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Where Corporate Growth and Community Impact Collide · Leaders in Lending

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You are listening to Leaders in Lending from Upstart, a podcast dedicated to helping
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consumer lenders grow their programs and improve their product offerings. Each week, here,
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decision makers in the finance industry offer insights into the future of the lending
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industry, best practices around digital transformation, and more. Let's get into the
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show. Hello and welcome to Leaders and Lending, brought to you by Upstart.
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I'm your host, Barry Roach, and I'm happy to be joined today
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by Nathan Cox, who's the CEO of Inroads Credit Union in St. Helens,
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Oregon. Nathan's taking a winding road on his way to the CEO chair.
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Started in the wine industry, worked his way through some incrementally challenging roles
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at banks and credit unions across California, but he's really blazed his own trail
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to hit this career milestone a CEO of a credit union. But the quote
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unquote finish line is really only the beginning for Nathan. In today's episode,
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Nathan's going to talk about embracing failure, overcoming doubt, taking lessons from adversity,
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and also enlighten us on the vital role of credit unions play in community
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economic development and the unique approach of the Inroads team has on improving the financial
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wellness of their members. Let's get started. Hello everyone, thanks for joining
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us on the Leaders and lending podcasts with Upstart. I have the pleasure today
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of talking to our good friend Nathan Cox, who's the CEO of Inroads Credit
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Union. Really glad to have you on today, Nathan, I know you
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are a fairly new CEO in the credit union space. Maybe tell us a
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little bit about your background and starting from going way back to when you started
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in your career to where you are right now, and a little bit of
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that history and that path that you've taken. No, sounds good. Thank
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you again, Barry. I'm honored to be on the podcast. Look forward
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to our dialogue so way back when. I've been in the industry for over
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thirty years. However, this industry isn't my first job, so to speak.
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My first job out of college was with the Galla Wine Company, where
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I was selling and building displays and I got promoted a couple times. Tis
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then that brought me from southern California to northern California and I got in the
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banking industry literally on a fluke in nineteen eighty nine. A friend of mine
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had recommended that I go to a job there, and I said, well,
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I am happy and I enjoy what I do, but I'll go on
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and go anyway. And by chance I ran across someone for HR. There
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was a recruiter and they worked for Wells Fargo, and Wells Fargo at the
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time was recruiting outside salespeople to grow their banking business. So in September of
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eighty nine, I went from the wine industry to financial services industry and have
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been in the industry since September of nineteen eighty nine. Wow, that's a
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non traditional path, Nathan, right, going from wine to banking. Any
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lessons from the wine industry that helped you when you go into banking, well,
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timing is everything. I left the wine industry when I thought it was
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tailing off, and the wine industry took off and the banking industry had a
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recession. So I tried to predict the future too much. That's a good
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idea. Yeah, So a little bit about your banking history then, I
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know you started with some fairly large banks in northern California, correct, Yes,
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so started off with Wells Fargo and I've worked for both domestic, publicly
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traded banks and large international banks. Most of my career has been with Wells
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Fargo and Bank of the West, where I spent ten years each. But
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my most recent kind of bank background was with US Bank, being the market
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executive for Sacramento and kind of the greater Central Valley area. That was my
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last stop before I hopped into the credit union movement, which I'm enjoying thoroughly.
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And was it about the credit union movement that kind of made you feel
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like this was a good move for Nathan, a good move for your career,
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you know? For me, it really is three things. Number One,
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I love the entrepreneurial attitude to where you know, we can partner with
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FinTechs or vendors that can help us go our business. That's number one.
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Number two two is that for me it's the greatest combination of taking the financial
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expertise and having impact on the community. So again that would be number two.
