Grow Your Credit Union

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

AI lets attackers scan for whoever stopped paying attention. Is your security plan built on real work, or on the hope that you're too small to find?

In this episode:

• What the TruStage cyberattack and the lawsuits that followed reveal about vendor risk
• Whether giving NCUA authority to examine vendors would make members any safer
• Why security training falls flat, and how a Department of Why gets people to pause before they click
• Where a credit union without an IT strategy should start

Links from this episode:

• Pure IT: https://pureitcuso.com
• Let's Go! Credit Union Services: https://letsgocuservices.com

A huge thanks to our sponsor, Pure IT. Learn more at pureitcuso.com.

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: James McBride, Founder, Let's Go! Credit Union Services Guest: Steve Koinm, CISO and Co-founder, Pure IT

WordPress tags: vendor management, ncua, cybersecurity

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

Cash App now gives six-year-olds a debit card, an allowance, and a savings goal. If your youngest account starts at 13, who's teaching your future members to bank?

In this episode:

• The marketing and leadership work credit unions should never hand to AI
• What a joke that bombs does to a leader's credibility, and when humor still opens doors
• Why Cash App is opening accounts for six-year-olds and how credit unions can compete for the youngest members

Links from this episode:

• Let's Go! Credit Union Services: https://letsgocuservices.com

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: James McBride, Founder, Let's Go! Credit Union Services Guest: Angie Dvorak, Chief Marketing and Growth Officer, Everwise Credit Union

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: https://growyourcreditunion.com

There's a new kind of AI failure, and it's sneakier than bad output. The model tells you your mediocre work is brilliant, over and over, just to keep you coming back. Harvard Business Review has a name for the lazy thinking that sets in when you believe it.

In this episode:

• The subtler AI failure that flatters you into thinking mediocre work is brilliant
• Whether credit unions are losing the mortgage game or just fighting an affordability wall
• Whether the cooperative movement is still cooperative or just competitors sharing a charter

Links from this episode:

• BOxD "what do credit unions look like in 10 years" survey: https://boxd.us/future-of-credit-unions/survey

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Steph Sherrodd, President and CEO, Sunward

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

Every CEO loves a Big Audacious Goal. The trouble is what happens next: the goal gets tossed to the team with a fantasy timeline attached, and they are the ones left figuring out how to actually pull it off.

In this episode:

• How credit union leaders can reduce the operational distractions eating their day
• How to write a strategic plan that gives leaders their time back instead of consuming it
• What has to be true before a small credit union can build its own AI back office

Thanks again to our sponsor, Pure IT.

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Jack Smith, CEO and Co-founder, Pure IT

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

A 77-year-old credit union did the due diligence, picked a solid vendor, and built a whole strategy on it. Then the vendor went under and took the credit union with it. The lesson isn't about that vendor. It's about what happens when your entire plan has a single point of failure and no way out.

In this episode:

• How credit unions can stand out when every institution has the same AI tools
• What a collapsed cannabis-banking strategy really teaches about vendor risk
• Whether stablecoins are the deposit threat everyone fears

Plus we talk with Jack Smith, CEO and Co-founder of Pure IT, about CU Intersect, the credit union event actually worth your January. A huge thanks to Pure IT for sponsoring this episode. Learn more at pureitcuso.com.

Links from this episode:

• CU Intersect (January 25-27, 2027, New Orleans): https://cuintersect.com

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Andrew Mattingly, Chief Operating Officer, FORUM Credit Unions

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: https://growyourcreditunion.com

The best teams run circles around everyone else, and it isn't because they hired the best people. It's because they built a system underneath those people that makes it safe to take a swing and miss. Most credit unions have the talent already. What they're missing is the platform that lets it perform.

In this episode:

• Why high-performing teams come from operating models, not star hires
• Why the growth stall everyone is panicking about may be the wrong thing to watch
• Why credit unions keep failing to personalize the digital experience they promise

Plus we talk with Jack Smith, CEO and Co-founder of Pure IT, about how credit unions can finally get past AI inaction and put it to work. A huge thanks to Pure IT for sponsoring this episode. Learn more at pureitcuso.com.

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Myrto Koimtzoglou, Chief Operating Officer, Farmers Insurance Federal Credit Union

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

Membership growth just hit its lowest point since 2011, and the boom years before it may have been borrowed all along, members rented from auto dealers who were never really yours to keep. The credit unions pulling ahead stopped renting and started building relationships they actually own.

