What was truly great about Indianapolis

It has been two weeks since the Forum Solutions Trabian Partnership Symposium and there is something that keeps me wondering why it stands out in my mind to such a great degree. The same thing applies for BarCampBankSeattle. Then today I was talking to Lisa Hochgraf at CUES and it finally dawned on me.
Passion. The Oxford English dictionary explains it as “to show, express, or be affected by passion or deep feeling.” And that expression and deep feeling was shown by every presenter during those two days. It was an experience that was there with every conversation you had with other attendees. It was what was core to the ~~Dianne~~ Denise/Ron debate. Everything during that time pointed to a group of people who had a passion for credit unions. You usually never experience this when going to the typical conference. You spend your bucks, sit at a table and hear numerous speakers over a few days. After every lunch break you try to stay awake always feeling sorry for the poor guy that is probably staring at so many closed eyelids. You come away thinking “didn’t learn much here, most of the same old thing.” You hear so few speakers with much passion. If you do see one or two you think the conference was ok.
Our credit union system is evolving with an incredible tendency to think that growth for growth’s sake is the prime strategy we need to follow. (Remember growth can sometimes hide a multitude of sins). That economies of scale is the only true mantra. But Indianapolis said something different. It said think smart and stay relevant to the member/owner. The energy and possibility of achieving what we set out to do is only going to be limited by ourselves. It was nice to be with so many people that saw so much opportunity and so few limitations.

What I like about marketing

Most of the time advertising is irksome. I mean it just gets into your face, into your head, into your space just when you want nothing to be there. Could some company ever try to sell you something exactly when you need/want it?
Then there are some companies that when you see their name you look further and want to see what they are saying. Three come to mind – Volkswagen, Apple and Audi. Volkswagen because they had one of the best print ads ever (remember all that white space, a logo and the bug?). Apple because well I’ve had an Apple computer since 1979 and they are just neat and work the way you want (even when it was a CLI). Then there is Audi (What is with German cars anyway?). This morning the Globe and Mail had an insert, a large fold out in black, very little print and their new sports model. All I can remember is 425 horsepower 8 cylinder and a picture of the car. That was more than enough.

Simplicity seems to be the key. A focused message. Nothing busy. It works for me. And that is why I don’t have TV, just can’t stand the commercials. They are like a ball bearing rolling around in my brain.

Web 2.0 sites that are fast becoming known by daily usage

There are a number of sites that I use like applications on a daily basis. Listed below are some most known and maybe, just maybe, a few that aren’t.

flickr – this is the picture mecca. If you upgrade you can download everything you every take with a digital camera. And the best part is the Contacts and Groups areas that you manage. Upgrading to the Pro account is well worth it.

Twitter – the Mac has a neat program Twitterific which makes twittering easy. When you get used to it, and you have to because you will initially discount it as a useless program, you can see what it is all about especially if you attend a conference with others of like minds.

Facebook – not much to say here as the main media has been pounding out information. You need to manage exactly what you want to use this interface for. One of the things that to me is amazing is the ability to quickly send a video on the wall. You can save a ton of time videoing instead of writing.

Jott – this is something I use all the time. Walking, driving or whenever you don’t have a pen or paper, send yourself a quick note (usually via cell phone). Sure you can get the audio message but it also is transcribed into text where it can be forwarded into an email or text message.

YouTube – who doesn’t know this one but again they have the facility for you to record and send a video to a specific person. Some may not have a Facebook account.

Linkedin – professional networking. It goes beyond Facebook in that it has a business focus.

tinyurl – change those long and cryptic URLs into something manageable. Simple and effective.

Simpy – the social bookmarking service. It is simple, works great and keeps bookmarks in one space. It has features galore.

WordPress – the most enjoyable blogging site. The more you spend time with this the better you like it. And if you can host WordPress on your own site it will take you days to get through all the themes and widgets offered.

I am sure some sites have been missed. But think about this – would you have thought any of this was possible 5 or 10 years ago?

Do human emotions equate well with business events?

There is a post over on IT Management about Apple and their arrogance. Maybe Mike Elgan has a point. He speaks of Microsoft being humiliated by Apple. I really can’t see the tears here. And do companies the size of Apple and Microsoft exist with some of the feelings he describes? These are both billion dollar businesses. They have brands. They make money. They do not cry.

