As a banking institution, Wells Fargo owes its customers trust, transparency, and accountability. However, the company seemed unbothered by this as it was driven by short-term goals of aggressive cross-selling quotas to meet unrealistic sales goals. This saw it create more than 2 million customer bank and credit card accounts without their customer’s permission. The company resorted to opening fake bank accounts. In doing so, employees with the knowledge of the bank’s manager falsified customer signatures. The short-term goal of this scheme was for the employees to earn monetary rewards under a compensation program advanced by the bank.
It was also crafted for the purpose of retaining the bank at the top position in market capitalization. Indeed, these short-term goals violated the duties that Wells Fargo had to its consumer, regulators, and employees. They ruined the bank’s reputation and image in the eyes of its consumers. The regulators lost trust in the bank as a result of the scandal as well. Meanwhile, employees were coerced to engage in unethical and criminal activities to meet the unrealistic targets set by the bank.