Nikos Salakas, Chief of Corporate Center & General Counsel at Alpha Bank, where he spoke about the Bank’s transformation, the importance of workplace and corporate culture, and the challenges of artificial intelligence in business operations.
Cultural Change
Mr. Salakas described the context in which Alpha Bank was called upon to redefine its operations, emphasizing that in a banking system emerging from an unprecedented crisis that had lasted nearly fifteen years, putting the employee and the customer back at the center was neither a given nor an automatic process, but required a conscious cultural shift and essentially “rebuilding” the bank from the ground up.
As he noted, this internal journey began with the redefinition of the bank’s purpose and values, emphasizing that the bank “set as its corporate purpose to support progress in life and entrepreneurship for a better tomorrow, and at the same time defined excellence, collaboration, efficiency, innovation, and accountability, so that culture is not a theoretical concept but a daily practice.”
In practice, as he explained, this change translated into specific initiatives and interventions, noting that “cultural change cannot remain at the level of declarations; that is why Management initiated a substantive dialogue with the bank’s own employees, through initiatives such as Alpha Day, where more than 6,300 employees from Greece, Cyprus, and abroad openly discussed the challenges of daily life, customer service, and operational issues.” This was followed by more than 80 initiatives involving 1,500 employees.
At the same time, he said that management placed particular emphasis on enhancing career development and compensation, noting that “after 17 years of virtual stagnation” the bank established a minimum salary of €1,600 for new hires by signing a groundbreaking Collective Bargaining Agreement and comprehensively reformed the compensation framework, with an emphasis on rewarding performance. At the same time, it enhanced family benefits, ranging from daycare to student allowances, and introduced coverage for the increase in the Euribor rate on employees’ mortgages. Regarding career development, he outlined a structured framework: in the first three years, an employee gains experience; by the fifth year, they achieve maturity; and between the fifth and eighth years, they move internally into a new role.
Acquisitions that strengthen the bank’s workforce
Referring to Alpha Bank’s acquisition strategy, Mr. Salakas clarified that “Beyond the financial data, the common denominator in all these acquisition moves is the people and teams we bring into the bank, the skills, and above all the culture they bring, ” emphasizing that Alpha Bank has completed seven transactions in just two years with the aim of strengthening critical sectors such as investment banking and wealth management.
He also emphasized that the recent acquisitions bring to the bank teams that operate with a customer-centric philosophy, excellence, and collaboration, and this is clearly evident in moves such as the integration of Axia into investment banking, FlexFin into the factoring sector, or AstroBank, as well as this year’s acquisition of AlphaTrust in the wealth management sector.
Recognizing the difficulty of integration, he pointed out that “the real challenge begins after the acquisition, when a large and often bureaucratic organization is called upon to integrate small, dynamic, and flexible teams without altering their identity; the goal is not for them to adapt to the bank, but to enrich the bank itself, to ‘infuse’ it with their own culture, which requires continuous engagement and clear direction from management.”
At the forefront of the repatriation of Greek professionals
When asked about Alpha Bank’s participation in ReBrain Greece, Mr. Salakas emphasized that this is a national challenge requiring substance and consistency, noting that “the ReBrain Greece initiative is extremely important, and we have already seen tangible results with more than 100 young people returning through the Bank’s efforts; however, the critical question is not whether we will say ‘come back,’ but whether we can create the conditions for them to do so.” He specifically referred to the latest ReBrain event in London and the Bank’s efforts to repatriate employees who participated in that event.
He pointed out that these conditions go beyond the narrow economic framework, emphasizing that young professionals abroad are seeking something deeper: meritocracy, excellence, collaboration, and a work environment in which they can trust their future. He also noted that the special tax regime for returnees, which reduces income tax by 50% for the first seven years, combined with the lower cost of living, makes Greek companies more competitive in terms of wages than it appears in theory, adding that “companies must demonstrate in practice that they operate according to these principles and offer not only competitive compensation but also meaningful career prospects, by changing their culture and operating with transparency and meritocracy.”
AI and the Transformation of Leadership
Regarding the characteristics of modern leadership, Mr. Salakas focused on artificial intelligence, highlighting its multidimensional nature and the responsibilities it creates for executives, emphasizing that “artificial intelligence is not merely a technological development, but an economic, social, and political phenomenon involving massive investments and intense geopolitical competition, which is already affecting all our lives and will affect them even more in the future.”
As he noted, public discourse on development and technological issues often breeds fear, which is why every major technological change first requires a level head, especially from leaders, who must demystify and understand for themselves what this technology means, how it affects productivity and organizational operations, and what the real implications are for employees, so that they can proceed with its adoption in a way that enhances people’s skills through reskilling and upskilling rather than creating insecurity. Finally, he emphasized that artificial intelligence is a tool for empowering and developing employees that should be adopted by everyone.