PSECU Moves MX Up The Org Chart

Credit unions around the country are investing in digital banking technology, but how well are members embracing these tools? How easily can they navigate among digital self-service, call center, brick-and-mortar, lending, deposits, and more? How seamless is the experience?

These are important questions for Pennsylvania State Employees Credit Union ($8.3B, Harrisburg, PA), which bills itself as a digital-first credit union. In 2021, PSECU released a redesigned online banking platform that better aligns with its mobile app and in doing so now presents a modern, unified face for its nearly 580,000 members.

At that time, CEO George Rudolph, who had joined PSECU in 2019 from Alliant Credit Union ($19.0B, Chicago, IL), unveiled a sweeping reorganization plan that placed six lines of business under chief officers — finance; human resources; member experience; revenue, growth, and lending; risk; and technology and operations.

Notably, Rudolph introduced a chief member experience officer who is responsible for all member-facing services, including the contact center and branches as well as marketing, sales, and a new member experience group. All told, the member experience function now encompasses approximately one-third of the credit union’s 835 employees. The reorg demonstrates PSECU’s commitment to moving away from functionally focused teams and siloed thinking, says Barb Bowker, the credit union’s chief member experience officer.

“Now, we start with questions around, ‘What is the member’s journey?’ ‘How would the member react?’ ‘What steps would the member take?’” says Bowker, a 30-plus year veteran at PSECU who formerly served as vice president of marketing and membership development. “Instead of leading with a technology product, we lead with creating a best-in-class member experience and then seek out technology necessary to drive the desired end state. We haven’t mastered this process yet, but we are well into our journey.”

A Broader View Of Member Experience

Founded in 1934 by 22 state employees who pooled a $90 investment, PSECU is Pennsylvania’s largest credit union. Although most members live in or around Harrisburg, the seat of state government, the credit union serves members throughout the state and has a growing membership of retirees in Florida.

PSECU is a SEG-based cooperative that serves employee groups encompassing universities, healthcare, media firms, convenience store chains, and more. As such, it must cater to every part of the member spectrum — from college students opening their first checking account to retirees managing their wealth — across all channels. Plus, the organization is moving into new regions such as the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania as well as other states where it has no physical presence.

Prior to the 2021 reorg, PSECU had one dedicated role to member experience. Its member experience manager was part of the marketing analytics group and poured over NPS feedback to map projects to improve the member experience. But, the credit union realized it needed more.

“Since then, we’ve realized one person is not enough to orchestrate the enterprisewide effort to focus on and bring about substantive changes to the member experience,” says Lindsay Oparowski, assistant vice president of digital member experience at PSECU.

Although providing a great member experience is arguably a priority for all employees, Oparowski says the reality is organizations need a constant advocate for the member.

“We want [members] to have a frictionless experience, and to do that, we really need to be mindful and put focus on it,” she says. “We need someone to internally coordinate, meeting with all the different work groups, including those behind-the-scenes support functions, to identify and resolve gaps. It’s important the member doesn’t have to find their way through our internal processes.”

Member Experience As A Product

Naturally, the technology organization is a key part of PSECU’s member experience goals. Prior to 2021, the call center, cards, and other operational and technology services were part of the transaction services organization. External-facing services were transferred to member experience, which became technology operations.

A key part of that change was the creation of application service delivery managers, or ASDMs, who serve as liaisons between application developers and the business.

“Those roles really helped us better organize our work, prioritize, understand, and track all of the work that’s going through the different pipelines,” Oparowski says. “They help us work together.”

The digital member experience team focuses on three areas: digital banking; innovation, which includes longer-term transformational projects; and journey mapping, which analyzes member feedback and other data. Currently, Oparowski is hiring three individuals to join the journey mapping team as experience product owners.

Many credit unions, including PSECU, have had digital banking product owners for years, but member experience extends beyond channels or individual products. So, at PSECU, the experience product owner will address overall processes and problems, such as how to make it easier for new members to join or borrowers to make payments.

“We’re putting structure around experience and calling it a product because it really is the way we show up to the member,” Oparowski says. “We are looking at how we can tie experiences together across channels and products, like we do in digital banking, in other key experiences like the new member application experience or the experience of making a loan.”

Member Experience Innovation

For the past 18 months, the digital member experience team has been busy influencing projects that drive member self-service and overall improvements in member experience. For example, the credit union identified what was driving the highest member calls and redesigned those experiences to reduce friction. Recently completed or soon-to-be completed projects include:

• Giving members the ability to edit the maturity options for certificates of deposits.
• Adding a spending summary on the online banking home screen to give members an at-a-glance view of all loan and share account balances.
• Giving members an online option to digitally access letters from the credit union.
• Providing members an easy self-service process for unlocking digital banking.
• Providing members the ability to reorder a debit/credit card in digital banking if it is lost, stolen, or damaged.
• Allowing members to move mobile deposits into any share account — not just checking.

“Although each of these enhancements might seem small, but, together, they make a big difference in the overall experience,” Oparowski says. “Moreover, since they were selected based on member demand and feedback, we’re confident that’s where our members want us to focus our efforts.”

A future project, part of the longer-term, multi-year projects under the innovation manager, is to provide personalized digital access to members with joint accounts. The project requires a significant amount of design and coding work, but it will allow members with joint accounts to consolidate their credentials to access account information.

The digital member experience team works with all teams across the organization that have a direct or indirect impact on the member experience. For example, the team meets weekly with finance to support rate change strategies. It also meets with the lending team to improve the member experience for taking out loans and onboarding new members.

“Of course, the member experience starts with trust,” Oparowski says. “That’s why our focus on the experience must also include ways to help our members avoid the ever-increasing fraud schemes popping up across the industry while doing so in a way that doesn’t make it difficult for them to use PSECU’s services.”

Finally, even for a digital-first credit union, a great member experience wouldn’t be possible without people support. That’s where PSCU’s human resources group comes into play. It finds and retains talent while making sure employees are equipped with the technical and soft-skill training necessary to provide great member experiences for PSECU members.

“It’s about working with every group and trying to understand how we can have that member feedback be the central piece, the guiding force,” Oparowski says. “What are our members saying? How can we bring their voice to the table? In those internal meetings and the operational decisions we’re making, we want to put the member at the center.”

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