Financial Minds: Meet the Experts

Pack your bags…the latest episode in the Credit Union Foundations series is headed south, theoretically speaking! Jaime is continuing the series this week with...you guessed it...the Carolinas Credit Union Foundation. She’s chatting with Lauren Whaley, president of the Carolinas Credit Union Foundation to talk about the goals and objectives of the foundation, how the foundation assists credit unions and their members and a few activities the foundation is planning for 2023.

If you’re interested, check out the Carolinas Credit Union Impact Report to see just what the foundation is doing for credit unions and the communities it serves!

Last week in the Credit Union Foundations series, Jaime chatted with Leigh Philibosian, director of the Credit Union Foundation of Maryland & The District of Columbia. This week, she’s continuing the series by sitting down with Sue Ward-Diorio, executive director of the CrossState Credit Union Foundation. They’re discussing how credit unions support the foundation, the role that the foundation plays in raising funds for grants, education and programs and the goals and objectives of the foundation. If your credit union is located in New Jersey or Pennsylvania, make sure to add this episode to your must-listen list!

Jaime is back this week with a new series on credit union foundations. She is sitting down with leaders from the foundations to talk to them about their goals, objectives and role in assisting credit unions. They’re also discussing some activities and events the foundations have planned for 2023. To kick off the series, she is chatting with Leigh Philibosian, director of The Credit Union Foundation Of Maryland & The District of Columbia (MD|DC Foundation). Tune in to listen to their discussion!

Thanksgiving is tomorrow, and in honor of that, Jaime is sitting down to share with you all the things that she is thankful for in the credit union industry. From the credit union leagues, associations and foundations to our partners and staff here at Vizo Financial, she’s reflecting on all the wonderful things that make the credit union industry what it is. Tune in to listen to this special Thanksgiving episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts. And, we hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Implementing a new service or project or even undergoing a conversion can be stressful. But here at Vizo Financial, we’ve got an incredible implementation team that handles these tasks for our member credit unions. This week on our podcast, Jaime is sitting down with Anita Fonner, Vizo Financial’s senior implementation coordinator, to talk about the inner workings of our implementation team. They’re chatting about what the team is responsible for, how often they handle conversions for credit unions and who all is involved in the process of these projects. Tune in to get a sneak peek at the intricacies of implementation!

Language and the words we utilize, especially when addressing a group of people, are vital when promoting a diverse and inclusive workplace. In order to dive deeper into the world of inclusive language, Jaime invited Jae Mikalik, a Vizo Financial DEI champion, and Erin Doan, Vizo Financial’s diversity, equity and inclusion director, to join her this week on the podcast. They’re chatting about examples of inclusive language, tips to improve its usage — including when mistakes are made — and how we are promoting all-encompassing language here at Vizo Financial.

With the November Fed meeting next week, Jaime is back with Fred Eisel, Vizo Financial’s chief investment officer, and Tim Sustak, Vizo Financial’s chief credit officer, to get their thoughts on the outlook of the economy. They’re debating whether we’re looking at another rate increase next week, as well as what the December FOMC meeting could look like. They’re also sharing recommendations and potential strategies for credit unions facing issues with tightening liquidity in this environment. Tune in to catch their discussion!

So far in our celebration of Cybersecurity Awareness Month, we’ve discussed multi-factor authentication (MFA) and strong passwords, as well as recognizing and reporting phishing attempts. This week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is joined by information security experts, John Cuneo and Mike Bechtel, to discuss the importance of updating your software. They’re diving into how updating software protects the credit union from malware and ransomware and the types of tools available to make those updates easier for your institution. They’re also chatting about anti-virus software, including the “Next Generation” software, a entirely new feat in the world of cybersecurity.