Remember in the mid 90’s — it was Microsoft that was ‘arrogant’ and Apple the weak and supposedly dying platform. It only lasted awhile before innovation and hard work changed this. Businesses either work to exist or move on to where ever they move on to. Let’s not get too excited here. I can’t see much blood on the floor. And whatever pain Microsoft is suffering because of this ‘bully’ Apple it is a long way from Microsoft’s heart (and pocketbook).

3 Days of Highlighted points

Listed below are 3 days of points some of the speakers made. They are not in any order.
You could call them key points (ideas that hit a home run or were hat tricks). Some of the quotes have been adjusted for clarity but the italics are mine.

1. In a time of highly diverse issues we live with three common themes – detect you competition, destroy your competition or avoid your competition.

2. Brand equity is an investment. So how does an investment blog?

3. A credit union must become more than an ATM. Too bad some ATMs give better service.

4. Why should they care about what you do. You need to show members you do care. Differentiate. Caring and service are not the same.

5. The lowest employee on the organization chart has the great contact with the member. But why are they the least consulted when it comes to any change in process with the member?

6. Promises to members must be fulfilled. Focus on execution. There should be a method to monitor integrity.

7. Avoidance of pain is a great motivator. see point no. 1.

8. Personal agendas can harm collaboration. Tough to collaborate when our system is driven by personalities.

9. Direct mail response sites at 0.28% Read ‘Punk Marketing‘ for a full explanation. Seriously.

10. Not measured, not managed. Tatooable

11. Credit Union’s may have satisfied members but no loyal members. Something we all need to ponder.

Tomorrow we hear Lydia Johnson – Vancity, Jason Knight – Wesabe, Shari Storm – Verity CU & Trey Reeme – Trabian, Doug True – FORUM Solutions and Tim McAlpine – Currency Marketing. These are key individuals in today’s CU world and it is going to be an honour just sitting and listening to them.

The Cleveland airport

Arrived in Cleveland and are just catching our breath before leaving to Indianapolis. Today has been a day of travelling and we had a chance to drive around Toronto for a few minutes. Interesting city that seems very vibrant. Places you have heard about most of your life (Hockey Hall of Fame, Osgoode Hall, CBC Headquarters) and you finally see. Sort of like seeing Niagra Falls for the first time. Nothing eventful other that being a typical tourist in a car that has no idea of direction. We should arrive at our destination and into our hotel room late this evening. Still can’t get used to the time. Events evolve around it but my stomach is still on West Coast time. I should be hungry by 9:30 pm tonight.

Tomorrow begins at 8:30 am with a pretty heavy line up of speakers. There should be a few announcements and presentations that will challenge some of the ordinary positions we have been having of social media and credit unions. We spent some time with Mitch Joel of Six Pixels of Separation fame last night. What you realize from him is that everything is changing and nothing is remaining static. Any attempt to ‘control’ any of what is being tried in the social media ring is going to be viewed with disdain by the audience that it is built for. It is a new way to view and create business possibilities but like that movie, Meet the Parents, you have to build it with the view it is in ‘the circle of trust’.

What is it with airports?

I am getting ready to head back east for a conference and a symposium. You do know the difference, right? At a conference you confer, at a symposium you collect opinions. Anyway you draw up the typical list – clothes (usually too many), toiletries (you usually forget toothpaste or a comb), camera (you usually forget to recharge the batteries), something to read (that you end up not reading but if you don’t bring something you end up reading airline magazines), miscellaneous stuff (work related) and an iPod (that is never a problem because it is important). Stuff whatever into the wheeled suitcase and put the expensive and important stuff in your carry-on. Your set for the next step.

The AIRPORT. Remember when you were a kid and someone mentioned airports. It was like Disneyland. When I was about 7 years old my Grandfather came to visit us from England. Everybody went out to the airport in their Sunday best. It was an important event. Now I consider airports par with root canals. Very, very painful. Last year in London we had a flight on August 10th from Heathrow. Instead of a few hours by plane it turned into a few days by boat and train. (which by the way cost about 500% more – now there’s a brand statement “Pay more and take longer”).

