WEST JORDAN, Utah — New hires at Cyprus FCU now pull out their smartphones and tablets during 90 minutes of training on all of the credit union's electronic services.
The $631 million institution just added the training program in response to technology demands increasing across all areas of the CU.
The move represents what several HR experts say is happening at savvy CUs — making sure new hires have the necessary tech skills to do their jobs.
Buddy Bennett, director of HR and training, said the 90-minute course was recently inserted into the CU's sales training program new hires receive after their first 30 days on the job.
"We decided to take away some of the selling training to talk tech with our new staff," said Bennett, a member of the CUNA HR/TD Council. "Employees need to be very comfortable with technology because it's used so much today to deliver financial services."
New Staff, New Technology
Analysts say the smartphone boon, the race to mobile and simply the increasing demand for electronic delivery services have more credit unions making sure new staff — including the executive team — either come to the CU with the necessary tech skills or pick them up.
Sam Kilmer, senior director at Cornerstone Advisors, Scottsdale, Ariz., said the need for better technology skills is pervading every area of the credit union. "Tech is in every line of business and employees of each of those lines have to be recruited to manage and drive technology accordingly."
Kilmer gave the example of a teller encouraging members to use a mobile app and an MSR pulling down a loan app that started online. "A lender now may dial in underwriting criteria on an automated underwriting system. An HR employee often uses an automated performance management system. A marketing employee who used to work on brochures now generates and tallies social media traffic. A call center agent is immersed in e-mails, live chat and secure messages."
Deedee Myers, CEO at recruiting firm DDJ Myers Ltd. in Phoenix, said more credit unions are expecting that staff have at least a minimal amount of tech skills. "Employees have to be able to download apps, use different social media and be able to integrate the tablet to the phone."
Myers believes not only smart hiring but ongoing training plays a key role, saying courses on basic technology skills should be delivered regularly by the credit union. "In the progressive credit unions, everyone in executive and middle management has a tablet and that is how they communicate."
Terence Roche, partner at Cornerstone Advisors, insists HR teams have to become astute at determining whether new hires have the tech skills necessary to do their jobs, saying training can only do so much.
"Employees have to be comfortable in these new channels," shared Roche. "It's not enough to say I can train you on what our mobile app does and what to say to members. You have to find people who like using apps. You can sell a new channel with training but you evangelize a new channel when you use it yourself."
Roche said it's not an easy job for human resources to determine if a potential new hire has the necessary technology skills. "HR has to be more careful about asking the right questions. And for key positions, this might even mean testing."
Roche feels that advertising for jobs through social media gives the credit union a better chance to reel in a tech-savvy employee.
Skill Set's Importance Growing
Executive Compensation Solutions, Covina, Calif., sees tech skills becoming a greater requirement among senior executives, particularly the COO, CLO and CMO.
"I talked with a number of CMOs who emphasized the credit union's footprint in social media is important," explained Bridget McNamara-Fenesy, senior client consultant to ECS. "They have to be comfortable using Twitter and Facebook — it's a key way the credit union accesses the membership, especially younger members. I even see more CEOs tweeting and making blog posts."
Cornerstone's Kilmer pointed out that a shift in CU IT spending since 2008 indicates credit unions are placing greater value on technology skills among the entire team. The latest "Cornerstone Report" indicates that centrally managed IT categories — core processing, infrastructure and data communications — have all declined in spending as a percentage of assets. Electronic delivery was flat. The Cornerstone Report focuses on 16 operational areas of 62 credit unions with assets of $250 million and above.
"The category that saw the growth, strategic systems, was the one least likely to be managed directly by IT," said Kilmer. "Strategic systems consists of applications such as loan/account origination, enterprise content management, enterprise risk management, customer relationship management, fraud, performance management and other analytics."
Kilmer said that median spending on strategic systems, as percentage of assets, rose from .046% in 2008 to .05% in the current report. "Strategic systems are the types of systems that workers throughout the credit union need."