In this episode:

• Whether credit unions ever won on relevance or just rented it from auto dealers
• Why handing out budgeting tips is not the same as building financial wellbeing
• What AI-driven fraud actually changes for how a credit union operates

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Ryan Marosy, VP of Marketing, Affinity Federal Credit Union

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

JOIN NCU-ISAO FOR A FREE TABLETOP EXERCISE ON AUGUST 27TH, 2026

Most credit unions only catch fraud after the money's gone. They budget for the cleanup, staff for the cleanup, build their whole defense around the cleanup, and it's costing them far more than the loss itself. The credit unions pulling ahead are the ones who stopped waiting for the loss and started predicting it.

In this episode:

• Why the true cost of fraud runs far beyond the dollar amount lost
• Why fraud is outgrowing its old home inside IT
• How disconnected data across departments lets mule accounts sit undetected
• What NCU-ISAO's intelligence-sharing network actually does for its member credit unions

A huge thanks to our sponsor, NCU-ISAO. Learn more at ncuisao.org.

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Brian Hinze, President and CEO, NCU-ISAO

Your best employee is ready to move up. There's no seat open. That doesn't mean there's nowhere for them to go.

In this episode:

• Whether AI ownership belongs to one executive or the whole organization
• What to do when a star employee is ready to move up and there is no seat open
• What the Credit Union Board Modernization Act actually changes now that it is law

A huge thanks to our sponsor, The Family Security Plan.

Learn more at familysecurityplan.com.

Host: Joshua Barclay

Co-host: James McBride, Let's Go CU Services

Guest: Jackie Belusko, Vice President, Member Relationships and Service, Sun East Federal Credit Union

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

Credit unions were built around the people you knew. Your neighbors, your coworkers, the people you could not avoid. Now communities form on Discord servers, Substack feeds, and shared Slack channels. So should we be pushing for rules that reflect that?

In this episode:

• Why AI is making broken credit union processes faster rather than better, and what to fix first
• Whether field of membership rules are now working against the mission they were designed to protect
• What rising negative equity in auto lending means for credit unions still treating indirect as a growth strategy

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: James McBride, Let's Go CU Services Guest: Jason Tilley, CIO, 1st Advantage Federal Credit Union

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The experience is where trust gets made or broken. Credit unions have always assumed theirs was safe. But somewhere between the app that locks you out and the branch that feels like a Saturday at the DMV, that assumption started expiring.

In this episode:

• Why credit union values are failing to connect with younger generations and what to do about it
• What member data credit unions already have and are not acting on nearly enough
• Whether the trust advantage credit unions have long assumed over banks is still real

A huge thanks to our sponsor, Pure IT.

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Kaylee Ganus, Chief Marketing Officer, United Federal Credit Union

Credit unions are running networks that look nothing like the ones they started with. Knowing exactly what is connected, who approved it, and what it permits turns out to be harder than it sounds.

In this episode:

• Who is actually on the hook when a fintech vendor relationship goes wrong
• Why routine connectivity decisions carry risks that boards rarely understand
• What regulators actually expect when they ask credit unions to prove their vendor oversight is real

A huge thanks to our sponsor, Pure IT

Host: Joshua Barclay Sponsored Guests: Trent Henson, CIO, Pure IT Kyle Stutzman, SVP of Product Strategy, Kinective

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: https://growyourcreditunion.com

Somewhere out there is a credit union board that poured themselves a bowl of nutritious succession planning. Most boards just grabbed the wrong box.

In this episode:

• Why transformation failures almost never start with the technology and what leaders are missing before the project begins
• Why young credit union professionals organized a panel at GAC to say the door to leadership is locked and what it will take to open it
• Which metrics credit unions treat as gospel that are actually just comfort numbers on a dashboard

A huge thanks to our sponsor Pure IT. Learn more at pureitcuso.com.

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Brian Waldron, President and CEO, Dort Financial Credit Union

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

Your team is not underperforming because they are lazy. They are underperforming because they stopped believing that what they do changes anything. That is not a motivation problem. It is a leadership problem. And it has a fix that does not involve a single town hall or strategy deck.

In this episode of Grow Your Credit Union, host Joshua Barclay and co-host Becky Reed welcome Monica Meyerand, VP of Community Impact and Partnerships at OneAZ Credit Union, to discuss what to do when your team stops believing their actions matter, why succession planning keeps failing at the board level, and whether credit unions should be going narrower not broader to stay competitive.

Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: https://growyourcreditunion.com

Credit unions are feeding communities, funding scholarships, and keeping members out of payday loan cycles. The only people who know about it are other credit union professionals. That's not humility. That's a problem.