Now I wonder about how the airport situation will be. The wonderful check in event, the hurry-up-and-wait attitude, the seating space that is ample for anyone under 5 feet, the ample refreshment container (not enough liquid to get a Kleenex damp) and of course the food. Five airports. Five different ways to get a root canal. Maybe alcohol will help here.

Do you want a balance with that transaction?

Today we had a meeting with Mobilearth, preparing to develop the next version of MemberNote (MemberNote3). Mobilearth are a local company that have developed a truly intriguing product — mobile banking with the full gamut of features. The first concept to produce is extended alert messaging. Over the past few years this has been the key mechanism that people see of value. If something happens to their account they want a text message telling them that. The discussions with users always moved to “Can you notice me if this happens?” If you take a look at your monthly statement there are more that ATM withdrawals or Interac transactions there. There are deposits, service charges, loan payments, etc. etc. There is no standard set of what members want noticed. By giving choice and self-management (DIY) to what alerts are wanted the end result is then solved. This process is handled admirably by Mobilearth and can easily be married to our current MemberNote product. The end result will be a very robust and powerful alert messaging system.

The next phase will be to introduce short codes to the product. Basically you would send a text message to a pre-determined number which initiates a query to your account. The resulting information is sent back to you via a text message. So you quickly want to know what the balance of your chequing account is. Sent BAL or BALANCE or ??? to telephone number 604-999-9999. You then receive via return text message the amount.

Whereas the alert system pushes the information to you on a predetermined action, the short code method is a push – pull process. You push the query to receive the pulled information. The beauty of being a small institution is the flexibility in technology development based on manageable transaction levels. You don’t need expensive sledgehammers to tap a pin into a wall. MemberNote 3 will maybe have one more component. But that has to be a secret. And it won’t be sending alerts to remind you to pick up the milk on the way home.

Went fishing

Finally went fishing and had just a great day. Got out on the Fraser River about 8:30 am and spent the whole day where the Harrison comes into the Fraser. It was busy out there. We just about caught our limit, 14 very nice Pink Salmon. We threw a lot of male Pinks back or let the line slack to let the hook loose to let them go. We must have had about 40 strikes the whole day. The weather was great, the company full of fishing stories, and the beer cold. Just one of the best fishing outings I have been on. When I came home it dawned on me. This was only 90 minutes away. Makes you realize how lucky you are sometimes.

Just love those planning sessions

Spent the day and will also spend tomorrow at a planning session for STAB. Everyone has been to these – SWOT, visioning, mission statement, etc. Hasn’t changed much in the last 20 years or so. You know what is coming. But this is the first one in awhile that is a little different. The facilitator is facilitating. He is really challenging everyone and getting things moving. We agreed to a certain process and if someone goes off the rails and starts rambling we can send him the signal to cut them off. This is keeping the dialogue short, sweet and focused.

One begins to see that the process is pretty standard with the key differences being the facilitator and the participants. We are a fairly new group and you get the sense that this is going to be a great group to work with. I think the session could have been held in a garage and it would not have diminished what we accomplished today. Tomorrow should even be better.

Innovation as a secret weapon

Ron Shelvin has posted something interesting. I would restate it in terms of “Innovation is a credit union’s secret weapon”. Just the nature of innovation makes it positive, dynamic and well — who wants to be called uninovated?

To innovate means to change, to make changes in something already established, to bring or introduce novelties, to alter or renew. It would appear that the major attribute needed is to be flexible. Now how many FIs could be called flexible? We are painted and stuccoed as rigid, certainly not flexible. This is an industry that has regulators, auditors, SWOT consultants, and inflexibility as part of it’s character. Flexibility and innovation can be viewed as risky by this group. But now is the time we can’t afford to be anything else but flexible and innovative. So here are 4 simple innovative ideas.

open the door 5 minutes before the posted time.
make sure a person answers the telephone, not an answering machine.
make sure the phone is answered by the 3rd ring. That means everyone answers the phone including senior people (who have also been trained on how to transfer a telephone call to another local).
phone and attempt to contact a member before you return any cheque.

Not exactly high points of technology. Just small things that have been changed from actions of the past. The key is that we as CUs have the ability to change, to do these things differently, to innovate. We don’t have the monolithic structure that prohibits us from doing this. So somebody please tell me — what is stopping us? Are we afraid to be different?