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And the number three is that it's a growth opportunity. I think the
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movement is really expanding its lines of business, and for me, coming to
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Inroads, it was a chance to help transform this company to prepare for the
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future given everything it's taking place in the industry terrific. Yeah, you know,
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you and I have similar backgrounds. I started banking as well and evolved
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into credit unions, and you know, nothing against banks or anything like that,
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but one of the biggest differences I found was and I worked for very
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large bank, like a very large bank, and there was a lot of
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talk in the bank about we'll focus on the customer, put the customer at
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the center of everything you do, and looking in the rear for mirror of
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that. Now, it's they didn't necessarily follow that ethos, right. There
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were a lot of decisions and a lot of strategies that were made in that
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bank that clearly were not in the best interests of the customer. It was
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more about the shareholder or some other constituent. Right. You go to credit
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unions and it is completely all about that member, right, Like, if
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you are not focused on that member and on that member experience, then really
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you don't have much of a business to grow on. Just kind of wanted
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to get a sense from you. Did you feel the same sorts of things
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coming into the credit union industry or did you have a bit of a different
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experience barrier spot on for me. I think, and again, banks are
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bad per se, but I think they're focused is shareholder driven and shareholder value.
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When you look at the crediting movement, it's more focused on stakeholder value
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and that member experience and stakeholders can be working with vendors, various business partners,
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community partners, but at the end of the day, everyone is properly
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aligned to drive and optimize the member experience. Right, That's great, And
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now you're a CEO, So congratulations on that. I mean, it's been
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almost a year for you now, right, yep, yep, coming up
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on nine months next week. Time flies still standing and you've got one hundred
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different things coming at you on a daily basis, right Whereas I believe your
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past role was very much more focused more on the lending side of things,
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and now you've got such a broader view of the whole organization. Just maybe
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talk a little bit about the transition there, Nathan, like, how that's
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been going and sort of what's been most helpful for you. I guess through
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that transition. You know, the transition has been great. I had a
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dialogue with my board Shair a few weeks ago, and you know she was
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talking about a few things that were unexpected, and I said, well,
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to be honest and said, I'm enjoying the transition because if everything went the
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way it's planned, we're not really going to grow as a company or grow
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as leaders. So for me, transforming the company into what is capable of
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being has been a great honor and a great privilege, and I'm having a
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ton of fun. I think for me, the move from California, you
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know, Oregon has been great. I think the people up here are very
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I love the food scenes. I gotta watch. I don't need too much.
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But the transition actually has gone fairly well. I think for me it's
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integrating a fail forward, fail fast mindset because I want people to take risk
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so that way we can grow the company. And I guess, if I
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had to summarize it into one simple phrase, we are transforming the company through
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digitization. Love it. So there's a connotation there that perhaps the company was
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on a path of digitization that wasn't quite where it needs to be today to
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compete. Was it more of an internal thing, more of a member focused
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digitization strategy, or maybe a little bit of both. I think a little
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bit of both, and probably the mentality that I've tried to implement the most
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is don't operate with both feet in the business today. Operate with one foot
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in today and one foot in the future, because you always have to look
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forward. And what I'm doing is ideally inspiring and transforming our leadership mentality to
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be more forward thinking. And also with the board as well, which they've
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totally embraced. Right, that's great. And those board relationships are so critical,
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right. They are the ones who who can be your biggest supporter sometimes
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can also bring in some challenges for you. Right, So describe how you
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successfully create those those effective board relationships, not just with the chair but with
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the broader board. No, thank you, that's an excellent question. I
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think number one. To have a strong relationship with the board, there has
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to be transparency. So when I first started having my monthly one on ones
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with the board chair and so, look, there's one rule that we're going
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to have this non negotiable and it's called no surprises. You don't surprise me
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and I don't surprise you. And I think that level of transparency has been
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respected to appreciate it. Also, I think the next thing is accountability.
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We have to hold each other accountable, and lastly, really making it a
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partnership. I've really had an open dialogue with the board and it's just about
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accomplishing those things, being transparent, being accountable, and just being open.
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And again they've completely engaged kind of forward thinking mentality and they support me.
