Jesse Schwamb, CFA , Members 1st Federal Credit Union (PA)

In the 7th episode of season 3, Vin and Zach are joined by the dynamic Jesse Schwamb of Members 1st FCU in Pennsylvania, a top 50 CU by asset size in the United States. The three embark on an energetic discussion of how Jesse and his team are improving the ancient business of financial intermediation, diving into topics including: his passion for using data and technology to personalize the money experience, jumping from first- to second-level thinking, the ubiquity of fintech, and much more.

For more insights and ideas, visit DCG at DarlingConsulting.com or follow us on LinkedIn.

Transcript

 [Jesse Schwamb, 00:00]

We are just hungry for insights, and I think you guys, we have like-mindedness with shared hearts in this kind of thing where we're after that second level thinking - like we want to get after it - we want, we want to manage the balance sheet in a way that doesn’t over engineer it,  but like creates exceptional value and like teases out that value. So, you know, like, I'm always saying to our people like, you know, the reason why we have the economic value like premium on the deposits is because of this brand culture to some degree like this is where it shows up. If it doesn't show up, there doesn't show up, like that, we’d expect it to.  So, we're always trying to be data-driven. I use, like, technical analysis, you know, typically reserved, sometimes for some wingnuts in like the equity space. But we've been doing that kind of thing for years to look at like daily trends, not just see like the strength of a trend in deposits, the direction, but the strength as well. So, these are like ARMs, Indexes, and MACD oscillator movements. We will do anything to see if it yields something.

[Vinny, 00:55]

Yeah.

[Jesse, 00:55]

So yeah, I'm. I'm happy to talk about that because I think that we all act like minded.

[Vinny, 01:06]

Welcome to On the Balance Sheet, Season 3, Episode 7.  Today we are very happy to be joined by Jesse Schwamb.  Jesse is the vice president of financial planning and analysis at Members 1st Credit Union, located in Central PA, and Members 1st is actually an $8 billion shop, I believe. They're in the top 50 largest credit unions in the United States, and Jesse is a really kind of a thought provoking interview that we're very much looking forward to.

[Zach, 01:32]

Jesse brings a ton of passion to this, and I think he's a very sharp guy and what you're going to see, I think, with some of his questions here is talking through how much they've grown, which has been fairly significant over the past decade or two, and then technology customer/member experience, you see a lot of conversation on how they deal with that and why he's so very optimistic for the future. So, great guy. Great conversation. And really happy he could join us. 

[Vinny, 01:59]

So, without further ado, Jess Schwamb.  

[Zach, 02:06]

And welcome to On the Balance Sheet. We are very glad to be joined here today by Jesse Schwamb from Members 1st Federal Credit Union in the great state of Pennsylvania.  Jesse, how are you doing this morning?

[Jesse, 02:16]

Well. It’s a pleasure to be with you.

[Zach, 02:19]

We're so happy to have you here as per usual. We like to just start to give our listeners a bit of a background in terms of how did you get started in the banking industry, and then what kind of path did you take to where you are today?

[Jesse, 02:31]

