You know the saying that timing is everything. In the case of blogs and CFC, this is very true. The past 18 months have delivered more change in banking than most of us can ever remember. We have examined these changes and their implications in our regular research, but the pace of change demands that even a research team leverages the means available to communicate better and more often. Welcome to our Blog.

For those of you whom I’ve not had the pleasure of meeting, my name is Sharon Chinn and I am the head of research for the Council on Financial Competition (CFC). More importantly, as I close out the 20th year of my professional life (eek), I still fondly reflect on my prior roles in banking as a teller, a branch manager, a retirement plan provider, and a strategic planner. Today, it is my privilege to work with you as we face the most serious challenges the industry has ever seen.

As many of you are on the hook for improving transparency, we will do the same for you. It is my hope that through this blog the Council can share its work, ideas, and needs with you on a regular basis. This way, you will know what we are thinking about and working on as often as you would like. And, you should feel free to comment about it. Your feedback makes our work better.

Over the next several weeks, you will meet our team through our blogs. Let me take a minute to give them each of them a quick (and very informal) introduction. Derek Frost is our resident doctor of consumer banking. Michelle Sato has authored much of the CFC work for the past several years.  Anne Walbridge is our small business guru and a Twitter enthusiast. Kiara Domingo has hosted customer focus groups and is an integral part of our branch sales work.

We look forward to being in touch more often and in a less formal way. Talk to you soon.