Lay a new core over a broken process, and the process just runs faster.

Darius Wise told his staff the credit union was not good at what it did. Red Rocks was coming off two years of net losses, a core conversion was underway, a merger had just fallen apart, and the board was turning over.

Darius spent two decades as a pastor before financial services. He joined Red Rocks as Chief Impact Officer, took the interim CEO seat during the worst of it, and returned the credit union to profitability within 11 months.

In this episode, we talk about what that took. Exiting a merger after staff had already been told about it, and the trust that cost. The layoffs. The habit of softening hard news that he had to unlearn in his first month. Why he'd rather be respected than liked. And the thing he wants every institution buying its way out of trouble to hear: new technology on top of bad people and bad process only lets you do bad faster.

We also get into the board he inherited, the reverse mentoring that changed it, why he's building branches while others close them, and why he'd rather choose a merger partner than be chosen by one.

Hosted by Jim Marous. Subscribe to Banking Transformed for new episodes multiple times each week.