I began my career in banking at a large regional bank, and it was a unique opportunity because it allowed me to straddle both the retail side of the business and the financial services or advisory side. So, my role was actually in the front lines offering both of those types of services. So, meeting with clients and depositors, both consumer and business, and then at the same time being able to work under the banks broker dealer as a financial advisor. So, I got to see this really unique confluence of all the things that financial intermediation is. And for me, that taught me a couple of critical lessons that really propelled the rest of my career and continue to influence me today. I would say, chief among those was I realized almost instantly that financial intermediation is this incredible technology. I mean, its finance is really the technology that gets things done. And financial intermediation, beyond just smoothing earnings or investment over time, allows one to transfer, move their wealth into temporarily across horizons in time periods, which is exceptional technology, like it rivals any other technology that humankind has put forward. And then beyond that, the second thing that those initial days growing up in regional banking taught me was that money, of course, while it’s cliche to say, it is an intermediated level of our lives, so of course it's always some kind of mean to an end. If you have a ticket to a theatre to go see a show, you’re never like boasting in the ticket itself. If you have, like, a ticket to go see Taylor Swift, it's not that you're just celebrating the Taylor Swift ticket, but the access, of course, it affords you to her concert, to her show, to that experience. So, I learned in those roles right away, that really the intermediation in markets and institutions – it’s all about finding what is beyond that layer that's driving the behaviors or the decisions informing the judgments of the people who are the borrowers and the savers that are interacting. So, when I started there, I loved that interplay, and that then propelled me into a more back office type of role where I decided, you know, I love the analytics that are all behind this. How do we discern what's going on in people's lives? Really care for them in that way, and how can those analytics bring about more informed judgments that result in actionable decision making that really helps promote the idea of people helping people in a cooperative financial environment. So, from there I was starting and selling writing investment policy statements, getting to work with clients and customers. I moved into more of a back office - more of like an analytical role, and I was there at another regional bank. And then actually, after that, finally saw the light moved into the cooperative credit union space with Members 1st.  And really, that's what my role is now - is to oversee our financial planning analysis department, of which we are bringing to bear all of the risk sharing, liquidity provision, and Information Services that are provided in managing that through interest rate risk, through deposit analysis, through lending study, really bringing together again those first principles of the risk involved in bringing savers and borrowers together in a way that engenders great value for all of the parties, including the institution that's facilitating those services.

[Zach, 05:45]

Jesse, thanks. That could be the best answer we've gotten out of the background in our 25 or 26 episodes.

[Vinny, 05:50]

And I'm like, why is he looking at all the data? He should be out on the front lines here. 

[Zach, 05:57]

Jesse, how long have you been at Members 1at?  And kind of the follow up question, because I know you’ve been there a long time,  you've been there for a long time, is how has your role, because I know you've been in the FPNA area, but there's been a lot that's happened In the past couple decades, how has that changed and what are you excited about - I guess in your role for the future?

[Jesse, 06:15]

So much has changed over course in intermediation, but it's really around the margins and draws you back into the central purpose of of what we're intending to do by standing in the gap between savers and borrowers. So of course, financial intermediation has, like, an ancient pedigree, I mean, we know that, like, the ancient Mesopotamians charged interest on loans before they figured out how to put wheels on cars. So, this business is old. It's seeing all these changes, I think, especially in how it uses technology to become more human, or trying to become more human. That is offering automated services that really, actually, beyond just trying to cross sell. Literally, come in and intercede to meet needs for members or clients or customers before or coterminously with as their understanding they need something to help them to meet some kind of objective. That's what I'm seeing a lot of this, of course, everybody's gonna say data and information machine learning, algorithm, understanding and processing is changing and that's all true. But I think the rub is going to be how we return to the roots of providing real intermediation. That is the cost and the price of time represented in borrowing and lending, and how we do that excessively well to place ourselves in front of credit worthy borrowers at just the right time when they need the help or support. Then, conversely, for savers doing the same thing with helping them provide for all of their needs. So, what's changing for us is the way in which we leverage all that information to create a robust perspective, that psychographic that employs and leverages behavioral economics as well as the traditional economics that presume that everybody has a quadratic utility equation and they're just at home crunching those numbers and their head pops off the pillow every day and says I cannot wait to go to my bank or credit union. Taking all of that but creating more well-rounded perspectives so that offerings are really resonant, that the offerings really do provide value, and that they're not necessarily always tied to more commodity-oriented services like payment structures, which again are being disintermediated or competed against, and the value of those are eroding. I think basic credit unions should get back to what they do exceptionally well, and that's providing risk, and sharing, liquidity and information services to the constituents in the communities that they serve.

[Vinny, 08:28]

Jesse, Vinnie here. And thank you again for joining us. I kind of want to just see if you would not mind. I don't want to have you share trade secrets, so to speak, but just if you could give an example of that - using data to sort of inform a product set that you folks have maybe delivered. Where it's it's outside the realm of what you would see with your typical financial institution. You know, a product that's available to a customer or a member.

