CUES Skybox

Be a CEO: Tips for Landing the Top Job

By Charles Shanley, SPHR, & Steve Swanston

Do you want to be a CEO this year? Next year? In 10 years? As members of the John M. Floyd & Associates executive search team, we have helped place hundreds of executives in new positions. And we've learned what works and what doesn't when you're looking for a new job. First, our top recommendations to better prepare you for the CEO job hunt. Our next post will examine what not to do when looking for a CEO job.

1. Education: You need to have the right educational background. For CEOs, that means a bachelor's degree at the very least. A graduate degree is better.
2. Diversity: Position yourself in as many possible areas in the credit union as possible. This will be a huge advantage for the CEO who will be overseeing all areas, including marketing, lending and operations. The board of directors will look for candidates with a diverse background.
3. Tenure is important. There is a big difference between having 10 years of progressive experience vs. having two years in five different places. Be very prepared to explain your moves and if it was a bad decision on your part, take responsibility for it.
4. Upward mobility: You want to show growth in your career from an assistant vice president to a vice president to an executive vice president or senior vice president. Also, you should be able to cite specific examples of times when you took on new responsibilities in different areas.
5. Be tech savvy. As a CEO, you won't need to show programming skills, but you do need to have knowledge of the current technology options out there and how they fit into your business.
6. Show risk. You need to demonstrate that you have the ability to take risk. Show how a risk paid off for you in the past. Or explain when you took a risk that did not work and what you learned from the experience.
7. Be prepared. Anybody can spend two minutes before an interview to look up a little bit of information on the hiring credit union's Web site. You need to do more than that. We make all our candidates go through a business plan based on guidance we receive from the hiring board. These are usually quite in depth, up to 20 pages long and include the job candidate's goals for the credit union, a short-term strategy for the first six months and a vision for the future. You need to know the CU's financials; get that from the National Credit Union Administration's 5300 reports. Also, identify some current problems at the hiring credit union and have solutions to offer. Finally, prepare good questions to ask during your interview. For example, a CEO candidate could ask, "What is the board's current vision or strategic direction for the credit union?" 
8. Research the area: We suggest that you fly into an area to get a feel for it. Mystery shop the credit union's branches, in person and on the phone. Talk to community leaders about their perception of the institution. Know the geography. Know the market. What is the cost of living? Who are the major financial players?
9. Check out the CU's culture. As you are researching, pay attention to the culture of the organization you want to work for. What is the dress code? Is it a social group of people who get together outside of work or not? You need to make sure you match your personal philosophy with that organization.
10. Have good references: Pick the right people. These can be board members, the chairman, or your former CEO. Throughout your career, be building these references and stay in contact with them.
11. Be conservative in appearance. Always wear a suit, no matter what the culture is. Even if you know the CU has a business casual dress code, still wear a suit.
12. Be prepared for your financials to be examined, both on the professional and personal level. The hiring board of directors will want to know about your credit union's current financial outlook. And they will also run credit reports and background checks.
13. Run your own credit report to see what pops up. Make sure there aren't any mistakes and, if so, fix them beforehand.
14. Network. Pick a good recruiting firm. Network with your contacts in the industry. Join local chapters, councils and leagues. Use social networking sites like LinkedIn and Facebook.
15. Finally, be accountable for what's not working in your job search. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is Einstein's definition of insanity. If you are not getting the results you'd like during your job search, examine the layout and structure of your resume and review your interview techniques. You'd be amazed by how often people are not prepared for an interview, how many don't do the required homework. JMFA can help coach you through these problems but, in the end, the job seeker has to take the ultimate responsibility.

Charles Shanley, SPHR, is senior recruiter and Steve Swanston is EVP/business development at JMFA Executive Search Group, Baytown, Texas. Contact Steve at steve.swanston@jmfa.com or by phone: 866.264.5017.

CUES partners with JMFA ESG on executive search.

Expand your network via CUES' LinkedIn Group.

 

 

Professional Development Tidbit: Vogeney's Views

By Lisa Hochgraf

If you're a lending professional in CU land that hasn't yet read an article by CUES member Bill Vogeney, it's time to take a gander. SVP/Chief Lending Officer at $2.5 billion Ent, Colorado Springs, Bill's been contributing articles for CUES for some time and we are sure lucky. He has written about topics including the future of credit scoring and managing loan pricing. And he's lending (ah, the punniness of that!) a lot of perspective lately about how CUs got to where they are today.

Find the collection of Bill's CUES articles by searching cues.org for "Vogeney."

And watch your mailbox for the upcoming August issue of Credit Union Management magazine. In the operations section you'll find Bill's "Loan Zone" column, "After the Golden Age," which talks about how to move forward in this new era after consumer lending has passed its peak. (Ask for a preview in your comment, and I'll get one to you soon.) 