So Apple has some new iPods

So all the hype is over and the release of a number of new iPods has happened. Besides the 160GB iPod (who has a 32,000 song library?) the Apple Touch iPod (ATi) seems the most interesting. If indeed it is an iPhone without the phone then it is a WiFi handheld computer. And with the ability to use a Web browser it puts the need for standalone applications in the rear-view mirror, but only for a moment. Web app providers could revamp their Web 2.0 application to this screen size. This will hold some interesting possibilities for the future. The more ubiquitous WiFi becomes, the scale of use increases and the evolving of possibilities speeds up. The need for clean, fast, and small size standalone applications for this device will also blossom. It seems to point to one simple possibility – you carry your computer notebook in your pocket so what do you want to do with it?

Currently playing in iTunes: Bombay Beats India (1.FM TM)

Bloggers meetup

Last night a number of us met at ShaShuka on Fraser Street. It was good to see everyone after a busy summer. John had his iPhone with him so the questions began. This is an amazing piece of technology. It is a computer with a finder, terminal, et al. The screen is crystal clear and John was moving through programs and lists in an amazingly fast fashion. This device will change the way we view cell phones, the way iPods changed the way we view music and digital imagery. Mobile banking with this device is going to put people’s financial transactions in front of them with complete ease. The question is what will banking look like when access to your account can be done from anywhere? How did the iPod change us when we could listen to our record collection from anywhere?

The consumer will no longer be a passive viewer but an active participant in realizing their spending habits. Think of it this way. You’ve set up your monthly budget, your using Wesabe to tag and assimilate your financing spending, you are in the grocery store and pay for the goods with your Debit card, the iPhone alerts you “Congratulations you are still within budget for food purchases this month….” or on the other side “Not good news – you are exceeding your entertainment budget by ….” Maybe we can become a nation of savers (more than 2.5% of our income) with a little discipline and technology.

9 days left

Only that many days left of this holiday? There is a song written by Sandy Denny (Fairport Convention) called “Who Knows Where the Time Goes”. There are numerous variations of the song but the melody is unforgettable and really does (where’s that English word?) put you into a space of realizing how precious time is. So next week there will be lots to blog about at work but for now golf, reading, and getting used to having our home sans kids.

Blogging on holidays

OK I will only blog on anything BUT work during the holiday period.

Technorati

Interesting point of view on the recent development with Dave Sifry. I met Dave a few years ago at Northern Voice. He understands business and people. Though it was a tough choice it will take Technorati to the next level.

flickr

Downloading just got much easier. The new interface is very good, in fact so good you don’t need a stand alone program.

With the picture library getting cleaned up (and being on holidays) there will be more downloads at the Tinfoiling flickr site.

The New Pornographers

Their new album is out – Challengers. The reviews are good (would one expect anything different?) I like “Mutiny, I Promise You” as the catchiest of them all. It is indie melodic at its best (with a hint of Vancouveresque).

Holidays, holidays, holidays

It has taken a week but finally it does seem like the holiday has begun. Haven’t done much but golf and smack a bunch of balls at the driving range. We were going to head south this week to Western Washington but our plan didn’t hold up and so far the weather has been less than nice. This week is catching up with friends, reading, and getting a handle on the volumes of pictures that we’ve taken over the last year. I am seriously trying not to think about work.

Hardware and the upgrade process

We are moving our banking server to a Linux system with a new Dell server. It is very surprising to see what you can buy now as compared to just a few years ago. One looks forward, thinks of how things could be in two years, and when the two years arrive you still can’t believe the forward progress. Which brings me to this point. Are we using the potential of the hardware we have available today? Everytime there is a hardware jump it takes time for the software to catch up to it’s potential. With the release of the new Macs this week we quickly upgraded some older machines, not to the new ones, but to the ones the retailers just dropped the prices on. The savings are pretty good (except our provincial government now has an environmental surcharge attached) and depending on what is needed you can usually fill the need fairly easily. The server is a different story. We need the CPU power in order to get the work done in a quicker fashion. What it again boils down to is the user. What they need vs what they want. Funny how that objective vs subjective view seems to become apparent so often.