Ep. 250: Yerbol Orynbayev - Lessons in Crisis Management and Restructuring

Welcome to the Count Me In Podcast! Join host Adam Larson as he
chats with the insightful Yerbol Orynbayev, a seasoned leader
with a wealth of experience in both the public and private
sectors. Yerbol shares compelling stories and lessons from his
remarkable career, including his tenure as the deputy prime
minister of Kazakhstan and his pivotal role in restructuring a
major bank. His candid insights and practical advice are sure to
inspire aspiring leaders and entrepreneurs. Tune in for an
engaging conversation packed with real-world insights and
takeaways!


Full Episode Transcript:
< Intro >


 


Adam:           
Welcome back to Count Me In. In this episode, we have the
privilege of interviewing Yerbol Orynbayev. Who shares his
extraordinary leadership journey, and the impactful lessons he's
learned. Yerbol's experiences range from serving as Deputy Prime
Minister of Kazakhstan, to transforming the Jusan Bank from near
bankruptcy to achieving $1.2 billion in profit.


 


Throughout the episode, Yerbol sheds light on the crucial
decisions and strategies that were pivotal in leading the bank to
success. His insightful advice on leadership, vision, investing
in people, and embracing failures provides valuable lessons for
aspiring leaders. Join us as Yerbol shares his invaluable wisdom
and experiences, on navigating crisis and driving change.


 


< Music >


 


Yerbol, we're really excited to have you on the podcast. I'm just
really excited to chat with you, about your leadership journey
and the different paths you've taken, and you've had quite the
leadership journey. What drew you to the different positions that
you've taken, and what are some of the lessons you've learned
along the way?


 


Yerbol:         
 Adam, first of all, thank you very much for this
opportunity to share my experience about Jusan Bank story, with
you, with your program. I worked for the government of Kazakhstan
for quite a long time. I resigned in 2015. Before that time,
before my resignation, I served as the deputy prime minister and
handled economic and then social responsibilities. And, so, in
2018, when I was already with the private sector, working on my
own business. I received an invitation from the university, which
asked me to help them to set up the investment division of the
endowment fund.


 


So it was a very exciting proposal. I believe they decided to
focus on me and then send this invitation to me because during my
time with the government, I served as a board member of the
National Bank of Kazakhstan. The board member of the Agency for
Supervision of the financial organizations. I also, successfully,
set up a western-type university in Kazakhstan. So a lot of
people knew me very well. So they said, "Okay, why not, after one
successful story, one successful project, let's offer him this
opportunity."


 


So in 2018, I started this journey, the Jusan Bank with other
banks, and I had this great opportunity to create the investment
division of the endowment fund. So that's how I started this
particular journey with the Jusan Bank, with its restructuring,
creating a new business model based on the ecosystem.


 


In terms of the lessons, actually, it was very interesting and
enriching experience. I learned very valuable lessons. One of
them is that you should really understand your business, and then
your customers. And, then, currently, there is a great shift, all
over the world, in terms of the customers' behavior. New
technologies like AI, digitalization, increased computational
capacities, and also the new generation of customers, they have
completely different preferences. So these two trends kind of
changed the whole landscape. 


So you have to understand your clients, you have to understand
your business within/out, know your customers. Because if you
don't know you cannot lead, and you cannot restructure or do some
right things without this really deep knowledge and understanding
the main foundations of your business. 


 


The second lesson I would say that, dream big. What I learned, in
reality, with great vision, with the right team, with the right
strategy, with the right implementation plan, you can achieve a
lot. So dreaming big it's very important. 


 


The third lesson I would say that always have an exit strategy,
especially when you're dealing with the big structures. Together,
the whole system, I managed about 10,000 employees. So this is
quite big, the price of the mistake could be very high, but you
cannot stop development. You have to still innovate. You still
should align your business, product, services, in line with the
current demands.


 


So you should innovate, you should do something new, but exit
strategy is very important. This is your hedge, that makes sure
that the whole structure won't collapse if something goes wrong,
this is very important. 


 


Trust your team, I think team is very important. The quality of
the people you are working with, their professionalism, their
ethics are very important. So as soon as you set up your team,
you know that you can trust your people, just let them perform.
And in the banking sector, this is more important than even
others because teamwork is incredible, this is very important.


 


I didn't see a person who can just, in one phase, cover all
requirements of the banking. You need a strong CFO, you need a
strong risk manager, you need a strong chief information officer,
so you see this is very complex. Then you can, together, compile
the team, or the professionals, who can work together, who can
share the same vision, who has very good ethics, only with this
one you can proceed.


 


So this is a very important lesson. If you are unsure about your
team, don't start. Because alone you cannot perform, you cannot
achieve. So I would say these are very important lessons I
learned from my journey with Jusan.


 


Adam:            I
think those are some amazing lessons. And maybe as we have this
conversation, we'll be able to see how you came to those lessons
at Jusan, as we talk through that journey. So when you first
stepped into that challenge, they said, "Hey, we want to bring
you on the Jusan Bank." What was the atmosphere like? What were
some of the challenges and the immediate hurdles that you saw
that you had to jump over, as you started that new part of your
journey?


 


Yerbol:         
 This, actually, was very interesting. So when I
took the reins of the bank, the situation was pretty horrible. So
I had a feeling like starring into the beast. I just give you one
example. The bank's auditors, KPMG, they came to us, after we
purchased the bank, and then told us that they won't be able
produce any audit report.


They said, "We have access to the accounts, but the accounts are
a mess, documentation is such a mess, so we just even cannot
interpret them." And the bank did not have people who can
interpret and work on this one. So can you imagine?


 


So 2018, the year they audited, was completely a failure, and
according to the regulation you still proceed because the public,
the regulator, would like to know. So this is one of the example
how the bank was managed. Also in terms of the business and the
morale of the employees, it was a complete mess. Two year...