[Jesse, 08:53]

Sure, one of the opportunities that we have is a collection of a large data set. So, we're always trying to go through now and create data-driven decision making that starts with hypothesis and then to literally test those hypotheses to see if they’re statistically significant. So, just like the bureaus and the other underwriting organizations, we're trying to bring together what might seem disparate data points and discern whether there's relationships among them that would communicate something to us, and especially if there's some kind of leading indicator. So, whether that's the depth of a relationship, or the services that a member is using, we want to be concerned with saying what is It that's behind that? So, again, going back to money or transactions, these to me sometimes seem to be a veil behind which is obscured the real behaviors, the real influences that are happening in the life of somebody. Of course, if this is all true, that the action that somebody takes in their financial institution - it's really just a signal, something that's happening in their life and the goal is to serve what's going on in their life with the use of these products and services. Then the best thing we can do is drive from first level thinking to second level thinking. So, we're combining this data, we're testing significance. We're seeing if, in a model, does it help to explain something that happens in the life of a member? So, like many people, we're building these models. Some of them are called things like propensity models or penchant for behavioral, or next best product models. We're always trying to get more human. I have this sense that most people now expect something from all of the people and the companies they interact with, like they do from Amazon or Netflix, and that is to log in and do a personalized experience. Like a personalized money experience – What does it look like, what is automated or self-driving money look like? And so, what we really wanna do is not just create contextualized opportunities. But really tailored, bespoke solutions or combinations so that we're using this data to help build a trusted partnership, not a creepy partnership of stalking the people that we serve, but one in which they get a sense that we really do care because we're trying to understand everything that’s going on.  And, to my mind, it’s starting at a place where I was helping to meet and walk through the demands of people and their needs and how money fits into that, I'm just constantly reminded that in life you really want people that you can trust, especially if this fear or the discipline in which you're interacting is seemingly complicated or complex, or you have no turn of mind for it, or you just decide not to interact with it in a more greatly magnified way so, to my mind, I think in life you need a great doctor you can trust, a great mechanic you can trust, a good lawyer you can trust, and a great banker you can trust because you're vouchsafing this great responsibility to somebody to help you meet needs. And so, anything that we can use, particularly data to match together and to insinuate, try to understand what those needs are. We want to do that.

[Vinny 11:48]

That's really a comprehensive answer.  Thank you so much. Kind of like, if if I remember at the credit union, I'm guessing if I turned on my account, it would say stop buying fishing gear, Vin, you know, lets get serious about that. In all seriousness, just transitioning a little bit - The growth of the credit union over the last, you know, decade plus really, I mean you folks went from a membership which was, you know relatively small. I’m not exactly sure of the numbers today. I Think there's close to 600,000 members. Is that correct? 

[Jesse 12:09] 

That's correct.

[Vinny, 12:17]

I'm gonna guess Joe Kenerson, who is one of our colleagues here, he called you the financial engine behind that growth. And I'm sure that probably makes you blush a little bit. Help me understand what was the real driver behind such significant growth which has taken place over the last decade.

[Jesse, 12:33]

Certainly not because of me. Although I know there's a temptation that that people always credit the finance people with the massive growth that they achieved.

[Vinny, 12:40]

Right.

[Jesse, 12:42]

But you're correct in those numbers. Your Member’s 1st is a federal credit union. We’re a member-only, not for profit. We have nearly 600,000 members over $7 billion in assets, and we're serving those members and communities throughout South Central Pennsylvania with 60 branch locations across a multitude of counties. And for us, that growth has always come from discerning what the need is in our communities and then making sure that we're oriented to satisfy that need. And so, for us, that comes with a very diverse product offering, especially with respect to lending. And we have a strong, indirect lending network, especially vehicle and auto loans. We also have a strong branch footprint and strong brand loyalty. So, we put forward this sense that we really want to partner with our members, and we take that very seriously. We place ourselves in their communities to be part and parcel of what's going on in their lives, and for us, that's more than just a mission statement. It's lived out in every interaction that we have. That is our essential purpose - is to come and meet the needs. So, where those needs are, we're going to try to fill them, and we're doing so in the way that engenders mutual value for all the parties involved, including building for our members  intergenerational equity building a capital base so that this institution not only has been around for over 75 years now, but will be around for another 75, and we'll continue to again meet the demands by bringing those two groups together. We certainly want to be more than eHarmony for money, but in some ways that's really what we're after - is to do that in a meaningful way. So, we have this high commitment to service, high commitment to bringing down the barriers of entry into bringing your financial well-being and center of gravity into our midst. And so, we do that both by a strong retail delivery channel, again in a physical location for branch networks, but also very strong digital channels as well. We are vigilant in building out those products and tools. So that again, we're providing bespoke offerings, but that no matter where you are either literally a click away, a call away from a person who's going to either speak with you, show up, or tell you where you can go and meet and get real actionable advice in decision making that helps empower you and your growth. So, all of those things have really contributed to why we went from, you know, when I started, it was just $1.2 billion now over $7 billion, approaching $8 billion. We’re very proud of the fact that we’re member focused, community oriented, and ensure that we take care of those who own the organization.