In this episode:

• Why the projects that stay on your list may be costing you more than the ones you kill
• What a $1 million internal fraud case reveals about trust, controls, and the danger of overcorrecting
• Why credit unions are their own best-kept secret and what to do about it

Host: Joshua Barclay

Co-host: Becky Reed

Guest: Kathryn Davis, President and CEO, Valley First Credit Union

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Read the show notes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com

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A $12.6 billion merger collapsed. The credit unions are now in court. And somewhere in the middle of it all, a CEO allegedly told his merger partner he was a dictator and didn't care what anyone thought. The question worth asking isn't what went wrong. It's why nobody asked the right questions before the papers were signed.

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In this episode:

• Why toxic workplace culture hits women harder and what credit union leaders are missing about their own culture
• What a collapsed $12.6 billion merger reveals about leadership character and due diligence
• Whether your conference budget is actually building skills or just buying inspiration

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Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Stacy Armijo, Chief Experience Officer, Amplify Credit Union

Read the shownotes and full transcript on our site: https://growyourcreditunion.com

Every time a credit union has an unmet need, its ready to swipe right on a new vendor. But 450 matches later, nobody's having the hard conversation with the partners already sitting across the table. What if the answer was never a new vendor? What if it was just a better conversation with the ones you already chose?

In this episode:

• Whether credit unions are ready for 52% of CEOs to retire in six years
• Why buying more technology isn't the same as innovating
• The case for and against board term limits

Host: Joshua Barclay

Co-host: Becky Reed

Guest: Mike Valentine, President and CEO of BCU

Read the shownotes and full transcript on our site: https://growyourcreditunion.com

Nobody is buying bad technology on purpose. Credit unions are doing the best they can with cores that weren't built for the world they're operating in today, and the gap between what modern software promises and what actually plugs into your infrastructure is nobody's fault and everybody's problem. So how many more systems are you willing to add before you admit the foundation is the problem?

In this episode:

• Whether credit unions are preparing their people for AI
• Why nearly half of CEOs report feeling lonely
• What's really causing technology rollouts to stall at credit unions

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Becky Reed Guest: Michael Goad, President and CEO of Dow Credit Union

A huge thanks to our sponsor, Pure IT

For nearly 10 years, Pure IT has helped credit unions modernize technology, strengthen cybersecurity, and build mission-aligned roadmaps. They meet you where you are, prioritize strategy, and reduce complexity. With deep cloud, security, and planning expertise, Pure IT helps credit unions operate securely and confidently. Learn more at https://pureitcuso.com/ today.

Read the shownotes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com The NCUA says deregulation is coming. Small credit union leaders say it's about time. But when the real burden isn't the rules on the books, it's the people enforcing them, does any of it matter?

In this episode host Joshua Barclay and co-host Becky Reed welcome Doug Wadsworth, President and CEO of Tri-CU Credit Union, to discuss these three topics:

• Is the NCUA's deregulation push solving the right problems?
• Why aren't businesses seeing a return on AI?
• Is it really getting harder to lead a credit union?

Host: Joshua Barclay

Co-host: Becky Reed

Guest: Doug Wadsworth, President and CEO of Tri-CU Credit Union. Get his book: Keep it Simple, CEO

A huge thanks to our sponsor, Pure IT

For nearly 10 years, Pure IT has helped credit unions modernize technology, strengthen cybersecurity, and build mission-aligned roadmaps. They meet you where you are, prioritize strategy, and reduce complexity. With deep cloud, security, and planning expertise, Pure IT helps credit unions operate securely and confidently. Learn more at https://pureitcuso.com today.

Read the shownotes and full transcript on our site: growyourcreditunion.com There's nothing wrong with using AI to speed up your work. But when you start relying on it to do your job, well, your peers start to notice. "AI workslop" forces your colleagues to interpret, correct, and redo the work you were supposed to finish and they definitely resent you for it.

This episode was recorded LIVE from CU Intersect 2026 in New Orleans.

In this episode:

• How AI workslop wastes two hours per incident and erodes trust
• Who's responsible when AI vendors mess up
• Why 56% of leaders burned out last year
• Whether traditional branches are still necessary
• Questions from the audience on technology and AI education

Host: Joshua Barclay Co-host: Elizabeth Osborne, COO at Great Lakes Credit Union Sponsored Guest: Jack Smith, CEO and Co-founder of Pure IT

A huge thanks to our sponsor, Pure IT

For nearly 10 years, Pure IT has helped credit unions modernize technology, strengthen cybersecurity, and build mission-aligned roadmaps. They meet you where you are, prioritize strategy, and reduce complexity. With deep cloud, security, and planning expertise, Pure IT helps credit unions operate securely and confidently. Learn more at https://pureitcuso.com today.