topics included quant methods, metrics and long-term scoring, and impact tracking.
Growing the business
From order-taker to upstream partner
Jenius had no research culture. Early requests came late and were already focused on a solution. Over three stages, I moved research from validating answers to shaping the questions.
Stage 01 · Awareness
Teach and prove value first
Earning credibility before asking for a seat at the table.
Tension
The business didn't know what research could do, when to involve us, or how long it takes.
Solution
I ran demos and forums on how research fits the product lifecycle, documented methods and timelines, and focused our early effort on the highest-value launches. Our wealth-management differentiator became the business's example of what working with research looked like.
Stage 02 · Momentum
Meet stakeholders where they are
Offering alternatives instead of saying no.
Tension
Requests asked for more depth than their timelines allowed.
Solution
I explained the trade-off and offered a realistic option instead:
"I can't run an interview series in two weeks, but I can run a quick survey. With one more week, I could do a small interview series. Next time, I'd love to be in the meeting where this comes up."
I also traced where requests came from, so I could ask to be in those meetings. Stakeholders started bringing us in earlier, to explore problems instead of validate answers.
Stage 03 · Structure
Systems that let research scale
Shared standards, visible demand and measured impact turned research into a planned, trusted function.
Tension
As the team grew, each researcher scoped, planned and reported a little differently.
Solution
A playbook covering methods and trade-offs, realistic timelines, stakeholder touchpoints, recruitment and statistical significance. It gave the business one consistent, repeatable way to work with any researcher.
Tension
Requests arrived ad hoc through many different channels, in different formats and with very different levels of depth.
Solution
A central intake asked stakeholders for objectives, research questions, timeline limits and the decision the research would inform. Researchers got matching scoping guidelines. Intake became about 50% more efficient, from request to scoped study.
Tension
On our Web/Mobile 2.0 redesign we could finally customize, but brand, design, product, platform, strategy and engineering disagreed on what mattered, often without realizing it.
Solution
To get stakeholders aligned, I:
- Grounded everyone in our personas and mission.
- Collected every research request, with no idea too small.
- Placed requests on a grid of uncertainty vs. impact.
- Combined overlaps offline, then negotiated the plan together, including engineering.
One mixed-methods plan answered about 80% of the major concerns, and every deprioritized request came with a reason.
Tension
As the business grew, complex problems produced overlapping requests from several teams. No one could see everything in flight or waiting, and it was hard to get the right voices into each study.
Solution
A shared, visible backlog by method, timeline and area of the business. A monthly steering committee shared recent insights and weighed upcoming work by impact vs. certainty. Weekly updates and monthly newsletters kept research visible between meetings. At peak, the team ran 35+ initiatives a year with 18–20 projects planned 4–6 months ahead.
Tension
Teams stored research plans and outcomes by their own conventions, some by project and some by feature, so studies were hard to organize and harder to discover.
Solution
A central repository with one naming convention across our tools. Tagging individual insights couldn't keep up with our pace, so I chose broad categories plus a few attributes: theme, method, device, participant source. It became one source of truth, built for speed over completeness.
Tension
Research value was hard to show. Without evidence of what studies changed, it was hard to hold teams to outcomes or make the case for more people and tools.
Solution
The tracker recorded which teams each study served, which decisions it influenced (strategy, design, live product) and time to insight. Monthly follow-ups held stakeholders to outcomes.
- It showed the wealth team over-using research, so we rebalanced toward credit card, a top priority.
- Next to the backlog, it showed leadership what we couldn't reach without more people, and won additional headcount and better tools.
Tension
Design and marketing wanted to move faster on simple questions, and sending every preference or A/B test through our queue slowed both of us down.
Solution
Design and marketing leads ran simple studies themselves, like preference and A/B tests, with templates, automated recruitment, guidelines and checkpoints with research. Both teams felt enabled instead of blocked, and research standards held.
AI adoption
Leading the team through AI, not just to it
The risk wasn't picking the wrong tool. It was researchers experimenting alone and repeating each other's mistakes. I treated adoption as a change to lead.
Experiment together
Monthly AI check-ins, plus a workshop mapping each researcher's work step by step to find where AI could help.
Learn from what failed
A "Gains and Pains" retro kept AI on preparation and summarizing, and kept interpretation with people.
Hand off trust in stages
With stakeholder approval, competitive intel moved from AI-assisted to AI-drafted with human fact-checks.
Before
Researcher onlyCompetitive reports written by a researcher, with AI assisting.
After
4x fasterAI-drafted reports with human fact-checking, freeing the team for research that needed judgment.
Impact
What the function achieved
For the business
For the team
By year four, the team was teaching itself: leading its own workshops, mentoring each other, and owning work I once ran.
What I'd carry forward
Lessons learned
Credibility comes before scale
Early on, the hardest problem wasn't capacity. It was helping the business understand what research is for.
Track impact from day one
A simple tracker from the start would have earned trust and headcount sooner than waiting for things to settle.
Don't become a ticketing system
Intake and prioritization kept us on the highest-impact work, not on whoever was loudest.
Give away territory
Handing off real ownership grew my people faster, and stopped me from becoming the team's bottleneck.
The rest of the story
The research that defined the bank
This case study covers the team and the function. The discovery, concepts and testing behind Jenius Bank's MVP are their own story.
Open to new opportunities
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