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So it's a lot of fun, a lot of hard work, but a
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lot of fun. Terrific. Yeah, not a lot of pleasant surprises in
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the credit union industry, right, Like, usually pleasant is not the adjective
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you think of with surprises, usually something that's really gone badly. So that
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effect of communication, I think is kind of the number one thing, so
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that everyone's always on the same page, right correct. And you talk before
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about failing fast, and there's a lot of people in the credit union industry
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who don't really think of it that way. They think, oh my god,
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you know, we don't want to We can't really fail at anything because
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our members are relying on us for something. But my experience has been that
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sometimes your best lessons come from adversity, right and how you deal with it,
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how resilient your team is in dealing with it, how you respond to
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these unpleasant surprises that can happen. Maybe walk us through a little bit of
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how that fail fast mentality has worked at Mwroards. You know, it has
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worked fairly well. We still have a ways to go. But I'm just
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a firm believer that you learn more from your failures than you do your successes.
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And I'll give you a little bit of a basketball analogy. When I
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walked on at Loyel and Marymount to the basketball team the summer before and for
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workouts alliday, was just shooting. I mean, I'm practicing shooting, a
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little bit of dribbling, but more shooting, more defense. So when I
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got to the actual tryout and I was trying to compete for a backup point
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guard spot, my dribbling was not where it needed to be. So I
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still made the team. But the coach pointed out to me, he says,
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hey, your role is not to be a shooter. Your role is
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to be a dribbler, a facilitator, and to play great defense. So
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I learned from that my weakness was dribbling, especially my off end. So
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during the season I worked that much harder on my dribbling so that way I
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can fulfill my role. But if I can focus on the shooting, and
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I'm not asked to be a shooter, then I haven't really grown. So
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that's why I say it's important that you learn more from your weaknesses than you
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do your strengths. Right, I promise I wasn't going a fanboy about your
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basketball career, but you know, hats off, right, congratulations, Like
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not everyone can say that they played D one basketball and you weren't recruited by
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anyway, really right, this was just your hard work and efforts that got
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you into that position and gave you that experience, right, well, and
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thank you, and really that's it. Yeah, I was not recruited athletically,
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had a host of academic scholarships and opportunities, but you know, I
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love challenges. And my high school coach, when I asked him after the
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season where I could go walk on at a Division one school, he just
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looked me in the eye and said, hey, you're just not that good.
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You need to go find a small Division III or in AIA school to
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go play and hopefully they'll make the team. But you're not that good.
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So I internalized that challenge and again did the work, put in the effort,
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and got to the point where you know I made the team. And
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the funny thing about making the team, I couldn't get a playwright, couldn't
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make a pass, right, And as you know, fall practice starts at
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the beginning November. And I went to the coach's office on November first,
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and you know, my head's down thinking, yeah, you know what,
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I didn't make the team. And I walked up the stairs to the office
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and he had my my practice uniform, my game uniform, my shoes.
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Isay, you made the team. Go put your stuff in your locker and
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then get your ass on the floor. Practice starts in a half an hour.
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And again that's the success story. So hard work does pay off.
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Hard work, But in the motivation of that challenge, right, people doubting
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you, people saying oh you can't do this, right, that's fuel for
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you. Right. And this was quite I won't say, but it was
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a few years ago before I had right hair at the boss spot. Mary,
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Yeah, you've experienced it those for your career, and Eathan, I
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mean, you know, we've all had people in our careers who maybe down
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to this, we've even downed ourselves sometimes, right, and yet you continue
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to persist and try and strive forward. You talked about how shooting was great.
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Now, back then you didn't necessarily have designated shooters. Right now,
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the game has evolved. If you can shoot the three, you can play
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anywhere now, right, So you worked on dribbling. You didn't have a
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three point line. That's a good point. Yeah, and short shorts.
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Your point line came in two years after I graduated. Yeah, there you
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go. So there were all two pointers exactly. So, but you worked
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on dribbling, right, You worked on and with your off hand. So
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all those maybe weaknesses you had, right, I know in your academic career,
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because you've talked about this in the past, that you had some weaknesses
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academically or with your own knowledge base that you knew you needed to correct that
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to be able to get to where you want to be in your career.
