Business View Magazine | January 2021

282 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE JANUARY 2021 “With the interest rate environment being what it is, people have been refinancing and purchasing homes because they’re able to get such a great deal on mortgages. That’s really benefited United and allowed us to continue to perform very well financially, despite the compressing net interest margins and additional loss provisions that we are building up in the event of charge-offs.” The cooperative even did some ‘pandemic- proofing’ before the words “novel coronavirus” or “COVID-19” became part of everyday speech. “We were already on this path of digital transformation before COVID-19 forced the closure of our lobbies,” says Wilcoxson. “Our digital investments support our value proposition to our members, which is that we know them and we deliver what they want; simple, personalized experiences, whenever and wherever they choose.” United already had a pretty robust roadmap for digital coming into 2020 and, at the beginning of the year, they were hitting that pace well. Wilcoxson explains, “The team was already Duane Wilcoxson, Chief Information Officer Kimetha Firpo, Senior Vice President of Human Resources