How do you evaluate your credit union’s mission?
Photo by Dani Hart
I was inspired to write this piece after reading a recently published article at creditunions.com, entitled How to Measure Mission. The article describes how Marine Credit Union of La Crosse, Wisconsin set out to measure how well it is living its mission to: Advance the lives of people from a place of financial need to a life of ownership and giving back.
Marine Credit Union, a billion-dollar asset credit union with close to 78,000 members, 22 branches and 417 employees.
Making a positive difference for members and communities is foundational for credit unions. Marine Credit Union is no different. But how do you measure mission? How do you measure the subjective? How do you track its progress and assign quantitative measures? It is not like loan and deposit growth, return on assets, operating expenses and other measurables.
This is what Marine Credit Union did to solve the problem:
They conducted an employee survey to see how staff identified with Marine Credit Union's mission.
They held a leadership workshop to discuss the employee survey results and identify the categories under which measures were meaningful: financial wellbeing and resilience, financial inclusion and capability, and workplace impact.
Then they distilled their findings into eight metrics to measure, and created and launched a dashboard, that the entire credit union can access.
What does Marine Credit Union measure?
Percentage of members using payday lenders
Number of employees trained in financial counselling
CD secured loan usage
Percentage of active members with at least $400 in savings
Families who’ve moved from renter to homeowner
Credit score improvement
Financial counseling and member education
Volunteer time off hours per employee per quarter
The purpose of Marine Credit Union's mission dashboard is clear; to ensure the entire organization focuses on its impact on members and the community.
What I like, especially, is that Marine Credit Union has done the work of turning a subjective measure into an objective purpose. Something that can be measured and managed for the good of the members and the credit union. It’s Peter Drucker 101.
And that the focus is so clearly about helping members financially by focusing on financial activities that pose both risk and reward. I see measures like these, and I see a strategy to both change opinions, while encouraging others, all aimed at changing financial outcomes for the better.
It’s through awareness and financial learning that beliefs and behaviors have the best opportunity to transform into members’ financial wellbeing. And it reminds me of the inspiration in building our financial education program, It’s a Money Thing.
Tim McAlpine is the Founder & CEO of Currency Marketing. He is best known for developing the It's a Money Thing Financial Education Program that credit unions from around North America are using to connect with new young adult members. He is also a driving force behind CUES Emerge, an emerging leader program that combines online learning, peer collaboration and an exciting competition component.