[Zach, 15:09]

Jesse, just a follow up to the last probably 2 questions: You have a very large member base, you got 60 branches. You mentioned bespoke, differentiated type of options. How do you guys kind of work through doing, what I mean is, two different examples like are you looking at data leading indicators in your member behavior and then using that to develop new products, or are you more the other side saying, we already have these products that we have and then once we see behavior we then drop them digitally into members inboxes, for lack of a better way to put it. Or do you do both? How do you guys kind of view those two type of things to to offer to your members, the best of what they can have?

[Jesse, 15:53]

It's absolutely some of both. So, we pride ourselves on really trying to keep our finger on the pulse of what's going on in the lives of membership, what's going on in the lives of our community, what's happening in the general financial industry, where there are trends, secular trends, we feel that that is a need that we want to meet. And then beyond that, we're doing exactly what you said, Zach, which is we're trying to read constantly the behavior. As you know, all of that is changing, the world is changing, and I think there is great opportunity for community banks and credit unions in this intermediated space because not only is intermediation very profitable and provides a lot of value, again that amazing technology that gets things done. But beyond that, there's also, I think, this opportunity for institutions like us to continue to understand that as other sources of non-interest income either fall away or soften for various reasons including just regulatory headwind burden, that really the unique differentiator of our business is that ability to intercede, but that requires then that our pricing mechanisms and discipline which we approach the pricing understanding of embedded options and those valuations which typically have been best understood by larger banks are  now also understood by smaller organizations, so that when we're competing on the margin, we can provide value you're talking about. So, for us, we're looking not just at well, what are the products and services, but the relative value of those things because there's lots of things that we believe we're very good at, that we wanna, we wanna lean into. And part of that happens by offering the right price. Sometimes that price is much better than our competitor’s. So, it's not just the ability to discern what are the things that people need, but at what price is it best to offer those things? So, we do a little bit of both. We're keeping our finger on the pulse of what's happening in the economy, and the general need of our membership for we're really vigilant about combing through all this information to, again, the goal is to take that data, synthesize it into information that can actually be used, and a lot of that is what we wanna offer this kind of campaign, or we can do this type of pricing, or we built out, you know, loan pricing models that help us really try to understand, and not the way their world appears to be, but as it actually is for us so that we can make sure that our margin, we're creating a sufficient margin along a stable trend no matter what's happening. We believe if we do that, we'll continue to again provide exceptional value to those we are serving, while at the same time building, as I said before, that intergenerational equity for the organization and all of its members that it supports.

[Vinny, 18:23]

But with that, there must be tremendous challenges because you got a lot of different folks at a lot of different locations. You got a growing footprint like Zach alluded to, 60ish branches. There's people within those branches that have to deliver these products, so to speak. How do you keep everyone in line? Like, how do you get everyone kind of pulling in the same direction?

Because I will tell you. In our travels, Zach, I'm sure you run into this all the time. Sometimes when we sort of start a new engagement with a new client and they've got a vast branch network because you know, let's be honest you see folks collapsing their branch networks? Quite the opposite direction, right, wrong, or indifferent? But I'm always told the biggest challenge is well, they do what they want over there, they do what they want over here - doing what they want. Sometimes there's legacy organizations that have been merged together. There's been acquisitions and people are all kind of beating to their own, sort of, you know, their own drum. So, tell me about those challenges. Tell me how you folks sort of reign it all in, centralize it, and make sure you can execute on it.

[Jesse, 19:21]

There's a lot of it there that is very challenging. You’re absolutely correct.

