Aug 13, 2020 | 3 min read

Creating a Mission-Driven Culture with Thomas South

By: Patrick Emmons

Creating a Mission-Driven Culture with Thomas South

When it comes to attracting talent, Thomas South believes it’s not necessarily about being specialized or competing based on benefits packages alone. Rather, he believes that maintaining a mission-driven culture is key to recruiting employees that will thrive in your organization.

As Chief Information Officer of Northern Trust, Tom oversees teams of technologists with extensive knowledge of the financial industry. While technology is integral to the company’s path forward, Tom has found that human touch is needed to complement an expanding suite of digital tools.

He joined Patrick and Shelli to discuss why mission-driven values are important to any business, as well as how to balance human knowledge and experience with increasingly remote, online environments.

  • (01:02) - Northern Trust
  • (04:16) - Competitive edge
  • (07:29) - High-touch service
  • (11:20) - The war on talent
  • (15:23) - Remote-only employees
  • (22:06) - Agents of change
  • (27:04) - Cross-training
  • (32:57) - Human-centered design

Thomas A. South is an Executive Vice President at The Northern Trust Company and currently serves as Chief Information Officer for the Firm. Tom was appointed Executive Vice President as head of Enterprise Business Architecture in February 2016, responsible for business unit technology strategy development, operations change management, and location strategy to support a scalable global operating model.

Prior to joining Northern Trust, Tom served in technology leadership roles at both Automated Concepts Inc. and Ace Hardware Corporation. Tom is active in volunteering and fundraising in various United Way and Make-a-Wish related activities and is seeking opportunities to provide greater support for gender diversity in the STEM fields.

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About Patrick Emmons

If you can’t appreciate a good sports analogy, movie quote, or military reference, you may not want to work with him, but if you value honesty, integrity, and commitment to improvement, Patrick can certainly help take your business or your career to the next level. “Good enough,” is simply not in his vernacular. Pat’s passion is for relentlessly pushing himself and others to achieve full potential. Patrick Emmons is a graduate of St. Norbert College with a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science and Mathematics. Patrick co-founded Adage Technologies in 2001 and in 2015, founded DragonSpears as a spin-off dedicated to developing custom applications that improve speed, compliance and scalability of clients’ internal and customer-facing workflow processes. When he is not learning about new technology, running a better business, or becoming a stronger leader, he can be found coaching his kids’ (FIVE of them) baseball and lacrosse teams and praising his ever-so-patient wife for all her support.

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We interview leaders from early-stage start-ups to billion-dollar enterprises who distill their lessons from their victories and their failures. Learn how these high-performing leaders organize their teams, establish a growth-minded culture, and leverage new technologies such as DevOps and Cloud.