CUaware held the June Lunch & Learn at State Employees’ Credit Union Operations Center where over 35 attendees learned about a collaborative CUDE project.  The project is a financial reality simulation called “The Reality of Money”.

Kelli Cheatham, Member Education Specialist at SECU, outlined the program for the attendees.  The program’s intent is to educate students on the basics of setting a budget and the consequences of purchase decisions. 

As usual, we have a CUaware quiz question to earn one of our cool t-shirts.  The question this time was based on the presentation and Ashley Springs from Summit Credit Union was first to correctly answer the question. 
Congrats to Ashley, and we hope to see you sporting your new shirt at the next event!

“The Reality of Money” is built on the philosophy of People Helping People, and this program will be available to credit unions.  For details and more information, please contact Jeff Hardin at the North Carolina Credit Union League.

On March 20, CUaware had another first: a Young Professionals (YP) Lunch-and-Learn. This L-n-L featured David Brehmer, CEO of First Carolina Corporate Credit Union. He taught us all about reading financial statements; even printing out end-of-year financial statements for everyone who registered for the event. The 44 attendees enjoyed a catered lunch while learning more about their credit union's financial statements. 

Please see Mr. Brehmer's presentation below to learn more!

Understanding Balance Sheets

The Triad Chapter of CUaware and the Northwest Chapter of the North Carolina Credit Union League joined efforts to hold a CUsocial and Northwest Chapter meeting at Foothills Brewing in Winston-Salem on February 12.

CUaware founders Patrick Livingston and Brandon McAdams gave a presentation to a group of 45 people on the purpose of CUaware and its mission to help create the next generation of credit union leaders.

The event also bolstered CUaware’s presence in the Triad, an effort led by Jessica Dillon, Chair of the Triad Chapter; Amie Hawley, Vice Chair of the Triad Chapter; and Carla Kimel, Volunteer Coordinator of the Triad Chapter.

In addition to coordinating CUaware socials, the Triad group announced they will lead a new volunteer effort and community service initiative called Project Backpack. This project will be a joint effort among credit unions in the Piedmont Triad with the objective of collecting essential supplies for homeless men and women, pack the supplies in backpacks and distribute them while credit union professionals volunteer to help feed the homeless on Sunday, March 31. Contact Carla Kimel at carlak@memcu.com to get involved by collecting, donating or distributing backpacks and supplies.

More info on Project Backpack

What do Credit Unions and onions have in common?

If you had of joined the 25 other Credit Union professionals at the Quorum Center for the first CUaware speaker series event of 2013, you would know!

Last Thursday, January 17, lots of new and “seasoned” faces came together to listen to John Radebaugh, Jeff Hardin and Eric Gelly from the North Carolina Credit Union League give us a high-level view of the Credit Union industry today. Using the Credit Union Developmental Educators (CUDE) metaphoric symbol, “the onion,” each layer of the credit union industry was discussed.

John covered the role of the credit unions, chapters, state leagues and the Credit Union National Association (CUNA). Jeff spoke of his experiences overseas with the World Council of Credit Unions (WOCCU) helping the Credit Union movement grow and thrive in other countries. Finally, Eric spoke on all the other partners in the industry like the corporate credit unions, credit union foundations and credit union service organizations (CUSOs) as well as the various regulators over credit unions.

Thanks to them, we no longer have to wonder about all of those crazy Credit Union acronyms, and we have a better appreciation of Credit Unions around the world!


We would like to extend a special “thank you” to our 2013 sponsor, CUNA Mutual Group, and to everyone who braved the "storm" to learn more about the industry in which they work.  We hope to see you all at our February event! 

Click on the link below to access a summary of the 2012 Year-End Survey. Thanks to everyone who participated!

