By Frank J. Diekmann
The Twitterverse has been quite fond of retweeting one person’s observation that one word is now being used an unprecedented number of times. The word: unprecedented. It isn’t alone. Finishing in the top three with “unprecedented” in the new buzzword usage cloud is “uncharted waters” (often mistakenly presented as “unchartered waters” in numerous credit union tweets and statements), and “normal,” as in, “when things get back to normal.”
It’s that last one that really deserves your attention and the attention of everyone in credit union leadership. You’ve heard the word countless times and in countless situations. People—you, your friends, kids and coworkers, all asking, “When will things get back to normal?” Or just casually inserted into the sentence, “When things get to normal…” as if it’s all a fait accompli.
But what if it’s not? What if things never get back to “normal,” or at least not the normal as we all knew it? Have you prepared for that? Are there opportunities you should already be planning to grab? You can bet others, especially in the fintech space, already are.
Consider these questions:
The Coronavirus’ Marketing Push
Credit unions have long pushed members toward electronic services, but at most CUs it’s been a gentle push, a nudge, a suggestion. None could have ever imagined their most powerful marketing tool ever for online/mobile banking would be a virus completely different from the types they and their IT departments had always battled.
Despite a semi-resurgence in flip phones, Americans seldom migrate to a new convenience and then back to an analog inconvenience. How many members who have been forced to learn to use the e-tools available to them have realized they no longer need to visit a branch and will be permanently crossing that off their to-do lists from now on?
Not Just the Stuff of Movies
For credit unions themselves, there are an unprecedented number of longer-term questions to be asking. You say you’ve been able to check the box when it comes to the ability to handle increased traffic without buffering or even crashing? Congrats. Now, the longer term and more important questions include how do you enhance those services in ways that deliver the personalization of an in-branch visit? I mean so it really feels personal?
Over the weekend I was reading some, let’s say interesting, data on the number of people in “friend” and even “romantic” relationships with AI-powered chatbots. It’s in the tens of millions, if not more. If you’re dismissing that as just the stuff of Hollywood movies such as “Her” and “Ex Machina,” isn’t that what we used to say about the pandemics seen in movies such as “Contagion” and “Outbreak”?
It’s time you are investing some serious money in your own AI and chatbots, because setting aside for a moment what it means in the larger context, “personal” is changing.
The New Google is Goggles
Speaking of which, for several years when I’ve spoken to various CU groups I have urged them not to underestimate the change being brought about by virtual reality and augmented reality goggles. As the world goes 5G and the tech improves, it seems the real future is a hybrid one in which members will virtually interact “face to face” via those goggles. Think that would be unprecedented? So is that device you carry with you everywhere now and on which you are perhaps even reading this column. Less than 20 years ago it was unthinkable you would be carrying your world in your pocket; today, it’s unthinkable you wouldn’t be. Get ready to strap on a headset.
Put Away the Shovels?
What about your branches? There’s been boffo business this decade for purveyors of those silver-plated shovels used in ceremonial groundbreakings for new CU offices. But will the changes in habit brought about by the coronavirus put an end to all those new branches and HQs as people do more business via their apps?
America’s Credit Union Museum is currently offering a video tour of what the original CU office looked like. But what if that video tour of what is a very good museum isn’t so much a look back but a look forward? Are your own branches just fodder for future historical tours?
Many branches have already gone through redesigns to become “consultative” spaces with smaller footprints. It increasingly looks like tomorrow’s footprint is going to be hand-held. Get ready.
Remote Workforce Not So Remote
Here’s another unprecedented change to be thinking about, as it’s likely to become far more “normal”: Working from Home. I agree with Timothy L. Anderson, CEO of U.S. Senate FCU who earlier shared this observation: “Has this experience now changed how we view remote work? Certainly. Obviously we had a few people working from home at times, on a needs basis. But remote work was not a philosophy we endorsed. After this pandemic passes, this credit union, and I believe many others, will view remote work differently. Overall, as a society we are becoming more remote in how we work. This may be the wave of the future.”
Certainly, there is immeasurable value in the value of collaboration, the hallway conversations and more that take place when employees are all together in one place. Plus, human beings are social animals; I mean, who ever thought they’d miss Ed in Accounting before the coronavirus quarantined us all?
But do people have to come to work five days a week? Do they really need the commute and the gas expense and the traffic every day? Plus, there are a lot of benefits to being at home that many employees have quickly learned to appreciate, beginning with the dress code. For parents, once that other “normal” returns with kids back in school (I expect to see teachers getting more thank you notes in the future and a much nicer end-of-year gift), working from home offers a new flexibility they are not going to want to surrender.
Sure, there are disadvantages, too. When not on the road I have worked from home for about 15 years, and as I have observed before, it’s not so much working from home as it is living at work, especially in this business. Burnout can become a new risk CUs will need to manage.
CU Boards Need to Step Up
A criticism that has long been lobbed against credit union boards is they aren’t forward-looking enough, and like the government are often responding to the last crisis. It’s likely most boards haven’t given much thought to the longer-term implications of what the coronavirus pandemic will mean to society, consumers and the credit unions that serve them.
But here’s some good news: most need look no further than themselves for a “new normal” change it’s doubtful their 2020 strategic plans ever considered: they are “meeting” virtually themselves. And they’ve had to get up to speed on the technology fast.
And that’s, what’s the word? Unprecedented.
What Do You Think?
What do you think? What longer-term changes are taking place right now that are likely to be permanent that I have missed mentioning here? Let me hear your thoughts at Frank@CUToday.info.
Frank J. Diekmann is Cooperator in Chief at CUToday.info and can be reached at Frank@CUToday.info.