Uniting all young colleagues within the bank
If you want to expand your network, develop your skills, get a better understanding of the bank and have fun, RING – ING’s community for employees under 36 – offers all this and more. International Youth Day, which is being celebrated on 12 August this year, is the ideal occasion to shine a spotlight on this network!
With 2,500 members at ING Belgium, RING is a substantial network within the company. Dorsan de Biolley (27) and Anton Lauwers (28) are two of them. They are also both RING board members, responsible for keeping the community alive and engaged.
Finding your way in the company
Anton and Dorsan both felt they wanted to do more than ‘just’ fulfilling their day-to-day role. Dorsan: “RING gives me the opportunity to meet new people who are in the same situation as me - that’s to say in their first or second role and finding their way in the company. RING unites all young employees who work in all kinds of different roles, locations and domains, so it’s super interesting.”
Bigger perspective
This is exactly what triggered Anton too, when he decided to join the board. Anton: “I really like the bigger perspective RING gives me. The network allows me to get to know lots of people and to understand the bank and our business better. In addition, it’s an excellent place to develop skills that you don’t necessarily use on a day-to-day basis, like event organisation, public speaking or stakeholder management.”
A good mix
Both: “Besides all this, the fun factor is important. Everybody benefits from a pleasant and energising work environment. It makes an important contribution to your job satisfaction. With our events, we aim for a good mix of connecting people – both with other young colleagues and with the senior management – as well as learning and having fun. We see that the members of the community really appreciate our activities, although the ‘connecting’ aspect has been quite a challenge in the past year due to COVID-19.”
Live events
Anton and Dorsan hope to be able to start holding live events again when everything gets back to normal. Anton: “Before the pandemic we organised three or four key events a year, including company visits (such as a joint visit with RING NL to the Dutch Tesla factory in Tilburg), lunch with the CEO, trips to ING locations abroad, and what I regard as a personal highlight: the End of Year Quiz on the top floor of our headquarters, together with senior management.”
Dorsan: “Luckily we don’t have to organise all this alone. There are five of us on the RING Belgium board in total. Besides Anton and me, there’s Carole Demin, Theodore Rihoux and Benjamin Urbain. Furthermore, RING BE is cooperating more than ever with the other ING networks, to get a broader view, connect people even more and focus on diversity and inclusion.”
About Dorsan
27-year-old Dorsan joined ING as part of the International Talent Programme in the Retail track. During this traineeship he worked in London for six months. He now works as a Relationship Manager for medium-sized companies in Business Banking. Dorsan is a big fan of tennis and hockey, both as a player and as a supporter. He is also very interested in cinema; Christopher Nolan and Guy Ritchie are his favourite directors.
About Anton
Anton is 28 years old and joined ING in September 2016 after finishing his master’s in Economics. He works in the Receivable Finance team within Wholesale Banking. He plays badminton at competition level. Last year, he made the bold move to join Belgium’s reserve army and he’s now in the middle of his training to become a navy officer.