We’re continuing our Cybersecurity Awareness Month celebration on the Financial Minds: Meet the Experts podcast this week! In the newest episode of this three-week series, Jaime is sitting down with John Cuneo and Keeley Hartman from Vizo Financial’s risk department. They’re discussing the types of phishing credit unions are seeing, how they’re different from spam and the risks of these phishing attempts. They’re also explaining how credit unions can protect their staff and members from these schemes, so tune in!

It’s National Cybersecurity Awareness Month! And, of course, Jaime is jumping on the awareness train with a three-part series on all things cybersecurity. In the first episode of the series, Jaime is sitting down with Vizo Financial’s information security analyst duo, Mike Bechtel and Keeley Hartman. Together, they’ll discuss multifactor authentication (MFA) and strong passwords, proper ways to implement them and why they are good lines of defense in the fight for credit union cybersecurity.

Jaime is wrapping up our workplace culture series this week by talking with Joe Bertotto about effective accountability. What’s meant by tough love? How can you make accountability conversations more palatable? Moreover, how do these conversations coincide with befriending your employees? Find the answers to all of these questions and more in the last episode of this riveting and insightful series.

Befriending your employees? According to Joe Bertotto, Vizo Financial’s chief culture officer, that’s the way to go in order to create a caring, cordial work environment and, in turn, boost employee productivity. This week on the podcast, Jaime and Joe are chatting about how managers can break the myth that befriending their employees is wrong and, instead, build relationships and even friendships that will increase overall team morale and productivity.

Vizo Financial’s goal is to create a culture that makes employees excited to come to work every day. With this goal in mind, Jaime is beginning a new series this week all about… you guessed it… workplace culture. And who better to join her for this three-week series than Vizo Financial’s chief culture officer, Joe Bertotto! Jaime and Joe are kicking off this series by talking about how to mold a job to suit a person’s strengths and the benefits of finding that perfect fit.

This week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is joined by Cindy Hagan, Vizo Financial’s compliance and fraud risk director, and Tarah Sweigart, Vizo Financial’s payments risk analyst, to discuss wire fraud. Tarah and Cindy explain what wire fraud entails, the different types of wire fraud and how to help prevent it from occurring in the first place. They also discuss the steps a credit union should follow when they realize a fraudulent wire has been initiated.

Financial literacy is a familiar phrase that is often utilized a lot in society, but what about financial wellbeing? Jaime is sitting down with Lori Timm from Allegacy FCU to discuss the term financial wellbeing and how Allegacy promotes holistic wellbeing both internally and externally. They’re also chatting about how Allegacy turns ideas into action to improve the financial wellbeing of their members, as well as recommendations Allegacy has for other credit unions that are beginning the journey of creating a dynamic financial wellbeing program within their organizations.

After taking a short hiatus, Jaime is back with Fred Eisel, Vizo Financial’s chief investment officer, and Tim Sustak, Vizo Financial’s chief credit officer, to get their thoughts on the current economic outlook. They’re chatting about how the housing market recession will impact credit unions, whether inflation will continue to show signs of easing and the effect of higher interest rates on credit union lending. They’re also debating whether or not they believe the Fed will raise rates another 75 basis points at their next meeting in September.

Jaime is wrapping up the Credit Union Leagues series of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts this week with Patrick Conway, president/CEO of the CrossState Credit Union Association. They’re sitting down to discuss challenges that credit unions in Pennsylvania and New Jersey are facing and how the CrossState Credit Union Association is helping these credit unions overcome these challenges. They are also chatting about Patrick’s vision for the future of the CrossState Credit Union Association.

Staffing, recruitment, retention, remote work, technology and cryptocurrency are all obstacles that credit unions in the Carolinas are facing. And this week, in another episode of the Credit Union Leagues series of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is welcoming Dan Schline, president/CEO of the Carolinas Credit Union League (CCUL), to discuss these obstacles and how the CCUL is helping Carolina credit unions overcome them. They’ll also discuss what the league is currently focused on and other issues that they are trying to address with policymakers.