Lisa Hochgraf is board/operations editor for CUES' Credit Union Management magazine and edits the CUES Tech Port e-newsletter, News to Go.

Podcast: Current Issues in Credit Unions, #38

By Christopher Stevenson

CUES is pleased to be share with our readers this month's episode of Current Issues in Credit Unions, a monthly podcast about credit unions and the issues they face. In this episode, Hal, Guy, Katherine, Faith, and Rob bring you a spirited discussion on share insurance, red flags, the Credit CARD Act, and more on corporate stabilization. Katherine brings us her segment, "The Big K Roundup," and discusses Connecticut low-interest student loans and mortgage modifications.

The hosts of Current Issues in Credit Unions, episode 38, are:

Hal Scoggins, attorney,  Farleigh Wada Witt, Attorneys at Law, Portland, Ore.

Guy Messick, member,  Messick and Weber P.C. , Media, Pa. 

Katherine E. Weber, Esq, member, Messick and Weber P.C. , Media, Pa.

Faith Anderson, American Airlines Credit Union, DFW Airport, Texas.

Robert Rutkowski, shareholder, Weltman, Weinberg and Reis Co., L.P.A., Cleveland, Ohio

Are You Leveraging Your Cooperative Advantage?

By Christopher Stevenson

When I interviewed with CUES almost four years ago, I spent a lot of time researching credit unions to prepare. It seemed that in whatever I read about CUs, the term "non-profit cooperative" emerged again and again. When I started my job, staff described credit unions to me as cooperatives and the movement as a "cooperative movement." It wasn't up for question; credit unions were cooperatives. Now, over the course of the past three weeks, I've had a number of conversations with credit union staff, directors, and suppliers about the cooperative nature of CUs, and the cooperative hardline seems to be softening a bit.

Throughout my conversations, credit union insiders said things like:

• Credit unions are businesses that were built on cooperative principles.   
• People don't know what a credit union is, let alone the cooperative principles and field of membership.
• Credit unions say they provide better rates as cooperatives; some do and some don't. What's the credit union difference if they don't?
• There is only a co-op advantage if there is an actual strikingly obvious advantage to the consumer. Is there?

I believe that the cooperative business model provides distinct advantages over for-profit models, competitively and for the members. I also believe that many credit unions do a poor job of communicating the cooperative advantage. The benefit of cooperatives is not, as my friend Tim says, "just a cuddly feeling," but the tangible, hard-hitting benefits aren't communicated to the members, or for that matter, employees or directors, very well. 

The most important benefit of the credit union cooperative model is that credit unions are owned and controlled by their members. Unfortunately, most members believe their roles at the credit union are insignificant. This can be especially true with larger institutions. However, would their attitude change if they truly undersood that they alone reap the benefits or suffer the losses related to the credit union's performance? Not only that,their participation directly affects the other members of the credit union. Members are interdependent.

Does your credit union adequately explain how the organization is designed to work? I'd guess not. I've belonged to three different CUs and worked at one. Not one of them gave me the rundown on the cooperative model. Had they done it, It would have changed the way I approach banking.

There is a saying among cooperatives that a cooperative without an education program will last a generation and a half. While credit unions do a great deal to provide financial literacy programs to their members (which ultimately benefits the credit union membership), they do little to educate new and younger members about the cooperative or its history. In a recent class of credit union board members, the instructor asked how many in the room knew the origin of the credit union they served. Less than ten percent of the class knew why their credit unions were created. At the same time, credit union staff and board members lament that no one shows up for annual meetings or volunteers, and few new candidates run for the board. Consider it for a moment. If the average member doesn't understand how the structure of the credit union is different from a bank or how their actions directly affect their own bottom line, why would they serve? 

Member education becomes even more important as the credit union grows. In large, complex organizations, the member can feel far removed from the action. How can one person's voice be heard among 100,000 other voices? However, members who understand the credit union's distinguishing features and mission, how they are represented by the board of directors, the CU's background and history, the different programs offered, and the competitive environment in which the CU competes are more likely to continue their patronage, provide constructive feedback, and serve as effective salespeople for the credit union. (See Shari Storm's recent post on the effectiveness of word-of-mouth marketing.) Think about it, if you really understand the purpose of the organization and can get behind it, you're much more likely to support it, even in tough times. In short, money invested in educating members about cooperatives is money well spent.

So if communicating the cooperative advantage is so important, how do you actually do it? I'd start with the employees. Do your staff members, tellers included, know they work for a cooperative and what that means to the members? When I worked for a CU in college, I had no idea--it wasn't discussed--but I was on the front line meeting with members. Don't think that staff training on cooperatives can be completed in 15 minutes at the end of a staff meeting, either. The goal is to communicate the value of the cooperative so well that staff members can communicate it to anyone who comes in the door. That means that whoever is doing the training needs to have more than just a cursory understanding of the benefits of cooperatives as well.

