About Session
Credit unions confront formidable but familiar challenges: an aging membership, costly digital and payment modernization, deep pocketed and dynamic new competitors, talent acquisition challenges, and no letup in compliance costs. But there are some new twists to these old challenges. Credit unions are said to be engaged in a “cage match” because Canada’s newly stagnant population means one entity’s gain is another’s loss. Moreover, credit unions are said to be “one move away from breaking the whole system” because potential mergers between federal and provincial credit unions could weaken increasingly frayed impulses to cooperation. It is said that the system will not fail, but it may fade away or evolve into something unrecognizable.
Although these challenges can appear daunting, credit unions have opportunities to move forward by questioning prevailing assumptions about mergers, scale, technology, and the future while drawing on the sector’s collective experience of cooperation. Marc-André Pigeon (Canadian Centre for the Study of Co-operatives, University of Saskatchewan) will explore how credit unions can reinvigorate and reimagine cooperative purpose and governance while remaining focused on the difference they make through small-business lending, member advocacy, community commitment, and the responsible use of their financial capabilities.