And of course, as you well know, the eulogy, I think, for the branch network has been written many, many times and is yet to really die, and this is interesting because even now, we're seeing that ongoing debate, and part of that debate is exactly about this - the structure and the challenges that come with that particular structure. For us, it really does start with the hiring process. We have, this organization has, really gone to great lengths to build out a very particular culture, a branded culture that we internalize into the essence of who we are as we act and react, interact with members and then serve one another. That is high and lifted up. It gets hegemony over everything that we do and everything that we say. And so, even when somebody's hired on, that's part of this initial process of discovery with them and going through that. And so, I think it starts with saying this is the kind of institution that we are. Now for me, in my experience, I work for both banks and credit unions. I do find that distinctive of credit unions generally, and maybe specifically of ours, and that is that we are. We undertake very seriously this idea that it is a financial cooperative. It is people helping people. And so, our loyalties and our incentives are mutually compatible to that goal. And with our membership. Beyond that, then, practically speaking, there's an immense amount of communication that's going on regularly across various channels, technical and otherwise, to unite all of our associates under this combined purpose of making sure that we're offering this kind of service consistently. So, this is another one of those things where that communication is so strong. The training is so strong. There's regular refreshers of that. There's constant reminders of the central tenants that we have in serving our members, our constituents, and our associates that that's so top of mind consistently. That has become part of our normative behavior. And so, all of our branch network is united in that mission. The organization is so strong on this, that I would say we're one of the few organizations that continues, for instance, to have annually an associate rally where all of our associates come together to be part of a presentation and a large group, a celebration, get an explanation of the state of affairs of the of the credit union. And so, all of these little things, celebrations of what's going on throughout the year, the coming together, it does help us build a family which remember central tenants, and as part of a family, we have this unique identity that brings a sense of cohesiveness that does transcend the physical location, but takes a lot of work because, of course, it's always a tendency to stray from that to have unique experiences. We always pull and fight against that, to bring ourselves together and just something - regular communication, whether that's through our Internet, through Microsoft Teams, through e-mail, various presentations, consistent video presentations among our central leadership. All of that makes us feel as though we're all together and we're seeing it, hearing, and understanding the same things. So, that goes a long way to making sure that we're all on the same page.

[Vinny, 22:14]

Here at DCG we have had a culture that has been, I think, something that's so precious to us. You know, our leadership team has done everything in their power to keep that culture what it is, and I think we have a survey on an annual basis, I guess every 18 months but, you’re asked some kind of adjectives that remind you of DCG and what it means to you. I always kind of put family down as one of one of the words and that you just kind of echo those sentiments. And the thing about a family is I think you can say things to people in a way that you otherwise wouldn't if they were a colleague or a neighbor. And so yeah, I think that's really important and that that helps spur, spur growth. That's a, that's a great answer.

[Jesse, 22:54]

It does help, as well, because as I'm sure you can attest to, that when you're a family, that means you could have challenging, robust, intramural conversations. and so we do that.  So, there is this like open exchange of ideas. Knowing that, hopefully just like your own family, if you sit down at a Thanksgiving table and some robust discussions that we say breaks out, that no matter how that proceeds, you leave the table knowing that you're still related, you have to be together, you have to get along. We have that as well. So, we're very concerned with driving and spurring one another along because that's what family does as well, so there's both this mutual encouragement and this this critical feedback that helps us, again, make sure that we're doing the things that that we want to do. We’re so committed to this, in fact, that when we spell family in our communications, we spell it with a capital one and an I, excuse me, capital one, and a capital M and a 1. That we can make it clear that we're always referring to the organization in light of it being a large family.

[Vinny, 23:52]

Yeah.

[Zach, 23:53]

What I hear in in a lot of that too, Jesse, is it takes hard work, too. A lot of these, you know, to be able to offer the things that you guys offer and have that personalized, you know, kind of money experience. It's not just, it's not easy. I think that's a huge challenge the industry is facing right now is that this is not an easy time, whether it's the curve, whether it's fintechs, whether it's digital type of competition, so, I'm just kind of thinking out loud and we like to ask a lot of our guests this, and for you guys who have been growing so much the last, you know, couple decades here. With assets, but plus members, I mean. Where do you guys see growth opportunities, you know, in the industry, and and what do you see, too, is maybe some challenges to that, whether it's for Members 1st or whether it's just for the broader industry, you can kind of take it however you like to run with it.