Make it standard practice to include verbal and written explanation of the credit union model to all new and potential members who step foot in the CU. Encourage volunteerism from the outset, explaining that a member's active participation improves the quality of the cooperative and can have a positive impact on one's personal bottom line. Discuss the importance and relevance of participating in board elections in providing direction to the credit union. Really, if a member knows what they're in for when they join a credit union, one of two things will happen: They will either bolt for the door or they will embrace the concept and be the long-term, engaged members every CU longs to have. If you think checking accounts are sticky, imagine what volunteerism and community will do for your CU.

Credit unions are not just financial service providers. They operate on a different business model that not only provides a competitive advantage if it's done right, but that also can help engage members in the organization and provide them a sense of community. Now, I may be all pollyanna-ish on this, but I firmly believe that one of CU's greatest assets is the cooperative business model. Why put it under a bushel basket? Talk it up.

What’s Age Got to do With It?

By Ginny Brady

Are under-30-year-old credit union leaders discouraged from sharing their ideas with the boomers who predominate in credit unions today? Periodically, this is a question that's discussed in the blogosphere. Earlier this month my friend Tim McAlpine wrote a post for CUES Skybox that touched on this issue. He described the frustration experienced by "next gen" credit union leaders who bring new ideas to "the old-people-at-my-credit-union" only to be met with skepticism and lack of interest.

I have learned many valuable lessons from wonderful young credit union professionals and advocates like Tim. Willingness to dream, to take risks and to be innovative are qualities that invigorate the credit union movement. There are some opportunities to reshape and influence the structure of credit unions that place all of us, young/old, volunteer/professional, senior management/first-line staff, on equal footing. If all of us do not take our rightful place in speaking our minds and sharing our insights, then shame on us.

Last week, for example, the Adirondack Chapter of the Credit Union Association of New York sponsored a panel to update members on

NCUA's Corporate Stabilization Plan and the current financial status of Members United Corporate Federal Credit Union. NCUA Associate Regional Director of Operations Anthony LaCreta; Members United Corporate FCU EVP/Member Relationships Kevin Brauer, and Credit Union Association of NY Director of Compliance Mike Carter answered challenging questions on the current financial position of Members United. They discussed the value of services being provided by the CUANY and the culpability of NCUA for the current crisis.

Each speaker reminded the group that NCUA is currently developing a plan to reorganize the corporate system. The general consensus of attendees was that corporates provide an invaluable service to small credit unions and their members. In many instances corporate membership gives us access to the technological infrastructure necessary to offer competitive services to our members under the credit union banner.

Many in the group, however, questioned the need for 27 corporates and wanted safeguards put in place to avoid future financial crises. Mr. Carter pointed out that NCUA is in the process of formulating a plan to address these issues and had earlier asked for suggestions and responses to its Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking by those interested in credit unions. He reminded us that NCUA, along with organizations like CUNA, NAFCU and CUES, had publicized the ANPR and repeatedly asked for comments from credit union professionals, volunteers and advocates. Approximately 450 organizations and individuals wrote letters or e-mails to NCUA. This was a small percentage of the thousands of possible respondents.

The ANPR provided an opportunity for an important voice in shaping the future of credit unions. All input was encouraged and not restricted by age or status. Sharing ideas and suggested innovations with a single credit union leader or CEO is one thing, but here was an opportunity to have one's voice heard by those who develop policy affecting all credit unions in the United States.

Some respondents decided to add their voices together and speak as a group while others preferred to write individual suggestions. Group input came from state and national associations, corporates and individual credit unions.

One question that I have is whether young credit union professionals used this opportunity to present their ideas. I may be wrong but I do not recall any letters or e-mails that specifically represented the Gen Y perspective. What a powerful message might have been sent to NCUA had respondents identified themselves as speaking from a young professional or volunteer perspective! It is important for our future credit union leaders to be heard, recognized and encouraged. Those same innovators who represent the movement of the future need to look for every opportunity to influence and challenge, including something as establishment-focused as the ANPR.       

NCUA will again be providing us with an opportunity to speak up and give our feedback later this year. Those of us who want to influence the future of credit unions should take advantage of our equal voice and be front and center with our opinions and ideas.

Ginny Brady has been a credit union member for over 15 years and has served as a member of the Ufirst Federal Credit Union Board of Directors since 1997. She has held the position of board president and is currently board vice president at the $15 million CU. A CUES Director member, Ginny was awarded the 2008 Volunteer of the Year Award by the Credit Union Association of New York. She has also completed the CUNA Volunteer Leadership Program and received the Blue Diamond Certificate. She has also developed a board of directors blog, The Boardcast.

Read two other posts by Ginny: "A Model for Credit Union Board Renewal" and "Is it Time to pay Credit Union Directors?"