ING: Scaling Growth Without Scaling Risk

In this conversation, Marnix van Stiphout, a senior leader within ING’s COO organisation, offers a clear and pragmatic view of what modern banking growth really looks like behind the scenes. While growth is often discussed in terms of new markets, products, or customer numbers, van Stiphout frames it through a different lens: how to grow safely, securely, and at scale — without adding unnecessary complexity.

ING’s strategy, he explains, is deliberately focused. Rather than chasing expansion for its own sake, the bank is committed to deepening its existing franchises across the markets where it already operates. That means expanding into adjacent segments — such as private banking, affluent customers, and business banking — while continuing to grow its core retail offering. Alongside this sits ING’s wholesale bank, completing what van Stiphout describes as the organisation’s four core pillars.

Each of these businesses brings its own operational demands, regulatory requirements, and risk profiles. The challenge for the COO organisation is not simply enabling growth, but doing so in a way that maintains resilience and consistency across the group. For van Stiphout, this is where productivity becomes the defining factor. Growth cannot rely on endlessly adding people, systems, or layers of process. Instead, ING is focused on becoming so efficient and well-organised that it can add customers, services, and volume without proportionally increasing cost or risk.

This philosophy reflects a broader shift in large financial institutions. Banks can no longer rely on scale alone as a competitive advantage. As complexity increases, scale can just as easily become a liability. The real differentiator is the ability to operate intelligently — with streamlined processes, strong controls, and platforms that are designed to support long-term growth.

Van Stiphout’s role, working closely with the wider COO leadership team, is to ensure that ING’s growth ambitions are matched by operational excellence. That means building capabilities that are secure by design, compliant by default, and flexible enough to support different customer segments across multiple geographies. It also means resisting the temptation to over-engineer solutions when simplicity will do the job better.

At its core, ING’s approach is about balance. Growth and safety are not opposing forces — they are interdependent. Sustainable expansion only works when productivity, security, and scalability move in lockstep. Van Stiphout’s message is clear: the future of banking growth belongs to institutions that can do more without doing more damage to their own complexity.