[Jesse, 24:42]

I think one of the predominant challenges that are facing almost all financial intermediation but especially for credit unions and community banks is perhaps the replacement of non-interest income in various forms, it’s likely to attenuate over time. That, either because again of regulation or disintermediation – lots of forces and, traditionally, I would say the financial intermediation portion, of course, borrowing funds from savers at a cost and lending those funds to borrowers at some other price, and keeping that spread in between, is going to come under attack in many ways, especially because that was typically funded through payment services, and payment services are one of those places where there's a lot of competition, and so this is where I say again, I'm not sure that's gonna be possible, quite honestly, for many places to entirely replace with new sources, the non-interest income that's going to get softened over time. And, so, this leads me back into going into a place where we're focusing again on that intermediation of finding ways to ensure that margin is strong and creatively gathering a strong deposit base that is sufficient and stable enough to support long-term assets and long-term asset growth. I do think there's great opportunity in markets for that place. It’s partly why we're creating that strong brand identity.

But I think institutions have to start going back to understanding their members and their customers from the perspective of their understanding and use of money, whether that's a store of value or a medium of exchange. Understanding interest first is conception. Not just as the price of money, but the price of time, and then stacking over and above that, all of these other premiums, you know, inflation, interest rate risk, maturity, duration, liquidity, and ensuring that all of their pricing is satisfied. Their capital, stress testing, and regulatory planning, and that they're looking at risk adjusted returns. There is tremendous opportunity for that kind of growth rather than deposits in that way. One of the places I additionally see that is just in the way to redefine what it means for a financial institution to offer financial well-being and health, and that might be, for instance, pairing deposit offerings with some kind of subscription-based accounts, whereby the customer or the member is receiving additional benefits of economic value because institutions can leverage economies of scope and scale on those provided them at lower cost, and then this is providing another reason for somebody to consider their financial institution. Again, the center of their well-being because it offers different, other non-financial considerations that help them manage their life of which, of course, finance is a life skill that is mostly helping to manage your life. So, there I think there's going to be tremendous opportunity for new deposits to come into institutions as they're meeting those needs in a more profound and prolific way, not just hot money, which is appropriate, and pricing out to being those deposits, but looking at creating a long-term, sustainable deposit franchises that really are going to support a growth extension/expansion and non-interest income in a margin over time.

[Zach, 27:51]

Jesse, that was a great answer. I was just kind of thinking through some of the conversation in the growth side and it sounds like, too, there's opportunities to be partners, whether it's with Fintechs or whether it's with newer technologies that maybe you develop in-house and what my last question for you is, how do you guys use, I guess that that technology channel, and I'm talking more than like a mobile app. How do you guys use some of those things to push some of your strategic initiatives on the deposit side? Any color there that you see, whether it's now or whether you think in the future, you're going to see more of, you know or or that you think banks should be thinking more of, probably a better way to frame it, to be able to compete with big banks, to be able to compete with other Fintechs, or you know, or other entities out there that who are a challenge on the on the deposit side?

[Jesse, 28:37]

The ubiquity of financial technology. That's the same tech word is really so fantastic, that I'm always thinking, what a time to be alive. I mean, like you guys can't buy experience like this. It’s incredible. And so, to that end, what we've been using that technology to do is to do the things that either it's out of our depth in that it's not at the center of our business, or we wanted to inform or enhance our business, or that they provide such great value in partnership that they come alongside and really run parallel to such a degree that we consider an extension of who we are. While we're enfolding that into everything that we're already doing. So, in to the extent that now you can do that. It helps with, let's say alternative data for underwriting. It helps us to understand the segmentation of membership so that we have a better sense of what the needs are that breaks down barriers or pain points all throughout a loan application process or account opening screening, or again just provides better insight for the member. Whether that's what their financial well-being and health is like in the form of credit scores or budgeting, all these things we want to do because we know at the heart what we do best is bring savers and borrowers together for providing information, liquidity, and risk sharing services. Insomuch as they fit within that scope, we want to use those things, especially when they provide value that we cannot achieve on our own at cost. So, we found that is the prudent way to do things. And this again is what it means to be alive in this time, where it's exceptional that there's so many opportunities that exist to do that. So, we're trying to balance and get the best of both worlds, we're never going to sacrifice the central purpose of who we are. At the same time, I think what it means to grow again, to take an ancient business and to continue to revise it and iterate it in such a way that it really, truly meets people's needs is to always be looking at proven technology to help you do that better. And so, we find that there's many fintechs that are helping us do that very thing, and for the members, we believe that's providing exactly the kind of value that they want and that they're now looking for and expecting from organizations like ours.