Calling all Virginia credit unions…this one is for you! Jaime is continuing the Credit Union Leagues series this week by chatting with Carrie Hunt, president/CEO of the Virginia Credit Union League. In this episode, Jaime and Carrie sit down to talk about the challenges facing credit unions in Virginia and how the league is helping Virginia credit unions overcome some of these challenges. They'll also discuss Carrie's vision for the future of the Virginia Credit Union League.

This week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is launching a new series - Credit Union Leagues. In this series, she’ll sit down with leaders from different credit union leagues to talk about challenges that credit unions are facing, how the different leagues are helping credit unions overcome these challenges and other issues the leagues are trying to address with policymakers. First up in the series is John Bratsakis, president/CEO of the MD|DC Credit Union Association.

Every credit union needs a core processing system; it’s a simple fact. But choosing and converting to a new core processing system is anything but simple. This week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is sitting down with Rodney May, Vizo Financial’s chief engagement officer, to talk about the mistakes credit unions can make when deciding upon a core provider and how they can avoid pitfalls of hidden fees and added costs. They’ll also discuss things to keep in mind when balancing the need to find a core system that will grow with the credit union without hurting their bottom line.

Happy six months!! Every week for the past six months, Jaime has had the pleasure of sitting down with an expert in the financial industry to talk about topics that affect our favorite people, YOU! We’re so grateful to all of our listeners and those who tune in on a weekly basis, and we are thrilled for what we have planned for the next six months. In this special episode, Jaime is discussing our podcast journey thus far, our future plans, resources and education that we have available for credit unions and the much anticipated #ILoveMyCreditUnion Day on July 29! We hope you enjoy this episode and our podcast so far, and once again, thank you from the bottom of our hearts for tuning in every week.

Do you have suggestions for podcast episodes? Email us at marketing@vfccu.org and tell us. We hope you’ll join us in participating in #ILoveMyCreditUnion Day. You can find tons of resources at www.ilovemycreditunion.social.

The key to driving employee engagement levels is not only ensuring that you promote the right people into management, but also training them to meet the varying needs of their employees. So, this week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is chatting with Joe Bertotto, Vizo Financial’s chief culture officer, to discuss what the term engagement actually entails, the barriers to employee engagement and why credit unions should invest time and resources in actively engaging their employees.

There are so many questions going through everyone’s mind regarding the state of the economy. Are we moving towards a recession, or will the Fed lead us into a recession? When will inflation go down? Will the next Fed rate hike be 75-basis points again? To help answer some of your burning questions, Jaime Agostino, host of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, is sitting down with Vizo Financial’s chief investment officer, Fred Eisel, and chief credit officer, Tim Sustak, to get their thoughts on the current economic outlook.

Elders in society can be susceptible to abuse and manipulation in many aspects of their lives, but this week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, we’re discussing how they can become the victims of financial exploitation. Jaime is joined by Cindy Hagan, Vizo Financial’s compliance and fraud risk director, to talk about who is at risk for elder financial abuse, the different types of elder financial abuse and what financial institutions can do when they believe a member is being financially abused.

What is project management office (PMO)? How can credit unions create a PMO team? And furthermore, how does having a project management team help your organization? During the latest episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is sitting down with Chris Dowhower, Vizo Financial’s project management director, to dive into these questions and more on the power of PMO.

If you’ve ever wondered about the Credit Union Development Education, or DE, program, then this latest episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts is for you! Jaime is joined by Chad Helminak, director of programs and impact for the National Credit Union Foundation, to chat about why people should attend the DE program, the impact the DE program has had on past participants and how you can register for the program.

Great innovations come from asking the right questions, and Jaime is doing just that in the latest episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts. She’s sitting down with Jeff Stoner, Vizo Financial’s chief strategy and information technology officer, and Brent Shaffer, Vizo Financial’s product strategy and development director, to talk about – you guessed it! – innovation. They’ll discuss how to make sure promising new ideas aren’t prematurely shot down and how to assemble cross-functional teams to drive innovation. They’ll also chat about how innovation is fostered here at Vizo Financial!