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So talk about that a little bit. Because you graduate from LMU, you
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ended up going off to getting a second degree. How that all happened?
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Yes, I had some great mentorship early on in my career at Wells Fargo
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and just had some great managers. And one of the pieces of advice I
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got was to go back and get my MBA Master's in Business and the logic
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was, and this is what the executive told me. He says, you
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don't want to be in a situation where you're competing for a job and the
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only reason the other person gets the jobs because they had an MBA and you
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didn't. And that was when the light went on. So I said,
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okay, I'll go back and get an NBA in marketing. He said,
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nope, go get an MBA in corporate finance. And I said why So
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that was my worst subject in undergrad. He says, no matter what line
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of business you're in, in a financial institution, HR, marketing operations,
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or lending, whatever, it all revolves around finance. So the more you
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can have a strong understanding of finance, that will help you. So that
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goes back to our conversation about the weaknesses. I put all the effort into
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the weakness and for me, graduate school was much easier than undergrad because I
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was working during the day and going to school at night. So in nineteen
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ninety six I got my MBA and corporate fininance from Goldigate University and just missed
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Magna cum latte. So wow, I had a little hiccup at the end
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of my term, but I was very happy with my GPA and my experience
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impressive, Nathan. And so I know because that finance background again similar similar
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experiences what you've had. I also got my NBA and finance because it was
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in a strong suit. But now as the CEO, I mean, if
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you don't have that fascile understanding of the numbers and the relations between the numbers,
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it's really really hard for you to make informed decisions. Right. So
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you've mentored many people through your career as well, right, I'm sure as
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you've been in leadership positions and trying to help those who work with you and
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beside you really achieve the best they can be. Maybe describe a little bit
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how you've been able to sort of mentor people throughout your career. Because we're
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not going to be here forever, Nathan, Right, we need those players
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on the bench to be coming up and taking these roles for us as well.
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So maybe talk a little bit about how you've been able to do that
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successfully. Yeah, just had that conversation last week with our executive team.
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So Number one, I think an NBA doesn't necessarily make you smarter, for
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what it does is it makes you think in a more analytical mindset, and
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you need that mindset to be a successful leader in the financial services industry.
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So I've taken that along with what I think is a very high level of
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self awareness and saying, Okay, here's where I'm at, here's I want
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to go. How am I going to get there? And I think we
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talk a lot about servant leadership or you know, all these different management tenants.
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I think really being an effective leader is about communicating with your people and
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earning and keeping trust. So the big thing I've done in the company,
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a lot of the business decisions were centered at the executive level, and what
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I've done in myself and our head of HR, we did a listening tour.
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So for ninety days, all we did was visit every department, every
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division, and we took notes to put everything together. And I realize that
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we have really, really good people. We empowered them to make decisions.
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So over the last couple of months, I've taken a lot of decisions that
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were done at either the executive level or the leader level, pushed them down
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to the organization and we're getting great ideas, great engagement. Because the executive
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team can't do everything to change a company. It's going to take the entire
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company to move the needle and help transform where we need to be. And
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we're getting some phenomenal ideas from the staff and they were always there, we
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just never solicited them. Right, terrific. I mean, kudos to you,
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first off for listening to the staff, because sometimes they don't feel like
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that's they've ever had a voice that way. Secondly, kuz to you for
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actually acting on it, because the worst thing you could do is go and
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ask for that feedback and then do nothing with it, right, stick it
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in the bottom drawer and go, oh that was great. I kind of
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check that box. I'm going to go on and do my own thing.
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No, you're absolutely those best ideas are really coming from They may not be
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fully formed ideas from the German population of the staff, but there's enough initiatives
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there that that's where your executive team can come in and really turn those those
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germs of ideas into real positive solutions for both your members and for your staff.
