N26 snaps up ex-Dropbox exec Adrienne Gormley as new COO

Written by Ruby Hinchliffe
1st October 2020

N26 has announced its new chief operating officer (COO), ex-Dropbox vice president and Irishwoman Adrienne Gormley.

The German challenger bank is active in the Republic of Ireland, with around 100,000 Irish customers. The bank pulled from the UK in February due to complications related to Brexit.

Last month, Georg Hauer, N26’s general manager for its home markets – Germany, Austria and Switzerland – became the new head for Ireland.

The bank said his appointment pointed to the importance of the Republic of Ireland as its only English-speaking market.

N26’s new COO Adrienne Gormley

New COO Gormley will head up N26’s global customer service, business operations, service experience and workplace divisions.

Gormley’s career history

Gormley, who is on the board of the American Chamber of Commerce, most recently served as Dropbox’s vice president of global consumer customer experience.

She also simultaneously headed up operations in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) for the file hosting service.

Prior to joining Dropbox in 2014, Gormley spent seven years at Google. During her time at the Big Tech, Gormley managed multi-million-dollar product localisation in EMEA.

She also ran German mid-market sales teams covering retail, travel and automotive industries. She built operations to manage Google Geo in 25 markets. And she headed up Google advertising for small businesses in Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland.

Styles joins as chief people officer

N26 has also announced a second key appointment in the last month in Diana Styles, who is joining as chief people officer.

Styles, a former Adidas executive, arrives at the start-up shortly after a dispute with employees over establishing a works council in August.

N26’s founders obtained an injunction against its workers that month. Its employees eventually succeeded in establishing representation. The action followed accusations that confidence in management is at an all-time low.

Valentin Stalf and Maximilian Tayenthal, N26 founders, claimed the elected body would go “against almost all values that we believe in at N26”.

The fintech opposed two separate German unions which provided venues for staff to meet. The co-founders later apologised for their actions against employees.