Power Partners

More projects have followed in rapid succession. In order to build an Internet-based currency exchange for corporate customers, for example, Wells Fargo brought in OOP Inc., a Chesapeake, Virginia-based company that specializes in object-oriented programming -- a fast-track way of creating software. Wells Fargo could have tried to run the entire project internally, acknowledges Greg Shaurette, 38, an OOP principal. "But even a big bank like Wells Fargo might not have enough time and expertise to staff up for this," he says. "With us, it's a matter of 'been there, done that.'"

As tech-savvy startups help Wells Fargo move to the Web, it's becoming startlingly clear that a lot of routine banking can be done faster and cheaper on the Net. "A lot of customers' questions about wire transfers or interest rates are being handled by highly paid people,'' Ostler observes. "There's no reason for bank officers to be fielding calls from customers asking, 'Did the wire transfer go out?' We hope that with the Internet, we can do in one step what now takes two or three rounds."

Initially, Ellis's group worked in traditional banking offices in downtown San Francisco. Even there, though, Ellis set a casual but intense pace -- coming to the office in blue jeans most days, but starting work at 7 AM and frequently putting in 12-hour or longer days. Then, in May, Ellis's team moved to SoMa.

Putting desks on rollers isn't just an attempt to look cool, says Danny Peltz, 32, a senior vice president who is part of Ellis's team. It helps bankers to assemble the right-sized team for a project and then to disband within minutes of completing a task. Similarly, the office's open layout means that people can overhear snippets of others' conversations -- and can jump in with helpful ideas. As Peltz puts it, "It's nobody's space, and it's everybody's space."

And since bosses aren't isolated from workers, he adds, the big, open workspace becomes a brainstorming bazaar. Gone for good is the silo mentality that has traditionally plagued many banks, where people in different departments battle for control of projects, do little to help one another, and guard knowledge jealously.

Ellis's team is rolling out its most ambitious project yet: the Commercial Electronic Office, or CEO. This amounts to a Web-based version of all of the services that a sizable corporate customer would need. Plans call for new versions of the CEO to be launched every 60 to 90 days, expanding the services offered in the initial summer version. Right now, only 3% of Wells Fargo's 30,000 middle-market business customers do any major banking online. Ellis says that he would like to see that percentage rise to 10% or more by the end of the year.

In order to bring so many services to market quickly, Wells Fargo must not only work with startup partners; it must also redefine how to work fast. At a recent strategy meeting, Ellis looked at the time estimates for version two of the CEO and asked, "Are these business days, or are we counting weekends too?" His subordinates smiled. "Calendar days," said Peltz. "We work weekends," msaid another banker.

That all-out hustle is contagious. Another team is developing a purchasing service aimed at small firms, which don't want all of the features that are built into Ellis's large-company offering. In early June, Wendy Quast, 34, Wells Fargo's VP of business Internet services, still had not signed a contract with her startup partner on the project, San Mateo, California-based PointSpeed Inc. But that didn't stop her from holding almost-daily meetings with PointSpeed's team, fine-tuning the look of their jointly developed Web site, and drafting marketing plans for a launch. "We don't want to slow things down by waiting for lawyers,'' Quast says. "We'll get a contract signed in due course. But there's no sense in sitting still until all of the legal details are worked out."

At times, Wells Fargo bankers manage to outdo even their dotcom buddies in terms of round-the-clock passion for doing business on the Internet. Last winter, Scient consultant Gary Braitman, 36, joined a group of Wells Fargo bankers at a Lake Tahoe ski resort for a strategic review. One afternoon, Braitman was riding a chairlift with Ellis. The ski resort was engulfed by a blizzard, and ferociously high winds were battering the chairlift. Within minutes, many runs would shut down because of dangerous conditions.

None of that mattered to Ellis. He leaned over to Braitman, exuberantly described a possible new Internet-banking service, and shouted in the gale, "Do you think that would be an extension of what we're doing, or a true innovation play?"

"I don't care," Braitman muttered. "I just want to get off this mountain in one piece."