Musings from the CU Suite

Written by Anthony Demangone

My colleague Eric is one of those Renaissance Men. He handles our IT and technology issues at NAFCU.

On the weekends, though, he hosts movie nights in his neighborhood, where he projects movies onto a screen - creating his own little drive-in theater for his kids and other neighborhood children.

Oh, but that's not enough. He builds furniture. He bakes. He loves home improvement.

I'm trying to keep his exploits a secret from my wife. My idea of "home improvement" is me walking through the door.

Eric's latest adventure, though, is pure genius. 

Here are Eric's cabinets. 

 

Normal, right?

But open them up, and you'll be surprised. Eric installed a dry erase board (via dry erase paint) and a tack board on the inside.

It is a brilliant concept that saves space and helps you stay organized. Eric took something with no value, and transformed it.

Many credit unions are doing the same sort of thing. 

• Using space in their lobby to highlight a local business that has an account with them. They rotate the business each month.
• Making their board room available to local charities, boards, etc., for meetings.
• Making training rooms available for area realtors, or groups that want to provide financial literacy training.

Credit unions are taking an unused asset, and squeezing as much juice as they can from it. The community is better, and the credit union takes credit. Seems like a win-win to me. 

And to the Erics of the world - I salute you! (And grumble under my breath, as you set a bad example to my better half!)

***

NAFCU members: We are announcing a new member benefit. Free training for your new employees. We've created five modules that will help introduce your new employees to our awesome industry. Here's what we're offering.

• Introduction to the World of Credit Unions
• BSA Training for New Employees
• Privacy and Security Issues
• Credit Union Share Insurance
• Pursuit of Excellence

I just found out that a few credit unions who were beta testing it wanted us to add a module to highlight discrimination issues (lending and workplace).  So it looks like I'll be adding that in the next few days. 

Go here for additional details, and let me know of other new employee modules that we should add. (Please send this to your HR/training peeps.)