Growth starts with relevance, simplicity, and human-centered innovation.
At Filene’s 2025 Inner Circle Symposium, leaders from across the credit union space gathered to explore how we grow membership, deliver on digital expectations, and support both members and employees in a fast-changing world.
Two main themes led the conversation: The Next Generation of Member Growth and Design for Digital. Across both, the message was clear: to thrive, credit unions must connect emotionally, innovate boldly, and design every experience around people—not just products or tech.
In summary: Align, Simplify, and Humanize
From digital strategies to frontline experiences, leaders emphasized:
- Making offerings simpler, more emotional, and life-relevant
- Bridging tech perception gaps with data and experience proof
- Aligning innovation and digital transformation to organizational strategy
- Creating inclusive, transparent cultures that empower both employees and members
- Embracing agile marketing and social media as growth engines
Filene’s role? Helping credit unions go from insight to impact—with the tools and guidance to get there faster.
The Next Generation of Member Growth Key Takeaways
1. Be Careful Overgeneralizing Generational Segments
As we go through the same life stages as the generations that came before us, there will be some similarities when it comes to attitudes and values. When that notion becomes dangerous is when organizations start to make assumptions that all generations will behave the same way as previous generations in that same life stage. With the continued aging of credit union membership (average age is 53) and less than 20% of Americans under age 40 using a credit union, it is critical for credit unions to better understand what drives Gen Z’s behavior and what makes them unique. It would be easy to say that Gen Z’s views and behaviors when it comes to earning income and investing will be the same as Millennials when they were in their 20’s— but the data is showing that assumption would be wrong. The credit unions that take the time to uncover what drives Gen Z’s unique preferences and behaviors will win at attracting and engaging these valuable potential members.
2. Up Your Relevancy by Understanding Attitude/Behavior Gaps
Attitude/behavior gaps are prevalent in all groups, even when it comes to choosing a financial institution. As the saying goes—“saying and doing are two different things.” The way that people’s beliefs play out is mediated by a number of other factors that influence their decision making and ultimately drive their behavior. For example, people may care very deeply about doing business with or working for a mission-driven organization, but their own economic situation could lead them to make decisions about what they buy or who they buy it from that are in conflict with that. These attitude/behavior gaps will be important for credit unions to understand as they drive differentiation and implement engagement strategies that better align with the unique needs of members.
3. Reap More Value From Social Media
There is still so much untapped value for credit unions in social media when they think about meeting potential members where they are. Big questions remain such as:
- Which platforms are utilized by the different generational segments?
- How do the different generational segments engage with social content and what are their preferences/expectations for each channel?
- How can credit unions leverage influencers to help? How do they find them, how much should they pay, what kind of ROI should they expect?
Many of these questions will be answered in upcoming research pieces, including the results of the Finfluencer Test, an 8-month FiLab study on the potential of influencer marketing and an accompanying playbook. In the meantime, check out this piece on social media best practices by one of the Finfluencer coaches.
Design for Digital Key Takeaways
4. Be Careful of the Technology Fallacy
One of the biggest traps of digital transformation is assuming it’s (solely) about finding and implementing the right technology, as opposed to what it’s actually about: shaping your organization for a digital world. Technology is important, but people play the most critical role in the success (or failure) of creating a digital organization, from culture to change management to member experience. . Credit unions need to design around member (and employee) needs and emotions, using purpose-driven engagement to guide every touchpoint. A unified strategy, effective governance, and KPIs are essential. A coordinated approach ensures digital growth aligns with member value.
5. Use Your Digital/Human Experience as a Differentiator
It’s no secret that a great digital experience is increasingly the expectation that all consumers hold, regardless of generation, but there’s not only one way that this experience needs to look or feel. Like a credit union’s specific take on branch or member support experience, digital is another pathway for credit unions to show off their unique, human-centered brand and value proposition. Credit unions have the potential to use digital to differentiate, rather than head-to-head compete with big banks (and each other) if they take this idea into account as they’re crafting their digital strategies. Use tech to guide members and support them—but always leave space for personalized, emotional connection.
6. Carefully Leverage Tech as an Enabler
Legacy systems and complex vendor stacks can slow transformation, making credit unions less adaptable to a constantly changing world. MVP thinking, centralized oversight, and member-focused tech investments are critical. Fragmented data, inconsistent quality, and unclear governance also slow progress. Stronger data structures enable fraud prevention, personalized offers, and better compliance. Emerging tools like LLMs (large language models), predictive analytics, and copilots show promise, but they require intentional use, transparency, and readiness for evolving regulations.
Filene's Takeaways
7. Align Your Organization on an Increased Risk Appetite
Fraud risk, ALM practices, and perceived “failure” in general, can’t be at zero for a credit union to be innovative, and ultimately, successful. The only way to bring risk down to zero is to be at a standstill. Risk needs to be strategically built into a credit union’s plan, with guardrails in place to ensure that the credit union continues to act overall in the best interest of the members.
8. Define Your Differentiators
One of the top strategic issues currently facing the future growth and stability of the industry is around driving relevancy through effective differentiation. Discussions around this topic at the symposium identified two viable opportunities for credit unions to explore.
- Digital Differentiation – in keeping with Dr. Kane’s message about using digital to differentiate, credit unions still see a lot of opportunity for how they define, design, and message the distinct elements of their brands and value propositions that make them the uniquely right choice for consumers.
- Gig economy and small businesses – traditional financial institutions have not always kept up with the shifting ways that people earn money, especially as the gig economy has become more prevalent. As another point of potential differentiation, credit unions pointed to the gig economy and small business as an area that they’d like to further explore, creating more access and opportunity for often un- or underbanked individuals.
9. Keep Up With Shifting Consolidation Opinions
Attitudes around mergers and acquisitions seem to be shifting, with a growing openness to mergers. In an upcoming piece, fellow Dr. Amy Hillman will address the pressures that are leading to these changing opinions and how credit unions are readying themselves for merger conversations as they become more and more common across all asset sizes.
10. Convert Your Insight Into Impact
The need for moving from insight to impact quickly and efficiently is still a top concern for leaders. To keep up with the rapidly changing operating environment, credit unions no longer have the luxury of time to internally test every potential new product/solution. FiLab is the industry’s proving ground to test innovative solutions, taking on the risk (as you navigate higher risk tolerance, see #7) and saving you valuable time.
Final Thoughts: Less Complexity, More Connection
The Inner Circle Symposium made it clear: future growth means leading with empathy, simplifying the experience, and aligning every action with strategy and values.
Credit unions have a unique advantage: trust. Now is the time to build on that foundation with bold innovation, empowered teams, and a member-first digital mindset.
Filene is here to help you move from ideas to action—let’s design what’s next, together.