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No, you're spot on. And one of the things I'm doing,
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we're out on a listening tour and one of the branch staff they called me
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out of something that I promised to do and I didn't. I say,
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you know what, You're right, So we changed it and shifted. So
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I think this is it goes back to the whole thing about transparency. So
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once a quarter, I actually spend a day working in a branch where I'm
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actually the greeter, or maybe I'll work behind the desk somewhere. But I
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want to be visible. So when the members come in and I don't say
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who I am, I just greet them and say how can I help them?
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And then during the course of the conversation I let them know on the
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CEO. But there's nothing that can't be done that I won't do. And
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if I can impart that mentality in the company, then the other employees will
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also say, Wow, he's willing to make sales calls, he's willing to
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solve problems with the members, then I can do that as well. So
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really trying to empower and engage the entire company to move us forward totally.
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Oh that's awesome, Nathan. So if you really want the unfiltered opinion from
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your members, go to the call center for a day, right, Because
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people over the phone tend to be a little braver in their opinions of things
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and so on and so forth. So you know, if they've got a
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beef with the CEO, and the CEO actually answers a call, hey maybe
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you can maybe you can knock that problem out right away, right, you
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know, it's funny you bring that up. I actually did that one day,
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spend half a day with our live staff taking calls as people are going
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up to the ATM. And because we have these interactive ATMs, so you
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can do a video or you can do a regular chat. And it was
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interesting some of the feedback you got. And then but the best part,
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and this is one of the coolest things about the job, we decided to
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give members fifty dollars on a random basis to credit in their account. So
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they didn't know it, but we had this one lady and she had a
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small child on the back seat, and you know, she's kind of going
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through a transaction. So I said, he you know, by the way,
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I'm the CEO, blah blah blah, and I'll turn it over and
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so and so to do the transactions. They completed the transaction that I came
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back on and said, hey, just to thank you for being a member,
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we're going to give you a fifty dollars credit and your account and make
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the deposit right now. So thank you for being a member. And Barry
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was so moving. She looked at us, she looked at the baby in
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the backseat. You can see the tears coming down her eyes because that fifty
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dollars made a difference. But for me, it wasn't the fifty dollars.
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It was the fact that I as a CEO connected with the member and deepen
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that relationship and built that trust. So that's what our business is about,
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establishing trust to optimize the member experience. Yeah, one member at a time.
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Right. So you're in that Portland metro area slash rural Oregon, you're
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somewhere in between, and we all know metro areas teem to expand, so
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it becomes maybe less rural daily and more metro, right, that's true.
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But you're also competing with a lot of large banks are important in a lot
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of large credit unions as well. So for inroads, Like, what's your
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vision for for how you see inroads sort of owning whatever it is that element
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of the market that you want to own, Like, what's it going to
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take for you all to get there? You know? I think our focus,
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and I've tried to tell people we can't be all things to all people.
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Let's be excellent at what we're really good at. So we're going to
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build a foundation of financial wellness, and that financial wellness, if you can
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envision a three legac stool, is financial health, physical health, and mental
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health. And we're going to go to market branding that three leged stool,
21:38
part for the consumer member and then the other part for the small business member.
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We can't compete with the larger of the regional banks because we don't have
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the infrastructure and the product set, and we have very friendly competition with the
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other credit unions. I mean I sit on councils with the other CEOs and
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we trade ideas all the time. So our focus is we have a very
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strong market share in Columbia County where our branches are, and we're expanding into
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Washington County because that's one of the growth areas. So again, we can't
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be everywhere. But my vision going forward is that as we digitize the company,
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we leverage our what we call our segs, our specialized employee groups where
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we basically do banking services for large local employers. We leverage that using our
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digital technology to grow our membership base and expend our footprint. That's terrific.
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Two of those three legs, right, Physical health and mental health not something
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you typically hear from a credit unit, right, But admirable that you're thinking
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of it in a much larger sense rather than just financial health. I mean,
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financial health is maybe a component or it can be a detriment to someone's
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mental health as well. Right, So why did you choose those two elements
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of the stool Because it's so unlike what I've heard from other credit unions and
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certainly some banks. We have lots of banks and credit unis who maybe are
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donating to certain causes and so on and so forth. But you're actually making
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this part of your corporate ethos almost right? How did that come about?
