The paper resumes the presentation of internal factors affecting the marketing strategy of Polish retail banks. The April and May issues of Bank i Kredyt included two earlier parts of the paper, dealing with financial, material and human resources. This part focuses on intangibles, seeking to determine their impact upon the marketing activities of retail banks.

Amongst the intangible resources of the banks under analysis, the highest value is attached to their market assets. This refers in particular to two banks of the selected five: PKO BP and Bank Pekao SA, boasting the largest shares of the market, both in terms of customer numbers and the range of products (deposits, personal accounts and loans). At the same time, these two banks have the best-known brands and images, those latter somewhat tarnished by the rather low opinions of their customer service.

Other intangible resources seem to constitute a liability rather than an asset for the Polish banks researched, at least with respect to their marketing activities.

One element which appears to be evolving in the right direction is the organisational structure. The banks are gradually transforming from the traditional hierarchical structures towards flatter divisional and matrix structures, bound to support customer-focused banking. The most visible sign of the changes is the restructuring of branch networks and the creation of regional centres. This, however, results sooner from the introduction of new technology or consolidation processes than a conscious strategy.

The organisational changes, supposed to stimulate a more customer-oriented operation of the banks unfortunately tend to boil down to purely formal changes. This is because they are not supported by efforts towards developing an adequate corporate culture. On the contrary - the changes, along with the new technology, the restructuring of branch networks and rationalisation of staffing levels - often result in conflicts, in particular between the main office and the staff at the branches. Inefficient incentive systems coupled with a badly designed business process and high staff turnover pose another obstacle to creating a bank culture underpinned by a common value system.

Although the banks have many modern instruments of cost, risk and customer management at their disposal, their management styles leave much to be desired. Short term financial objectives prevail over long-term strategic ones, a tendency which can be observed particularly in the construction of evaluation systems for banks and their human resources.

The research leads to the conclusion that Polish banks - and particularly the largest ones - represent a very traditional model of operation, based primarily on the amount of assets and not their quality - or the expertise accumulated by the bank. Even the changes that do happen are, paradoxically, a testimony to such an attitude; they typically result from knowledge "purchased" outside (chiefly from consultants) or provided by strategic partners (foreign owners or shareholders). However, the problem is that the most valuable source of true and inimitable competitive advantage - i.e. the broadly understood corporate culture, common value system, experience of customer relations and other skills which constitute the secret of the company - cannot be purchased. It has to be developed internally.