[Zach, 30:41]

Jesse, I love it. I love the passion, too, you know, it exudes out of the out of the screen, obviously, in your voice here, too. Vin do you have anything else for Jesse today or.

[Vinny, 30:48]

No, this has been extraordinarily eye opening. I have enjoyed basically your perspective. Joe had mentioned to us Jesse's a very dynamic speaker and and, he's got great insight and vision, you know. And that's something that you don't really see, quite frankly, in this space. Quite, you know, often I think we do get stuck in this notion of the commoditized products and services of our forefathers and not thinking critically enough about having products that are set to follow the behavior patterns of those who are our customer base, our membership. I really enjoyed this, and thank you, Jesse, for your time.

[Jesse, 31:30]

It's been a pleasure.

[Vinny, 31:37]

We're back and what a great interview with Jesse, Zach; he is a tremendous speaker and really, I had a lot of takeaways. But I'll tell you during the course of of the interview, the one thing I kept thinking about, you just can't help not think about it if you work here at Darling Consulting Group, in our main lobby, we have a sculpture called the Curious Mind, and it's something we talk about as an organization to always, always challenge assumptions. Always just have an immense amount of intellectual curiosity, always looking for a way to kind of learn something that you think might be true. But maybe it's not.

So, listening to Jesse, and I'll tell you, the way he thinks about products, the way he thinks about leveraging data, that you just can't help - and even our conversations prior to and after the interview, this insatiable need and curiosity out of him and their organization to offer the very best services and products for their membership. And now I'll tell you, I think he's a personification of that sculpture in our in our building. So, I know it's a little bit kind of interesting. Some folks aren't familiar with it, but if you get a chance, take a look at it, because that's what he actually reminds me of.

[Zach, 32:50]

Vin, absolutely, I think that that segues right into what I was thinking about as he kind of answered those questions, the theme of intermediation, how he and the credit union, right, are very important part of of their members, or if you're you're a banker, your customer, your client lives  in his thinking about the personal money experience - I believe that's what his quote was, when they're trying to personalize it, it's not commoditized. It’s not on a billboard on Route 93 here in in Massachusetts or wherever you live. It's they're trying to take data, they're trying to go from the first level to the second level. To understand, okay, why is this data, where is this data coming from, what's the cause of it? How can we intercede in their, interject rather, and figure out ways to give our members the best products, or the best resources that we can to help them get to where they have to get to. So, I think like you said, he personifies a curious mind. I think that, I think they are a very good example of where banks and credit unions need to be going if they don't want to become commodities, right, as the digital influence continues to kind of permeate in the space. And as things are just getting leaner and tighter, and I think he has a ton of ideas, we could talk for another couple of hours and dig into more of the detail, but that to me was how hard they work on that. And it clearly does have benefit in in drive value for them. I think that's a really important takeaway for our listeners. Yeah, and the proofs in the pudding; they've grown significantly in the last decade plus and, you know, they're they're a hefty sized credit union. So, it was a really terrific conversation, but I guess this is a stop for us. So, thank you for joining us for this episode, and we look forward to you joining us on future episodes of On the Balance Sheet.

[Dana Bernier, 34:40]

On the Balance Sheet is a podcast produced by Darling Consulting Group (DCG). All views and opinions expressed by the hosts and guests are solely their own and may not represent those of DCG. All third parties are independent entities and are not affiliated with DCG. This podcast is intended for informational and educational purposes only and is not considered as advice. All views and opinions expressed are based on the information available at the time and may have changed based on the current market and other conditions.

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