“Are credit unions future-ready”, was the theme of the opening keynote at Woccu‘s 2022 World Credit Union Conference in Glasgow.
Ian Khan, a thought leader who has worked with clients in finance and banking, including credit unions, offered several tips on how credit unions can get ready for the 5th industrial revolution.
Describing it as the era where Artificial Intelligence (AI) will automate everything, he encouraged credit unions to think about the impact the revolution might have on their members and their sector and track future readiness.
Those attending in person were able to take part in a survey which asked them to assess their future readiness. Around 31% of respondents said their credit union is future ready while 27% said they were tracking some sort of future readiness.
Khan is best known for creating the Future Readiness Score, an organisational metric to measure and achieve future-readiness. He argued that “future readiness was all about adapting to change,” and described recent innovations, such as Saudi Arabia’s NEOM, a project to build a smart city driven by AI, or Sony and Lego investing in Metaverse.
“There are so many incredible things happening, we need to pay attention to where the world is heading,” he said.
He also encouraged credit unions to speak to vendors and providers to figure out how algorithms impact their services or how they can shorten processes, adding that “algorithms can do wonders when it comes to customer service”.
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He believes other trends credit unions should keep an eye on are decentralisation, tokenisation and tech convergence.
“Start thinking as an experiential credit union,” he told attendees whilst warning that 67% of strategic failure happens due to a lack of execution and encouraging credit unions to form partnerships.
“You need to strive to become more future-ready as an organisation,” he said, describing how many resources were available for credit unions looking to assess their future readiness.
Credit unions looking to explore the issue further can undertake Khan’s survey here.
Read more Co-op News reports from the 2022 World Credit Union Conference here.
