Words Matter in Leadership

“Words Matter,” I did not create this phrase, the first time I heard it was from a great CEO I worked for, Gerry Agnes, at Elevations Credit Union. He used this short statement often. However, these two words take on a lot of nuanced meanings. When used in grammar and spelling, words say a lot…

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Preparing Your Culture Ready for Data Analytics

When most of us think about data, we think about numbers, charts, graphs, and reports. However, we need to talk about CULTURE. Collecting, aggregating, normalizing, manipulating, and presenting data seems to consume the conversation. However, here is the question we need to ask ourselves, “Is our culture ready to become truly data-driven?” Too often organizations…

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Culture = Rules of Engagement

It seems companies either overcomplicate or ignore their Culture. The reality is, your company’s Culture can, and should be, a way you can differentiate yourself from your competition, especially in the financial services world. Think of Culture as a pathway to creating a “competition of one.” A “competition of one” means you have no other…

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Data-Driven Marketing – A Primer

For marketers today, it was essential to bring to light how the Marketing team will provide offers to members as it’s a significant change to our traditional methodology. The new approach is designed to provide improved, more consistent and more relevant product offers using the wealth of data from our core and your ancillary systems…

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Behavior is your Brand

man in blue denim jacket doing hand sign

Branding is often seen through the wrong lens. It is often seen as a combination of your logo, promise, voice, font, and color palette. But to leave it there is an injustice to what brand really is. The brand is behavior. The behaviors your members/customers experience when they engage your employees, products, and services. Think…

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M&A – Don’t ignore the Culture

One of the primary growth strategies for credit unions includes Mergers and Acquisitions. Any decent CFO can aggregate the income statements and balance sheets and forecast the impact on the key ratios to establish the business case. The CTO can identify the projects to convert or combine technology platforms. The COO can consolidate the processes.…

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CMOs Need to Measure and Analyze the Data!

The CMO is faced with a constant challenge to prove the value of their marketing efforts. The channels we use continue to grow, the technology continues to innovate, and the consumer expects more personalization and customization of offers than ever before. To be successful, CMOs must collect, segment, analyze and visualize the data to create…

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What’s Up With Bank Websites? 7 Things to Fix What’s Broken

Bank websites look at them. They are ugly. They look like someone puked products and offers all over your iPad. They require the user to scroll endlessly. They have complex navigation points and menus, menus, and more menus. To research, find and buy requires many clicks. All of this is friction. Why can’t banks get…

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Branching Strategy, It Starts with the Member

Historically branches are seen as transaction channels. Today, this view of branches has changed and continues to evolve. Members and potential members like the convenience of brick and mortar, they like the demonstration of financial strength and security. Still, the truth is, they rely less on branches for their daily, weekly, and monthly transaction business…

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