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Nathan? You know, you bring up a really good point about the banks,
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and again, just being very realistic, I think a lot of times
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financial institutions will make charitable contributions because it's the right thing to do for a
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variety of reasons. If you look at a credit union, we're driven by
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community involvement and community impact. And if you look at the data, and
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no matter what the source, you'll see, there's a direct correlation between the
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strength of someone's financial health and the strength of their mental or physical health,
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and if their financial health is not strong, that stress impacts their mental health
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and that mental health impacts their physical health. So we're working with we have
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great programs for middle schools and high schools to help them about the budget and
24:00
what we call financial reality fair, and then doing the same thing for small
24:03
business owners because by default, crediting is serve a lot of the underserved or
24:10
underrepresented communities, and those communities do not have financial equity. So we could
24:15
take all three of those areas financial health, mental health, and physical health
24:19
and really use them to have an impact. That's why we're changing lives and
24:25
leaving a legacy at Inroads, and the companies completely bought off on that.
24:29
So now we're going to execute that strategy going forward. Impressive, so impressive,
24:33
Nathan. So that's part of that's through digitization, right, the ability
24:37
to provide more services faster and at the time and in the channel in which
24:42
the members need to access them. So you've obviously had to establish some new
24:48
fintech partnerships right up starts of fintech, So we partner with hundreds of banks
24:52
and creditings across the country for making sure that we are providing lending in a
24:57
more inclusive and more accessible man across the country. So talk about at inroads
25:03
and maybe even personally, what you look for in a fintech partner or what
25:07
really is a catalyst to make inroads feel that this is going to be something
25:11
that's going to be sustainable and a fully functioning partnership going forward. I think
25:15
my definition of a great partner would be what I would call a stakeholder.
25:21
They have a vested interest in the company because they want to optimize the member
25:26
experience, not just complete a sales transaction. And literally I'm starting to draw
25:32
the line for the company between partners and stakeholders. I would consider obviously a
25:37
company like Upstart being a stakeholder because based on my knowledge of the company,
25:41
which goes back several years, you're really making a difference in the underserved community.
25:45
And that's what I look for is you know, there's an old saying
25:49
Barry said, if you really want to know where somebody's at, don't watch
25:53
their lips, watch their feet, because they can tell you one thing,
25:56
but their feet will say something different. I think companies upstart when you watch
26:02
your feet, you guys are doing all the right things really, you know,
26:06
being a stakeholder with credit unis to try to drive lending to underserved,
26:11
underrepresented areas. So just using you as an example, that's what I look
26:15
for. I don't want a vendor just to come to me and said,
26:18
oh, we have the solution, click on here for a meeting, invite.
26:22
No, I want to know your value proposition, how you can help
26:25
us, help the community. And I think when you have a mutually beneficial
26:30
relationship, that's a win win for everybody. Awesome. Yeah, No,
26:33
So it goes beyond just what the solution is, right, it gets into
26:37
what are the values of the company. Was a vision of the company?
26:40
Does it match what Inroads is trying to do, Because then you know that
26:44
you've got a partner for life basically on this right exactly. Terrific, Nathan,
26:48
this has been a great discussion. A couple other things I do want
26:52
to touch on. You work on a lot of economic development initiatives, and
26:56
you've got a long career as a commercial or small business banker, so you've
26:59
sort of seen the impact that credit can have to really the lifeblood of certainly
27:03
new businesses as well. So talk a little bit about in the inroads area
27:07
in your market, how you see inroads sort of helping from that perspective,
27:11
and it could be from either better access to credit for small businesses or you
27:17
talk a little bit about your work with schools, but any other sort of
27:18
economic development initiates that you think you guys can be at the forefront ome.