Jaime and Jeanne are wrapping up our three-week series on CU Onboarding this week with a discussion on measuring the success of your credit union's onboarding program. Join them as they chat about how to evaluate the impact of an onboarding program, the benefits of the program for employees and – finally! – the secret to a good onboarding program.

Jaime and Jeanne are back for episode two of the three-week series: CU Onboarding. In this episode, they're discussing how credit unions can begin building an onboarding program and how they can keep it updated and relevant. They also talk about how to keep new employees interested in all the activities in an onboarding program without overwhelming them, as well as some highlights from Vizo Financial's onboarding programs.

This week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is joined by Jeanne Heath, Vizo Financial’s learning and engagement champion, for a new three-week series on credit union onboarding. In the first episode, they’re covering the basics of onboarding with these questions: What’s the difference between onboarding and orientation? What are the necessary components of a good onboarding program? How does an onboarding program set a new employee up for success? Find the answers to these great questions and more by joining Jaime and Jeanne for this discussion!

A corporate account manager is indispensable to credit unions, which is why Jaime is sitting down with three of Vizo Financial’s corporate account managers in our latest episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts. In this episode, Jaime is talking with Ty Snavely, Steve Houser and Joe Reiner about their role within the corporate and why it’s beneficial for member credit unions to have a corporate account manager. They’re also discussing the new expanded relationship meetings that Vizo Financial is now offering to members and how these meetings will provide greater value to credit unions.

Vizo Financial is proud to be participating in the pilot program for the FedNow service. And to talk about the FedNow service and instant payments, Jaime is joined by Mike Moyer, Vizo Financial’s senior application analyst and project specialist. They’re discussing the different types of instant payments, what features will be available to Vizo Financial’s members when the FedNow service launches and how credit unions can get ready for the FedNow service.

Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) was added as the eighth cooperative principle within the last few years and has since transformed the way Vizo Financial operates. In our latest podcast, Jaime is talking with Erin Doan, Vizo Financial’s diversity, equity and inclusion director, about the steps Vizo Financial took to begin our DEI efforts. They’ll discuss how the DEI program at Vizo Financial has impacted the organization and strategies on how credit unions can have the hard conversations concerning DEI at their credit unions.

Jaime is finishing up our four-week series dedicated to CU Security this week by chatting with Mike Bechtel, information security analyst at Vizo Financial, about email safety. During this conversation, they’re covering why email is a popular target for bad actors, the difference between phishing, spear phishing and whaling and how credit unions can be prepared to combat these email attacks.

This week, we are continuing our four-week series on CU Security with a discussion surrounding multifactor and two-factor authentication! In this episode, Jaime talks with Robert Gentry, information security analyst at Vizo Financial. They’re chatting about the key difference between multifactor authentication and two-factor authentication, which method is the most secure and if these methods are secure enough to protect credit unions from bad actors.

Welcome back to our four-week series on CU Security! In this episode, Jaime sits down with John Cuneo, Vizo Financial’s information security director. They’re chatting about the Log4j vulnerability discovered just before the end of 2021, what the term “Zero-Day Vulnerability” means, how these vulnerabilities are discovered and how credit unions can be prepared to combat these attacks.

Security and risk are two issues that constantly impact credit unions. Join Jaime for Financial Minds: Meet the Experts as she begins a new four-week series on CU Security. In the first episode of this series, she interviews Lori Gall, Vizo Financial’s chief risk officer, to chat about business email compromise, how credit unions can mitigate this risk and her take on NCUA guidance issued in October of 2021.

This week on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is joined by Vizo Financial’s compliance and fraud risk director, Cindy Hagan. They’re chatting about a topic that is incredibly significant and ever changing in the financial industry: compliance. They’ll discuss the recent sanctions being imposed on Russia and a credit union’s role in regard to these sanctions, what 314(a) refers to and reports like Currency Transaction Reports and Suspicious Activity Reports.

