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If I told you I have a podcast where a credit union executive tells you about high rates on CDs, free checking, and super cheap new car loans, how quickly would you turn the dial and give a listen to Joe Rogan?

Right, you know the answer.

So I will tell you what I really have is a fascinating podcast with Josh Rodriguez at West Community Credit Union in Missouri, an institution approaching a half billion in assets.

That’s because Rodriguez is doing things I’ve never heard about at credit unions.

But keep in mind on LinkedIn he identifies himself as Innovator/CU Professional/Storyteller.

I met Rodriguez at the CU 2.0 Live event in Arizona in June and when he told me he is a storyteller I knew I had to get him on this show. I had never before encountered a credit union executive who said he/she is a storyteller.

And you know…stories are the most powerful form of communication.

In this show, Rodriguez talks about why stories are so potent, he also talks about a creative content package he has developed to help West Community’s employees better know the execs in the c-suite…and maybe also do some thinking about their own career development.

And then he drops the bomb that West Community has planned a series of podcasts where members will tell their stories about their relationship with the credit union. You have to hear how Rodriguez describes this project - and hear, too, the passionate excitement in his voice as he opens his playbook.

Here's the website for these shows http://bankingonyoupodcast.com/

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Keith Leggett is a name that used to provoke cursing by usually mild mannered credit union executives - and so here he is again in a CU 2.0 Golden Oldies podcast.

Leggett has retired from the American Bankers Association, where he was chief economist, and he also has put -30- on his Credit Union Watch blog but this show from the archives is well worth a listen in 2025 because it focuses on credit union - bank mergers and also on credit union tax exemption. Two issues that are even bigger headlines now.

In the show we discuss Maine Harvest, an innovative credit union idea that alas merged with Five County Credit Union in 2022.

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Could this really be the end?

For going on 20 years I have heard screams - usually emanating from one trade group - that the credit union tax exemption was in peril. I thought that was a terrific membership renewal hook but didn’t seen any likelihood of passage.

This year is different. This year the threat is real. On the show is Jason Stverak,, chief advocacy officer at DCUC, the Defense Credit Union Council, whose membership includes the nation’s biggest credit unions but also smaller ones too. All primarily serve military, active duty and retirees.

DCUC has not been the association with a long history of yelling about tax exemption.

But Stverak says that indeed the threat is real.

He also explains what the impacts on DCUC credit unions would be were the tax exemption to go away. And the impacts would be sizable and harmful, both to credit union members and the communities in which DCUC members operate.

In a recent show, onetime Bethpage CEO Kirk Kodeeski warned that if credit unions lost the ax exemption their business model would be shattered.

On this show we hear exactly what that would mean for defense related credit unions.

It’s ugly.

By the way, how much money do you think would be saved were the tax exemption to go away?

Three billion dollars.

That is chump change in today’s Washington DC.

Hear how DCUC is fighting back in this show.

By the way, four years ago DCUC CEO Tony Hernandez (US Air Force retired) was on the show. Hear his episode here.

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Like what you are hearing? Find out how you can help sponsor this podcast here. Very affordable sponsorship packages are available. Email rjmcgarvey@gmail.com

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Find out more about CU2.0 and the digital transformation of credit unions here. It's a journey every credit union needs to take. Pronto

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Here’s the question: Is the First Tech - DCU merger of behemoths a sign of mergers to come or it is an outlier, a one-off deal that arose because of unique circumstances and histories??

Kirk Kordeleski, onetime CEO at Bethpage, itself a member of the behemoth club, and now a SERP expert with PARC Street Partners, and he comes with strong opinions abut credit union mergers.

But there’s more on the show including Kordeleski’s musing about the longevity of the credit union tax exemption - and how important it is to the credit union business model.

Kordeleski also ponders the probable future of NCUA in an era of slashing federal spending and federal employee body counts.

Just about all the credit union hot buttons get pressed in this show..

And Kordeleski also addresses this question: if you are the CEO of a $10 billion credit union that just now merges with a $5 billion credit union should you ping the board the next day and ask for a 50% pay hike.

Place your bets now:

Is this RIP for NCUA?

Is it say goodnight to the tax exemption?

Are mergers the best way for a credit union to grow?

Or is interna; growth the shrewder option?

And should that CEO ask for the 50% pay boost?

Listen up.

Like what you are hearing? Find out how you can help sponsor this podcast here. Very affordable sponsorship packages are available. Email rjmcgarvey@gmail.com

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Find out more about CU2.0 and the digital transformation of credit unions here. It's a journey every credit union needs to take. Pronto

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Live from Munich Germany on today’s podcast is Dr. Marlene Wolfgruber, AI Strategy Lead at global automation company ABBYY and, between her advanced education at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, a school Google’s AI tool Gemini says is one of Germany’s best and a leading university in global rankings., and her work for ABBY, a global technology company specializing in intelligent document processing (IDP), process mining, and linguistic software., she brings two decades of AI knowledge to the show.

She brings a captivating message to the show: . What’s especially caught our eye is this: “Financial institutions will leverage AI-powered hyper-personalization to deliver finely tuned financial products and advisory services, dynamically adjusting to individual customer needs, preferences, and financial behaviors in real time. “

As I read that it is saying that while today meaningful personal banking services are reserved for the highest economic strata, AI will usher in a new day with all of us will be able to get genuinely personalized advice and suggestions that will come not via a human but a machine.

And the AI advice just may be very, very good.

Along the way Wolfgruber tells how close we are to that day of real personalization and what has to happen to get there.

