Growing Again: Jenius Bank Opens a Phoenix Office

Preliminary rendering of collaborative working space at the Phoenix office. Image provided by Forward Tilt.

In 2022, Jenius Bank opened its first office in Charlotte, North Carolina. As our team expanded, we looked for opportunities to open another office. We considered several cities, and the Phoenix area rose to the top of the list for a variety of reasons: its established infrastructure to support our business needs, access to top technology talent, and a high quality of life, to name a few.

In 2021, Phoenix was named one of the top 50 cities to live in by U.S. News & World Report. Phoenix is home to many financial and tech companies, placing Jenius Bank in good company. Admittedly, Phoenix is quite warm in the summer months, but many consider the desert climate a plus and a major reason to move there.

Technically the office is in Scottsdale, only 20 minutes from downtown Phoenix. If you’re familiar with Scottsdale, it’s home to several trails and parks that are perfect for hiking and camping, great restaurants, and top-notch golf courses. But rest assured, the team will be hard at work building Jenius Bank and rolling out lots of new products. If their golf games happen to improve, it’s only a coincidence!

Connecting with Top Talent

Our Chief Information Officer and his team will be based in Phoenix. With several products in the pipeline for 2023 and 2024, the tech team will be growing quickly, and the new office gives Jenius Bank the ability to add experts to our team.

"Phoenix has been growing as one of the largest tech talent pools in the country, and we have been able to attract a large number of tech people to Jenius Bank from the Phoenix area,” says Anish Jacob, Chief Information Officer.

This talent will have experience from multiple industries, including finance, technology, and data. Drawing on these different experiences, new team members can offer insights on growing and maturing our business. Nearby universities also have hundreds of students earning finance-related degrees and will allow us to recruit fresh and eager graduates.

Most Phoenix employees will be part of our engineering, development, and technology teams, but employees in other back-office departments that live in Phoenix can also take advantage of the office space. For junior team members, the office gives them in-person connections with senior employees to help them grow their skills.

“If I’m hiring a junior software developer, for example, with less than three years of experience, working a hybrid schedule out of the Phoenix office is a great way for them to be mentored by more senior developers and get entrenched in the company culture,” says Clayton Sierra, a Senior Recruiter for Jenius Bank.

Padmaja Kodavanti, Head of Engineering, is looking forward to having the chance to work with her team in-person. “I definitely see benefits to having a dedicated office space for more collaboration across the team, better work relationships and opportunities for me to connect more with the team and spend time mentoring.”

These new employees will join a team of over 200 Jenius Bank employees dedicated to creating a first-class digital banking experience.

Opening in Another Financial Hub

Phoenix has spent the past decade attracting companies to the area, particularly companies that have high data needs. With its low risk of natural disasters and comparatively low power costs, the city is a great location for many industries, including banks.

Like Charlotte, Phoenix is a financial hub that is home to operations for approximately 50 financial institutions, including American Express, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America.

“We wanted another central location for employees to gather,” says Eric Thompson, Jenius Bank’s Program Management Executive. “We also looked for a location that would allow for business continuity.” Being on a different power grid from our Charlotte office, Phoenix allows back-office functions to continue in case of a power outage on the East Coast.

In addition to this important business continuity consideration, the office site was chosen with our employees’ convenience in mind. Anish was very involved in the site selection. “Cavasson is a very new location with new buildings, and they’re building a community around it,” he says. The location will have amenities like a medical office, restaurants, and green spaces.

Place for Collaboration

Most of the Jenius Bank team works remotely from around the United States, but our teams in Charlotte and Phoenix offer employees a hybrid opportunity. Flexibility is a key component of our culture, and both offices allow connection and in-person collaboration, while giving everyone there the ability to work remotely when needed.

“My team plans to have a hybrid model of working,” says Padmaja. “We plan to be in the office a few days each week when key meetings and discussions take place. This will help us collaborate better with whiteboarding and brainstorming.”

As the first tenant in the space, we have designed and organized it to fit our needs. Employees will have access to modern workstations, a kitchen space, covered parking, and a coffee shop downstairs. We will also have open seating areas for groups to huddle and collaborate away from desks.

“Unless people want to come in on a daily basis, we will be using this office more for collaboration,” Anish says. “Instead of coming in every day, team members working together can come in on a cadence or use the space for planning and whiteboarding sessions whenever it’s appropriate.”

The space includes a large boardroom with room for 20 people and two smaller conference rooms for team meetings.

“The breakout area is going to be huge and become a good hub for some of our future Jenius Bank meetings,” Eric says.

The building is at the juncture of two major highways, making commuting to the office via car or mass transit easy. For team members visiting from other cities, they can fly into one of the two airports near the city and stay at the hotel a few hundred feet from the office building.

Want to join the Jenius Bank team? Check out our benefits and apply to one of our openings today. Our recruiting team is looking for candidates in both Charlotte and Phoenix to join our technology and engineering departments, as well as fill many other open roles.