Is a Chief Growth Officer Right for Your Credit Union?

Credit unions often find it challenging to grow their organization past a certain market, size or member base. Sometimes, restrictions on joining the credit union limit their opportunities, but other times, the lack of growth is due to poor strategy.

Many organizations turn to their chief marketing officer to obtain new members and increase deposits. However, some organizations prefer a more comprehensive approach to business growth and turn to a chief growth officer (CGO). But what are this role’s responsibilities, and is a CGO the right choice for your credit union?

The Responsibilities of a Chief Growth Officer

A CGO has responsibilities that overlap with that of the chief marketing officer, chief lending officer and COO. The CMO mainly attracts new members through marketing initiatives like advertisements and promotional offers. At the same time, the COO and chief lending officer find new members through new services and markets.

A CGO acts as an intermediary between these functions, formulating new strategies to increase the number of qualified leads the chief marketing officer obtains. Aside from working with both the marketing and delivery departments, they partner with other executives in the credit union, including the CEO, CFO and chief technology officer.

The background of an effective CGO can differ, but most have experience in service delivery at the senior level, often as a COO with marketing experience. They may also have lending and technology experience.

Most chief growth officers aim to take the business in a new direction and expand the organization’s reach. However, a growth initiative is much more than simply changing the content of a company’s marketing materials. It can include tapping into new markets the credit union isn’t yet familiar with or catering to a member segment that has historically been largely ignored.

To accomplish their goals, CGOs rely on departmental relationships and data insights to understand their members’ needs and eliminate friction in the member growth process.

A Chief Growth Officer Can Replace a Chief Marketing Officer

Like all executive positions, a CGO’s responsibilities are at the company’s discretion. While most CGOs work toward sustainable revenue development, their tasks may sometimes override those of a chief marketing officer.

As a result, some organizations choose to replace their chief marketing officer with a CGO. But before shaking up your organizational structure, it’s critical to understand why you’re not seeing the growth you expect. Is the lack of development caused by a lack of talent in the marketing department, or does the organization need an overhaul of its member and deposit growth strategies?

If your current chief marketing officer isn’t demonstrating the skills necessary to bring in new members, you may simply need to replace them with a new chief marketing officer who brings more to the table. Conversely, if you need a strategy overhaul, a CGO is likely the right choice. However, remember that even if you replace your chief marketing officer, you’ll still need a talented vice president of marketing to perform the core marketing and analytics functions.

CGOs are a fairly new concept to the executive department, but many organizations outside credit unions are already seeing benefits from bringing them on board. Companies including Coca-Cola, Mondelez, PayPal and Tyson Foods have CGOs they’ve recently added to their teams.

Benefits of a Chief Growth Officer to a Credit Union

How does a CGO stand to benefit a credit union? Here are a couple of areas where they stand to make significant contributions.

Dramatic increases to long-term growth. Generally, chief marketing officers strive to meet short-term goals, like increasing deposits by 1% over the quarter or 4% for the year. They’re also typically not looking for ways to reach an entirely new member segment; they’re attempting to bolster member growth with the same audience they’ve interacted with for years.

It often takes a CGO to step in and bring a fresh new vision to a credit union. Their vision includes finding members in untapped markets, like the newly-employed Generation Z, who may be unfamiliar with the benefits of a credit union.

Reaching out to a new market can dramatically spur growth well beyond a 4% yearly expectation, but it will require many adjustments to the credit union’s current marketing strategies. As such, the CGO must partner with marketing and service delivery departments to achieve significant business objectives.

Knocking down departmental silos. Too often, executives and senior leaders get caught up in the mentality of “This is just how we’ve always done things around here.” They may fail to account for the changes in the world around them and lose out on opportunities that their competitors seize.

Therefore, a CGO can’t implement a robust growth strategy without buy-in from other departments. While a chief marketing officer’s authority generally extends to just the marketing and product divisions, a CGO must look past those teams toward operations, finance and technology. After all, if they don’t have the support of everyone, their strategies aren’t likely to be as successful.

Partnering with other departments often brings a new outlook to divisions previously ensconced in their daily routines. It helps everyone realign their priorities with the company’s vision, not just their singular departmental objectives.

Drawbacks of Hiring a Chief Growth Officer

While there are definite benefits to the CGO role, there are a few disadvantages. The primary drawback is the potential to cannibalize existing roles. For example, chief marketing officers who get wind that a new CGO is coming on board may feel like they’re being replaced, as many of the responsibilities of a CGO will override their own.

If you’re considering hiring a CGO for your credit union but still want to keep your chief marketing officer in place, both leaders must understand the differences in their duties. If there is friction between them, it will ultimately impact the company’s growth objectives and potentially lead to unnecessary infighting.

Leaders must also realize that CGOs will likely push for significant changes that are well beyond your existing comfort level. And sometimes, those initiatives will take time to bear fruit. Therefore, you’ll want an effective means to measure their performance so you feel comfortable giving them the time they need to implement radical change.

A Chief Growth Officer Can Propel Credit Union Growth

If you feel that your credit union is leaving money on the table and missing significant growth opportunities, a change in the form of a CGO may be necessary. But you must first identify what you want them to achieve and what you’ll expect them to oversee. With proper planning, your credit union should see the results you’re hoping for.

Shawn Cole is the President & Co-Founder of Cowen Partners Executive Search in Vancouver, Wash.