There are a lot of moving parts going on in the economy right now with the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, inflation and the Fed hikes coming this month. Jaime Agostino, host of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, is sitting down with Vizo Financial's chief investment officer, Fred Eisel, and chief credit officer, Tim Sustak, to talk about the state of the economy. They'll discuss how inflation and the tensions between Ukraine and Russia could impact the U.S. economy and credit unions, as well as other key economic factors credit unions should be looking at as a whole.

This week, on Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime is sitting down with Joel Schwartz, founder and co-CEO at DoubleCheck Solutions, to discuss a hot topic in the financial industry right now: non-sufficient funds (NSF) and overdraft fees. During this conversation, they’ll talk about how the DoubleCheck program works, the implementation process for it and how credit unions can benefit from the program, regardless of whether they want to keep their current NSF and overdraft process the same or completely change it!

Welcome back to our four-week series on the Evolution of Credit Unions! In this episode, Jaime wraps up the series by joining Ron Longley, director of hybrid infrastructure, and Jared Ness, account executive, with Arraya Solutions to talk about information technology. They’ll discuss the biggest information technology issues facing credit unions today, how information technology is changing the financial landscape in 2022 and how credit unions can stay on top of new technologies.

This week, we are continuing our four-week series on the Evolution of Credit Unions with a discussion surrounding credit union security! In this episode, Jaime talks with Mike Bechtel, information security analyst at Vizo Financial. They’re chatting about all things security, like how the security needs of credit unions have changed in the past two decades, what security concerns credit unions are facing today and best practices for an all-inclusive credit union security setup.

Welcome back to our four-week series on the Evolution of Credit Unions! In this episode, Jaime talks with Dave DeFazio, partner at StrategyCorps. They’ll discuss how fintech is transforming the financial industry and the way members are looking to meet their financial needs, as well as how implementing newer financial technologies can help credit unions evolve and stay competitive.

The landscape of payments is constantly evolving, and credit unions are having to adapt as members continue pushing the movement for faster payments. Join Jaime for Financial Minds: Meet the Experts as she begins a four-week series on the Evolution of Credit Unions. In the first episode of this series, she interviews Eric Dotson, executive vice president of Aptys Solutions, to chat about faster payments, how they have evolved over the past 25 years and the most popular forms of faster payments we can expect to see in 2022.

There’s been a lot of talk about the new current expected credit loss (CECL) model recently because the January 1, 2023, deadline to adopt the model is quickly approaching. Join Jaime as she interviews Michael Umscheid, president/CEO of ARCSys, in the latest episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts. During this episode, they’ll discuss the benefits that the ARCSys CECL solution provides to credit unions and why it is so imperative to start the implementation process now as opposed to waiting and ultimately facing additional challenges.

CUaxis is a credit union core community that offers a plethora of benefits to its members, including a robust core processing system that meets the varied needs of credit unions. In this episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts, Jaime interviews Rodney May, chief engagement officer for Vizo Financial, and Scott Collins, EVP, national sales and marketplace relationships with CU*Answers. They’ll discuss the benefits the CUaxis community offers credit unions and how the partnership between CUaxis and CU*Answers results in a state-of-the-art core processing system available to members in this one-of-a-kind community.

THE PREMIERE EPISODE IS HERE!

From cyberattacks to excess liquidity, the new year is bound to bring new challenges for credit unions. Being prepared, though, and having a trusted partner will help make navigating these challenges a little easier. Join Jaime Agostino, marketing and business development director of Vizo Financial, for our very first episode of Financial Minds: Meet the Experts! In the episode, she interviews David Brehmer, president/CEO of Vizo Financial, to talk about the challenges that credit unions and the Corporate could face in 2022 and how Vizo Financial is able to assist credit unions when facing these challenges.