27:23
I think two areas. Very one would be obviously small business, but also
27:27
focusing on the micro lending or loans under one hundred thousand dollars. You have
27:34
a local dentist that needs to get more equipment to expand his or her practice,
27:40
or a local restaurant chain that wants to do something put up a distribution
27:45
facility financing that I think when you really zero in on small business lending,
27:51
the economic impact isn't just the financial viability the company, but it's also job
27:57
creation and then have that job creation trickle down through the community because it affects
28:03
so many people, you know, the daycare provider, the local grocery store,
28:07
so forth, and so on. So what I've been able to do
28:11
is in part kind of a long gain view of economic development here and having
28:17
people invest in the community and really look at it from a relationship standpoint,
28:22
not a transaction standpoint. Right. What's statistic, Nathan, You probably know
28:26
better than I do that every dollar that gets put into the community for supporting
28:30
small business turns into eight dollars in GDP or something like that. Right,
28:33
And so as you're supporting that small business community in your area, it just
28:38
has that much of a greater impact on the whole community at large from an
28:41
employment perspective and so on and so forth. And I think one of the
28:45
things that's really fun about working in a rural a suburban community the passion for
28:51
the success of the community is great. So as a native California now working
28:56
in Oregon, I've been well received because I'm taking this personal and I want
29:02
people to see my passion for the community to be successful. It is not
29:06
just about inroads credit union, but what the community can do to band together
29:11
across political lines, across governmental lines. How can we have impact Because Verry,
29:15
what people are starting to see now is that if we don't reach out
29:18
to the middle school and the high school kids and get them going a financial
29:22
wellness and they go down a different path not only are we losing an economic
29:27
impact, but these are potential employees that we're going to have five to ten
29:33
years down the road, and if we don't move them along properly through that
29:37
financial wellness, how can they be employable down the road if they've been exposed
29:42
to other things that will have a negative impact on their lives. So that's
29:47
what I think the aha moment hit folks locally, is like, Wow,
29:51
this really is important, and everybody's on board. Yeah, amen to that.
29:55
Financial literacy is not in the curriculum. I have school aged daughters.
29:59
They're not learning through their school, and there's two camps in that that may
30:03
think that it's necessary or it should be part of what the school system allows,
30:08
but you're sort of ignoring that aspect of it and just going ahead and
30:12
saying, Hey, we know this is a gap in our community. This
30:15
is something that Inrods can certainly help with, and you're just going forward with
30:18
a program on that. So is this something Neathing that Inrods has had for
30:22
a long time or does it serve of a new thing that you brought in.
30:25
It's a new concept that I brought in, and it parallels with some
30:27
legislative approvals that were done in the state of Oregon of mandating financial literacy being
30:33
taught at a certain school age level. So again we're running kind of side
30:38
by side on this, but really, to me, it's just common sense
30:41
for a financial institution because we have a great community impact in the communities that
30:47
we serve. That's part of our mission is, you know, we have
30:51
to help transform lives and help them be better off, not just for our
30:55
benefit, but for the benefit of the community. So I didn't know this
30:59
was a state legislator concept. So then I guess the school boards have to
31:03
find institutions that are willing to partner with them on this unless they're building this
31:07
curriculum themselves. Potentially, yes, there was some legislation passed I believe came
31:12
through the Oregon State Senate. It's not going to be implemented for a few
31:17
more years. But in Roads has had partnerships with local high schools for the
31:22
last few years. So now we're going to deepen those partnerships. We're also
31:26
going to go to the middle school level, and as we expand out our
31:29
footprint, we're going to reach out to other local high schools and explain to
31:33
them about our financial reality fairs, our Team Up for Schools program. So
31:37
as an example with our Team Up for Schools, the local high school gets
31:42
a branded debit card and it's like a cash back rewards program. They get
31:48
five percent of all the debit cards spin back to them at the end of
31:52
the year. So we've been able to present checks from maybe ten or fifteen
