In the beginning, there were two banks— BB&T and SunTrust—each with their own values, traditions, and buzzwords. Then one day, some very well-paid consultants said, “Let there be Truist,” and lo, a new entity was born. And thus began the epic saga of a company trying to remember who it was… before it ever really figured that out in the first place.
Welcome to Truist: where culture goes to get rewritten, overwritten, and promptly forgotten.
Culture Crisis: Now Hiring (Preferably from Wells Fargo)
Imagine trying to assemble a spaceship mid-launch, using leftover parts from two decommissioned aircraft—and then, just for fun, swapping out the engineers with folks from the last rocket that exploded on the launchpad. That’s Truist’s idea of a “cultural reboot.” After all, nothing says “cultural new beginning” like importing a wave of executives from Wells Fargo—the bank famous for forging more fake accounts than a Russian troll farm.
Because what’s better than a merger of equals? A merger of equals plus a few seasoned veterans from a company whose internal motto was once, “Lie until they find the fine print.”
When Identity is a Mutt
If Truist were a dog breed, it wouldn’t be a golden retriever or a noble German shepherd. No, it would be the corporate equivalent of a Labradoodle-Pitbull-Pekingese mix—charmingly unstable, impossible to define, and constantly barking at the wrong problems. As a side note, mutts used to be referred to as ‘mongrels’ but this has recently been deemed an offensive term. Because of this, I won’t be using this word to define Truist.
Word sensitivity matters at Truist, resulting in a sloppy mix of office slogans, where “purpose-driven” meets “we-just-made-this-up-last-quarter” in a boardroom PowerPoint with pastel color palettes. Employees spend more time deciphering the new mission statement than actually living it. Spoiler alert: it now includes the words “care,” “client-first,” and “synergy,” but no one’s quite sure in what order or why.
Corporate Alzheimer’s: We Forgot What We Forgot
Truist suffers from what can only be described as corporate Alzheimer’s. The company has forgotten what made it unique, but insists on throwing “culture town halls” to try and remember. These meetings often feature a rotating parade of HR-approved videos, buzzword bingo, and a freshly-minted culture acronym that mysteriously changes every quarter like a secret code only the chosen few can interpret.
Meanwhile, longtime employees walk around like ghosts of a forgotten era, muttering things like “We used to care about the client,” and “Remember when tech support picked up the phone?”
The Identity Vortex
At Truist, onboarding new hires feels like introducing them to a sitcom that’s switched lead actors mid-season… three times. New employees are handed a lanyard, a values handbook, and a riddle: “What does it mean to be Truist?” No one knows, but if you guess something vague like “leading with purpose,” you’ll pass orientation.
The real kicker? The company surveys its own people about culture, then disregards the answers like it’s reading horoscopes for entertainment.
The Theater of Authenticity
Of course, no modern cultural meltdown would be complete without performative authenticity. Truist puts out polished PR statements about “living our purpose” while internally ignoring its own advisory force and alienating talented people with processes so convoluted they’d make the IRS blush.
The moral of this story: Truist isn’t lacking culture—it just has too many and can’t decide which one to fake today.