Top 5 NTCUE Finalists

Today, after weeks of preparation, the five Next Top Credit Union Exec Finalists made their final presentations during CUES’ CEO/Executive Team Network™ in Savannah, Ga.

The Finalists, five young credit union employees, have been blogging and posting videos at NextTopCreditUnionExec.com about their respective projects in preparation for the face-off event.

(In the photo at right are, from left, Colleen Tilton, Ali Fett, Nicole Haverly, Shannon Cahoon and Michael Murdoch.)

The Finalists had seven minutes to recap their projects in front of the judging panel and a live audience at CEO/Executive Team Network. The public can also vote online for their favorite Finalists between 3 p.m. Eastern time on Oct. 24 and 5 p.m. Eastern time on Oct. 25.

Here’s a recap from each finalist. Or watch the full 2016 NTCUE finals videos. Then vote for your favorite!

Shannon Cahoon, community outreach coordinator at $967 million Fibre Federal Credit Union, Longview, Wash., started by comparing her project to track the return on investment of financial education to Sasquatch. “As credit unions we have the unique opportunity and the imperative duty to offer our members financial education, to help them become more capable consumers and towards living more financially-stable lives. But as credit unions, we must also be able to stand before our members and guarantee an appropriate return on the programs that we offer. … I wanted to create a process where credit unions could use resources we already have available us to measure the programs that we’re offering to see the impact that they are really bringing back to our bottom line. … The fact that many credit unions don’t do this has led me to equate financial education with what I call the Sasquatch quandary.” If you’re not a Sasquatch believer, why not? It’s the lack of proof, she said. “How many of your credit unions offer financial education? It’s great to see [so many hands]. How many of you can tell me the exact dollar figure that program returned to your credit union last year? No one, right? As credit unions, we’re really good at doing the good stuff. We just aren’t as good at showing how these valuable programs are also having an impact on our bottom line.” View Cahoon’s presentation to learn how she has created a process to measure profitability for financial education programs.

Ali Fett, AVP/talent development at $760 million Verve, a Credit Union, Oshkosh, Wis.,  introduced her project, The Jar, by saying, “In researching engagement and how to help our team members have a fuller life, everything came back to this theory, rooted in psychology called Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. It’s a theory to help us understand each other’s needs as humans. Maslow suggests that we have this deep desire to reach a level of self actualization, or our full potential. Those that reach that level are more engaged. They have a deep sense of empathy. They’re more creative, have problem solving skills and overall are happier and more positive. The problem is only 15 percent of us reach that level.” Find out what’s in each jar when you view her presentation.

Nicole Haverly, senior portfolio manager at $1.8 billion Affinity Plus Federal Credit Union, Saint Paul, Minn., spoke of her project, the Savings Accelerator Program. “It’s a program of interlocking gears,” she said. When members take out or refinance an auto loan, they also open a new savings account, which has a higher interest rate and they agree to make monthly payments into that account. In addition, the corresponding loan has a reduced interest rate, depending on credit score. When loan is paid off, the member has an accumulation of savings. “On average, the members save about $1,000 or more,” she said. The program launched earlier this year and has resulted in 165 loans with a total of $2.3 million in funding. So far the CU has saved members more than $16,000 in interest and cumulatively members have saved more than $50,000. “I know that the Savings Accelerator Program is … not going to change the world, but I do know that when we have programs like this that are scalable and they’re relevant  … we’ll make our employees’ and our members’ lives a lot better with all their increased savings.” Learn more when you view Haverly’s presentation. 

Michael Murdoch, marketing specialist at $236 million NW Priority Credit Union, Portland, Ore., started off by saying, “I’m a fifth generation Oregonian. I’ve never really known poverty. My family is lawyers and dentists and loggers. I’ve never lived it. But when I think about how many kids are out on the street every year, it always makes me emotional just to think about it. Last year, over 36,000 children were on the street, on any given night, in the United States. So I’m here today because I believe financial education can help alleviate that. … My project is People Providing Hope. It’s a financial literacy program that offers banking, teaches credit, budgeting, savings, life skills and social skills, all through hands-on, one-on-one mentorship and coursework.” The program is currently being offered through three community organizations in the Portland area. One day after working with some of the children helped through the program, Murdoch thought, “I need to be doing more … and then I remembered I’ve got one of the greatest team at my back: Credit unions! I have credit unions to help me make the world a better place. So I need more help. This is just a model. This is just an example of something you can do in your community. It doesn’t have to be People Providing Hope. But I want you to think about the people in your lives that you can tap, teams that you can leverage to go out and do something that improves lives.” View his presentation.

Colleen Tilton, director/staff development at $440 million Blackhawk Community Credit Union, Janesville, Wis., explained that an employee engagement survey showed training was an area of contention for Blackhawk Community CU staff. Employees either thought they didn’t get enough training or that there wasn’t accountability for the training they did receive. Tilton created “Learn to Earn,” to help the credit union transition to a learning organization. “Learn to Earn is a revolutionary way that we pay our employees from a [cost-of-living adjustment] organization to one that rewards them for education. When I was designing the framework for Learn to Earn, I wanted to mirror that college planning process, from meeting with an advisor to choosing classes and coming up with a development plan. From that we will be doing a discovery class in which employees will go through personal and professional assessments and decide where they want to be in their career. And we will help them through that process.” One of her favorite parts of the program: each senior manager will teach a class on their own part of the business. For example the CEO will do a strategic planning course and the CFO will lead a credit union finance class. To pay for the program, the CU revamped how it does compensation. “Instead of doing COLA increases, we will only be doing increases for those who enroll in the Learn to Earn program. We will also be eliminating our sales incentive program as well as centralizing our training budget to decrease duplicate efforts.” View her presentation.

The Finalist with the highest score, based on a combination of judging panel results, audience votes, online votes and social media engagement, will earn the title of 2016 CUES Next Top Credit Union Exec and a $20,000 educational prize package from CUES. The competition is supported by a partnership with CUES strategic partner DDJ Myers Ltd., Phoenix, and CUES Supplier member Currency, Chilliwack, B.C., Canada.

Watch the live-streamed announcement on NextTopCreditUnionExec.com at 8 a.m. Eastern time, October 26.