Individuals and the industry benefit when credit union executives undertake professional development.
By Soma Sarkar
I’ve learned a lot about growth during my credit union career. When I was hired in 1994 to fill a branch manager opening at the Credit Union of New Jersey, I was my CU’s 12th employee. Back then, CU of New Jersey had $42 million in assets and was a cash operation. Now, it has 99 employees, $317 million in assets and is a full-service financial institution. As the credit union has grown, so has my role in it. Now I’m EVP/chief operations officer, overseeing all the CU’s retail branches, plus lending, compliance and a call center. I think my plan to attend the three years of CUES’ CEO Institute is an important next step, not only toward my own professional growth and the future success of the credit union, but also the overall development of leaders for the future of the CU industry. I’m excited to begin next month by attending CEO Institute I at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. As credit union executives, we need to prepare ourselves and our peers as strong leaders to keep the movement going forward. With the number of credit unions shrinking and CEOs retiring, keeping qualified leaders at credit unions rather than leaving for banks or the insurance industry is important. I am very excited because I am going to be networking with my peers and will be taught by some of the world’s finest instructors. This is a rare opportunity to bring learning of this caliber back to my credit union. After talking to previous graduates of the program, I found it easy to enroll. You can go to any class and learn something, but there needs to be a practical element and you need to be able to practice new skills. People who are coming out of the CEO Institute are equipped to apply the information they’ve learned. That’s how you get the ROI out of the money spent. To take the next step into a CEO position, I need some help in thinking and presenting strategically. At CU of New Jersey, we encourage education and reading. In fact, we encourage it a lot. We make management books and leadership books available to foster an environment of continuous improvement. You need to be able to educate yourself to move forward in this industry. Growth begets growth. From my participation in CEO Institute, I’ll be able to share the learning with my credit union team members, which will strengthen the organization as a whole, and the industry as well. That’s a win-win-win by any measure.
CUES member Soma Sarkar is EVP/chief operations officer for $317 million CU of New Jersey, Ewing, N.J. A few spots remain for CEO Institute I: Strategic Planning, April 12-17 at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. Or register for the summer session of CEO Institute I, Aug. 16-21, also at Wharton.
