Aug. 20, 2008 at 1:10pm

Phelps philosophy can benefit credit unions

Posted by Melina Young in Increasing Assets, New Members
No comments

A few weeks ago I was reading ESPN magazine’s edition on golden child Michael Phelps.

For any non-Olympics followers, Michael Phelps was a swimmer for team USA in the Beijing Olympics. Throughout the games Phelps broke world and Olympic records left and right. And at 23, Phelps has won more gold medals than any Olympian in history. The previous record was 9 – he now has 14. Many are arguing that Phelps is the greatest Olympian of all time.

Experts argue that Phelps’ ability to win extends beyond training and a body built for swimming. Phelps has an amazing ability to tune out what is happening in the lanes next to him and just swim. He wins because he doesn’t race his competitors, he races himself.

I think this philosophy can be applied to credit union growth in assets and new members. Here is an example:

A credit union JayRay works with, The Union Credit Union, recently finished a successful name change and marketing effort. As one of the smaller credit unions in Washington state, The Union Credit Union averaged four new members per week before the name change. Since the name change on July 15, The Union Credit Union has averaged 26 new members per week. That’s an increase of 650 percent.

However, these numbers pale in comparison to BECU’s average of 860 new members per week. If The Union Credit Union leaders were competing against BECU instead of their own numbers, they would be disappointed with their performance and less motivated to continue their efforts.

Now, I realize that The Union Credit Union would be crazy to try and pull numbers like BECU, so here is a more realistic example:

Blue Mountain Credit Union has a similar number of members as The Union Credit Union, and shows growth of one new member per week. Blue Mountain would probably be happy to see the numbers The Union Credit Union was showing before the name change. But it shouldn’t set goals based on other credit unions’ results.

The rewards will come when you take into consideration factors like SEGs, location, competition and staffing – and then focus on improving your own numbers.

Giving your credit union the goal of beating its own personal best presents more attainable goals than trying to return better numbers than your fellow credit unions. Plus, this fits with the philosophy of cooperation instead of competition. Does anyone have a story of a credit union setting and achieving personal goals? Or a different philosophy that you think works better than this one?

Comments (0)

Add your comment below