By James P. Grenon, Director of Lending, Piedmont Advantage Credit Union

Recently, I had the privilege of attending the 2012 CUNA Lending Council Conference in Miami, FL, and represented both Piedmont Advantage Credit Union (Winston Salem-based CU) and young CU professionals from NC. I say it was a privilege because where else can you network among top lending CU peers nationwide in mid-70 degree weather all week and not care about coming back to NC with a tan! I think the conference planners strategically placed us in conference rooms without windows so we would remain engaged and not daydream about the crashing waves and palm trees outside our hotel in beautiful South Beach.

Speaking of Crashers, it was refreshing to see a great representation of YP’s at the conference led by Sean Flynn (Tampa-based, GTE Financial) and Mike London (Atlanta-based, Delta Community CU) who are members of the Cooperative Trust, which is a grassroots group of young CU professionals that started from their efforts with Crash the GAC a couple of years ago.

Sharing among peers is invaluable, but in addition to networking there was an all-star lineup of keynote speakers and presenters giving high-level relevant information impacting our industry and highlighting the conference theme of Innovate, Collaborate & Grow. If I had to sum up everything I learned from the conference, my top 10 highlights and musings would be: 

10. In your mobile banking and social media strategies, do not assume only younger members use these channels. Brett King, author of Bank 2.0, says “70% of Gen Y will be mobile banking first by 2015; half of all customers will be by 2016.”        

9. CU’s not offering private student lending is losing opportunities to forge a 10- to 15-year relationship with young members and their parents.  

8. 47 is average age of a CU member. Business will fail without acquiring the next generation of consumers in next five years. How do we overcome this as an industry and as an individual CU? 

7. What happens in an Internet minute? 100k tweets, 1.3M video views & 6M Facebook inquiries. Do you think your CU needs a social media strategy? 

6. “Banking is no longer a place you go; it’s just something you do” says Brett King. There is a major shift from physical product bought in a physical store to digital product bought in a digital store. Did you buy your iPhone app in a store?    

5. 2013 is the year of Mortgage Compliance with more than 3,500 pages of regulations comprised of seven major proposals heading our way. Bill Klewin, CMG’s Compliance Leader, says you must “Build, Borrow or Buy compliance staff to survive upcoming regulatory changes.”    

4. “The U.S. Economy is heading in the right direction, just at the wrong speed” says CUNA Economist, Mike Schenk. Consumer confidence is up and that’s good news for loans. How can we jumpstart it?       

3. Make sure your CU’s lending strategy includes ways to minimize friction (hassle factors) to make member experience easier and in real time.

2. Find ways to get members to say “yes”. Brett Christensen, Owner CU Lending Advice, discusses how CU’s were formed to serve the under-served. These are the members with the greatest need and have the fewest options.  

1. Regardless of your field of expertise, there is a CUNA Council for you to join and actively participate in to ensure the future success of our industry.

September's CUaware event will feature none other than Jim Blaine, the president of State Employees' Credit Union, the second largest credit union in the country.  This will be an intimate Q&A inside the SECU Daily Planet at the NC Museum of Natural Sciences.  Besides being such an iconic setting, this feature of the museum was funded by the SECU Foundation, an inspiring example of the credit union operating principle, "Concern for Community."

Join us on September 20th at this amazing location or check out the live stream below.  Eitherway, don't miss this event and have your questions ready via a hand raised or a tweet sent!

David Jamshid, a Business Analyst with Coastal Federal Credit Union, recently returned from a credit union immersion program through WOCCU that sent him to Guatemala for an International Credit Union Leadership Program. The Program is designed to facilitate idea exchanges, promote foreign language skills development, enhance cultural diversity and improve problem-solving skills as they relate to credit union development and management on a global basis. David was one of nine young credit union professionals from five U.S. states. Participants were hosted by Guatemala's largest credit union system, MICOOPE, to learn about the growth strategy that led it to reach more than 1 million members today.

David presented a review of his trip and shared some of the 'out of box' thinking making credit unions successful in their respective markets at the CUaware event in Raleigh on August 16.  The presentation is below.

For a recap from WOCCU, click here.