She also offers fascinating insights into the journey that has brought AI to where it is today - and also why suddenly ;y large language models such as ChatGPT are on every lip, certainly every lip in credit union c-suites.

Oh, and while Dr. Wolfgruber has the credentials that certify her as a propellerhead, she talks in a way that I can understand and that means you can too.

Listen up.

Like what you are hearing? Find out how you can help sponsor this podcast here. Very affordable sponsorship packages are available. Email rjmcgarvey@gmail.com

And like this podcast on whatever service you use to stream it. That matters.

Find out more about CU2.0 and the digital transformation of credit unions here. It's a journey every credit union needs to take. Pronto

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If I say a temp worker, probably you think of a fill in receptionist and that’s true as far as it goes. But talk with O2 Consulting Group and it’s a plunge into a whole new world - especially impacting smaller credit unions, ones under perhaps $500 million in assets. Where exactly does that CU find the talent to, say, implement an AI program? Just maybe a fractional e CTO - shared by two or more CUs - or a temporary exec is exactly the cure.

Enter Bonnie Ortiz, CEO of O2 and longtime COO at the Partnership Credit Union, She’s worked inside at credit unions - she knows the terrain - but now she also has assembled a team of seasoned credit union talents who are available for fractional and temporary roles at credit unions, to help solve anything from tech issues to compliance matters.

It’s a fact: credit union operations have become increasingly complex. The day of the shoebox credit union is long gone. Real talent is needed but that talent may be too costly for a smaller CU. The O2 solution is a potential lifesaver.

Also on the show is David Martinez, CIO at $500 million Arlington Federal Credit Union, a credit union that has used O2 talent many times. Martinez is a happy customer.

He’s also a past guest on this show. There a link in the show notes and the topic is about how mid sized CUs can survive, indeed thrive.

Keep listening to this episode and Ortiz offers keen insights into the nuts and bolts of a credit union merger. She’s looking at the issue with a COO’s eyes: how exactly will this merger work? The concerns she raises are keen. . Any CU considering a merger - and who isn’t? - needs to give this a close attention.

Listen up.

Like what you are hearing? Find out how you can help sponsor this podcast here. Very affordable sponsorship packages are available. Email rjmcgarvey@gmail.com

And like this podcast on whatever service you use to stream it. That matters.

Find out more about CU2.0 and the digital transformation of credit unions here. It's a journey every credit union needs to take. Pronto

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Here’s the bad news: AI today is more of a promise than a working reality at most credit unions, says Al;ex JImenzez, a consultant with Backbase, which focus on helping FIs achieve more and better consumer engagement.

But then Jimenez has plenty of very good news for credit unions - and, he insists, their size gives them exceptional advantages when competing with far less nimble mega banks. Do not think smallness is a liability. It just may be a winning advantage.

Along the way Jimenez talks about genuine use cases where AI is in fact bringing real results to credit unions.

And he insists that the AI tool kit in credit unions is going to get much bigger and better, sooner rather than later. It’s a space to keep watching because very real results are coming.

Listen up.

Like what you are hearing? Find out how you can help sponsor this podcast here. Very affordable sponsorship packages are available. Email rjmcgarvey@gmail.com

And like this podcast on whatever service you use to stream it. That matters.

Find out more about CU2.0 and the digital transformation of credit unions here. It's a journey every credit union needs to take. Pronto

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When Bert Hash, Jr. took over as CEO of MECU in 1996 it was a $400 million institution with one branch that served municipal employees of Baltimore. In this podcast he tells about the institution he took charge of. It had exactly zero ATMs. It did not dispense cash to members - if a member wanted a withdrawal, they were issued a check and most went across the street to a bank to cash it.

Hash, who came to MECU after a long career with banks, knew there had to be changes. Within his first six months he put cash in the branch, installed the first ATM, brought in computers and prepared the institution for the battles ahead of it.

When he retired in 2014, MECU had assets of $1.3 billion, a membership of 106,000, and it had grown from one branch to 11.

I knew I had to talk with him even before I heard that story and that was because retired SECU North Carolina CEO Jim Blaine and Renee Sattiewhite of AACUC enthusiastically seconded the motion.

When I initially asked Bert, he momentary hesitated - did he belong in the company this podcast features? Of course I knew he did. But he is a decent, modest man and you will hear that personality throughout this podcast.

In one section he tells of taking a call from an irate member who believed MECU had made a mistake with his account. Bert agreed with him but still the man went on and after 30 minutes, the man was still threatening to move his account to a bank. Bert told him he was sure he would find at least one thing different at a bank. What, asked the man. "You won't have a half hour conversation with the bank CEO trying to convince you to stay," said Bert.

His is a credit union life and it is made all the special because, as an African American, he faced challenges in his career path and in his leadership of MECU. He tells his story in this podcast which is an especially personal document.

At the end, you will hear a podcast paste on where a recording of a call Bert made to me is. That's because as he reflected overnight about what he had said when asked if he witnessed racism in financial services, he decided he had more to say. His perspective is thoughtful, nuanced, realistic. (Sound quality is different. But the recording is audible.)

He offers a brief summary of the 100+ year of African American credit unions, tells why he think them important in reaching out to the underserved, and offers a stirring perspective on the real credit union mission.

Along the way, you will hear mention of many past CU2.0 podcasts - Jim Blaine, Bucky Sebastian, Gary Oakland, Renee Sattiewhite, Bill Bynum, Cathie Mahon, and Marc Schaefer.

This podcast is recorded in Phoenix - thus the first remarks from Bert.