31:57
thousand to his high as six thousand and one check we present was over one
32:01
hundred thousands, So this is real money and again as part of our financial
32:06
wellness commitment, terrific, terrific. Well kuno's again to you guys for taking
32:09
that initiative and to you Nathan, I mean this was your brain job coming
32:14
in. This was one of these new ideas. The CEO has maybe a
32:17
disproportionate effect on sort of the future of the organization, and this is maybe
32:22
one example of where you're really coming in and this isn't just rhetoric. You're
32:27
truly making a tangible impact to the lives of your community. So again,
32:31
props to you and the Inroads for that. Thank you. I'm going to
32:35
close with what we typically do on leaders and Lending podcasts where we talk about
32:38
your bold prediction for the future. I'm gonna put a little bit of a
32:42
twist out of here, Nathan. I want to know a bold prediction that
32:45
you think more from a financial services perspective, and then maybe a bold prediction
32:49
for Nathan, because you're a well rounded person, right, you have a
32:51
lot of things going on personally in your life. So one bold prediction for
32:54
Francise services, one bowl prediction for Nathan, and then we'll hold you accountable
32:58
for this X number of mine from now. I won't say how many months,
33:00
but at some point bold prediction for financial services, I think you will
33:06
see continued mergers amongst credit unions and acquisitions of credit unis buying small banks or
33:14
bank branches. The regulatory environment and the increased cost of technology is becoming an
33:22
issue for most of us, and then when you layer that over intrastrate risk
33:27
and liquidity risk that we deal with on a daily basis, at some point,
33:30
I think it just makes sense to merge. And I'm not saying that
33:35
for us, I'm just saying generally speaking for the industry. And then a
33:37
lot of CEOs are retiring, so you'll see that come together more and more
33:40
in the next twelve to twenty four months. Definitely bold prediction for Nathan.
33:45
In fairness, I sprung this on you, but that's when you get the
33:49
most genuine and authentic answer. Right, let's see consistently. Shoot, I
33:54
have a golf scorer in the mid eighties, mid eighties. Okay, I've
33:59
been playing the rain up here. I really tried to get better. Well,
34:01
there's you know, there's driving ranges, right, there's putting greens and
34:05
stuff like that. But are you at one hundred and twenty right now?
34:07
We are you at ninety? Like? I kind of no. No,
34:10
My handicap has been seventeen for the last six years because I just don't play
34:15
enough. And you quick, funny story, So we're as you know,
34:20
we had a pretty bad ice and snowstorm up here a couple weeks ago,
34:23
so it was pretty harsh, I think for about four days pretty much the
34:29
city got shut down. So I'm tired of staying inside. So on Sunday,
34:32
I was like, all right, the sun is out even though there's
34:34
snow, and the sun is out, and I took a picture of sent
34:37
it to my friends. I went to this driving range and a lot of
34:40
the range is covered with snow. And I'm out there hitting balls and it's
34:44
forty degrees and snow on the ground. But I'm out there hitting balls trying
34:46
to get better. So we had a good laugh about that. That's dedication
34:50
right now. These are yellow balls that you can find the snow, right,
34:52
not not white balls because that'd be pretty hard for the for the you
34:55
know, some were yellow summer white. But that's on the fact of these
35:00
guys at the driving range. But in all serious I think it really comes
35:02
back to what we start off on. You got to put in the work.
35:07
And I always tell people I don't have the perfect answer for everything.
35:10
I don't have all the answers, but my breath of experience and my death
35:15
of experience gives me a really good perspective about problem solving and how to get
35:20
things done. So I've imparted on my executive team. As we talked about
35:25
earlier, fail forward, fail fast, but just don't look you straight ahead,
35:31
broaden your perspective when you learn a lot more, and when you learn
35:35
more, you become a better leader. Nathan, no better way to attend
35:38
the podcast. And on that note, thank you so much for your time
35:40
today. I really appreciate it. I want to run through a wall for
35:43
you at this point right now, you're just very motivating and I just think
35:47
that that you and n Roads are in for some some great successes in twenty
35:51
four and beyond. So again, congratulations and everything that you've accomplished so far.
35:54
You've got a long road to go. I'm rooting for you, and
35:58
I'm sure that you'll all make it. So thank you again, Thank you,
36:00
very friend, and utter thank you. We'll see you all sometime soon.
36:04
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