New Emerging Tech & Ideas Podcast Episode 2

Using Tech to Connect with Diverse Members

Hosted by Commonwealth Co-Founder & Executive Director Timothy Flacke, our new podcast highlights conversations between Commonwealth and tech leaders to discuss the implications of AI and other emerging technology on people earning low to moderate incomes, the financial services they use, and how technology can and should address their needs. 


Our second episode features an interview with Ben Maxim, Chief Digital Strategy and Innovation at MSUFCU. He is also Chief Operating Officer at Reseda Group, a subsidiary of MSUFCU that serves the entire credit union. Watch the podcast episode below or find it streaming from Apple Podcast or Google Podcasts.

Here are three ideas and excerpts from Ben’s conversation with Tim:

Support back-office and employees with AI tools

Tech and AI can actually help the employee with those in-person interactions that may not have a digital component for the member interface. But as [members are] talking to our employees, there’s a lot that happens that we can help them. AI can prompt [employees], and they can get better answers and get more consistent answers. They don’t have to learn this giant manual from day one and remember it for the next 10 years. They can find out stuff. We change….procedures and policies every day to keep up with compliance, different needs. We’re able to help support the employees that way.”

Create bespoke products for your employer customers

We do have some significant employers, like the university, where we’ve crafted special loans for their employees. … [For example,] there are a lot of professors or staff at the university that only get paid nine months of the year typically. And then, depending on what they do in the summer, they may not have planned ahead to not have income coming in for three months. So we created a product that basically [is like a] savings account that would pay them out their salary. They would divide it over 12 months, [even as the income] comes in at nine, and then it pays them back out as though they got it over 12 months. And that would allow them to help have consistent income through the course of the summer when maybe they didn’t plan for that.”

First financial touchpoints are changing with new technology

The early experiences people are having are not with financial institutions necessarily. They are [happening through] a way to make money move between themselves and other people. And then they’re getting loans not through the ways we think of in credit cards and cars and houses, but through Buy Now, Pay Later [services]. [This is the] kind of the first interaction with all of this stuff.”

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New survey examines digital financial services usage, opportunities for providers

As part of the Emerging Tech for All initiative, Commonwealth recently published a new survey report Generative AI and Emerging Technology: Applied Insights for Financial Services Providers, which contains findings from a national survey of more than 3,000 people across the United States. Some of the key findings include:

  • More than three-quarters of adults living in the United States use digital financial services at least once a week. However, usage differs along the income spectrum—only 66% of households earning less than $40K use digital financial services weekly or more, compared to 84% of households making more than $120K.
  • This LMI sector represents a significant growth market for financial service providers, and with major advancements in chatbots and mobile technology, these providers can reach this segment at a significantly lower cost than previously.

Read the full report here.


This work is supported by JPMorgan Chase & Co. The views and opinions expressed in the report are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of JPMorgan Chase & Co. or its affiliates