NEW YORK — While it's best to leave the "naughty or nice" list to the bearded, rotund, red-and-white-dressed man in the know, a holiday wish can be appropriate at any age.
So for the 12th straight year, Credit Union Journal asked information technology executives from credit unions around the nation to share what's on their tech wish lists.
Virginia Credit Union Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer Christopher Saneda, said IT touches "all things" in business and in turn impacts all types of internal and external forces. These variables informed his response.
"One wish for 2014 - should it be clarity in alternative payment solutions, regulatory relief, economic recovery - I think my wish is for something more attainable, something that is sure to benefit the industry, something we can all assist in bringing to fruition," Saneda said.
As a member of the CUNA Technology Council Executive Committee, Saneda said his wish is for "every credit union to be talking to their primary vendors about Credit Union Financial Exchange (CUFX)."
Since credit unions, like the $2.4 billion asset Virginia CU, can expend millions of dollars every year on lengthy system implementations, new cost-saving processes are in demand. "A great deal of this expenditure is on customized interfaces - CUFX can fix this. I wish for quicker speed-to-market. I wish for simplified interfaces. I wish for core-agnostic vendors and CUFX can provide this."
Fellow CUNA Technology Council Executive Committee member Jeff Johnson, who also serves as senior vice president and chief information officer for the $1.8 billion Baxter Credit Union, agreed with Saneda's forward-looking thoughts.
"My wish for 2014 is improved speed-to-market and decreased complexity and cost of integrating third-party and core software. There are a few key components for achieving this wish," said Baxter. "First, credit unions need to drive the adoption and embrace CUFX standards. Second, a viable, extensible, and adaptable cloud-based service-bus/middleware solution needs to be developed on top of CUFX."
But is CUFX just a wish? Saneda said the movement will soon become an industry staple.
"Each of us needs to pressure our vendors to adopt the CUFX standard, and then we need more pioneers like Baxter CU to implement vendor solutions that are committed to CUFX. It is exciting to think of the possibilities that CUFX offers the credit union industry and 2014 brings us closer."
Message To Vendors
The $178 million Mutual Credit Union in Vicksburg, Mississippi, recently overhauled its IT operating system with help from Horsetail Technologies. Among updates was a new encrypted WAN, a switch upgrade, virtualization and storage area network upgrades, among other action items.
Despite these critical updates, Mutual CU's President Michael Mathews, wants a unified vendor-based industry best exemplified by the CUFX movement.
"I wish third-party software would work as advertised in conjunction with the core. Our entire credit union relies on these software and hardware combinations. When a program fails to work properly the entire CU suffers." When asked if he thought his wish could come true in the near future, he responded, "fifty-fifty."
Disaster Relief Preparation
For Rich Head, IT director for the $300 million Linn Area Credit Union serving 24,000 members, this year's wish centers on disaster preparation services.
"I wish we had a fully redundant, secondary hot site with full live replication, which would be utilized in the event of a major outage or disaster," Head said.
With such a platform in place, he explained that any real downtime for members could be eliminated while minimally disrupting employees.
When asked if the wish could become a reality for the Cedar Rapids, Iowa-based credit union, he said, "In the near future, low probability. Long term, as we grow, the likelihood of this becomes greater."
Keep It Simple
Heather Moshier, senior vice president of information technology for the $5.8 billion asset San Diego County Credit Union, hopes 2014 includes a streamlining of technologies.
"Our systems and programs have become so complex in order to provide the wide variety of products and services necessary to compete with the big banks. If we can simplify our systems with industry efficiencies and reduce the number of dependencies of additional coding, our IT environments will become less resource intense."
Moshier, who also serves on the CUNA Technology Council Executive Committee, said if the aforementioned "wish" is realized, "We can then focus our IT talent on new development efforts and offer more products and services to our members."
A realist, Moshier said her industry-wide wish is a work in progress.
"I see simplification coming soon and really taking off within the next three to five years."
E-Wallet
When Paul Parrish, executive vice president and chief financial officer of One Nevada Credit Union, was asked his wish, he looked to a product that would best serve the credit union's 75,000 members.
"I would wish to have a solid roll-out of a successful CU Wallet pilot - an integrated E-Wallet solution - as s part of our overall mobile wallet offering since. The odds are with it that the mobile payments space will start to figure itself out in 2014."
And when asked if he thinks his wish will come true for the $700 million credit union, he responded: "Probably much more likely than Santa delivering on that Ferrari idea that I plan to run by him at the mall next week."
New Mobile Apps
While there is no shortage of mobile apps hitting the market, David Doss, president and CEO of Arizona State Credit Union, has a specific request:
"The introduction of new mobile apps is a wish for 2014," Doss said. "We are especially interested in loan apps and the ability to deliver higher member value on both the auto and mortgage lending platforms. Providing member service through app technology is also a priority. We have mobile banking, but need to reach a higher level of convenience in the palm of our members' hands."
For the $1.5 billion credit union, the "wish" is balanced by strategy.
"It's about a 95% probability that we will move forward with this in 2014," he said. "We are extremely focused on member experience and technology is a big part of driving satisfaction and loyalty with our members."
Customized Software
Maps CU Software Development Manager Loren Paulsen said her wish is to "differentiate credit unions from banks and emerging alternative financial institutions through custom software development."
With a proven track record of building in-house software applications such as the celebrated Sprig app, and more recently, its Buy Local app, the wish of this $480 million credit union is being supported by hard work.
"In order to take things to the next level, and create radically different types of accounts and member benefit programs, we need to align all of our systems," said Paulsen.
He explained the plan has three critical components.
- Converted to an open, extensible core system (Fiserv's DNA) last year.
- Convert to an open, extensible online banking system (the credit union has entered the Request for Proposal process).
- Contribute Maps CU's innovations back to the credit union industry through its existing software development CUSO, CU Wireless.
