As a cooperative, we offer our employees development and educational opportunities as well as competitive benefits. BECU is a place for employees to grow, make a meaningful impact for our members and focus on personal and financial wellness. As an organization, we value our people — we couldn't serve you without them. As a bonus: We have fun and get a lot done, too. Here’s what we achieved together in 2023.
Cultivated Cooperative Doers
It's a team effort. Our unique, values-based culture supports our employees’ professional growth and personal well-being, ensuring we serve you better.
Welcomed New Employees
You may have noticed a few new faces at your local Neighborhood Financial Center (NFC). As we continue to serve our members and compete in a hot labor market, we are thrilled to have had nearly 1,100 new employees join us in 2023. In total, we now have over 3,100 employees serving you! This new talent almost doubles our year-over-year hires from 2022.
To help us grow and fulfill BECU’s member-centric purpose with efficiency, safety and soundness, we also welcomed several experienced leaders to our Executive Management Team. The team oversees BECU's strategic direction and daily operations, supporting our cooperative principles and delivering value to members, employees and communities through a new vision and strategy.
BECU’s 2024 Executive Management Team:
Nurtured Future Talent
In 2023, BECU onboarded and developed new talent and celebrated our existing employees who are dedicated to their communities and our cooperative values. Here's how.
Our annual internship experience for 14 summer interns offered remote, in-person and hybrid opportunities. Students engaged with BECU executives, conducted job shadows and participated in a community service project. Positions ranged from Marketing Operations, Strategic Support and Retail Market Development to IT Engineering, Credit Modeling and Analytics, Communications and Enterprise Risk Management. We look forward to watching their careers grow.
“The BECU internship has helped me prepare for my future by giving me exposure to technologies that are used in tech environments through hands-on experience and shadowing of my team members.“ — Manuel M., Systems Technician IT Intern
In addition, we implemented new training and development experiences, connecting employees to purpose-driven learning environments that build our internal community. These learning experiences promote a shared passion for BECU’s vision and cooperative values through practical application of skills and the sharing of knowledge and expertise, resulting in both relationship and skill building across BECU.
Celebrated Employees
At our eighth annual Being BECU Awards, we selected 16 peer-nominated employees from more than 200 inspirational nominations. These stellar employees significantly impacted our members, the community or BECU.
Since its 2016 inception, the Being BECU Awards have recognized 113 outstanding employees going above and beyond to demonstrate BECU’s core values:
We thank our employees who continue to embody BECU values and bring our purpose to life.
In 2023, BECU employees gathered on Indigenous Peoples’ Day for BECU’s Day of Purpose, a day of connection, inspiration and service.
Unkitawa's Kyle Schierbeck, a Standing Rock Lakota tribal member, opened the event by bringing employees together to honor and recognize the important traditions and contributions of Indigenous communities.
Nearly 3,000 BECU employees joined in-person and online to hear from BECU members, community partners and other inspiring speakers. Purpose-focused learning sessions included:
- Pivot with Purpose: Gravitas CEO Lisa Sun demonstrated how employees can position themselves around an authentic purpose, bringing solutions and setting changes to any situation.
- Reimagined Experiences – Inclusive Design for Multimodal Member Engagement: Award winning technologist at Inclusive Innovation, Noelle Russell, shared how employees can use an “intrapreneurial” mindset to be the voice of innovation in their roles and advocate for the importance of inclusive design.
- The Journey to Financial Freedom: Participants from the PBS television show, Opportunity Knock$, shared how removing the shame and stigma of financial struggles and approaching each other in support of their strengths can unlock pathways to financial freedom.
- Using the Co-op Model to Drive Innovation and Differentiation: Dr. Taylor Nelms, senior market insights and advisory services director at the Filene Institute, talked about methods that can be used to foster member-centric innovation, while aligning business strategy with community commitment and social mission to accelerate growth and impact.
Together, our employees assembled more than 30,000 care kits for community nonprofits at the event, packaging items like school supplies and personal care essentials. Nonprofit recipients included:
“BECU is truly living the culture and the credit union principles. It’s more than just an organization because of BECU’s leadership team, employees and the members who make, keep and spread that culture to our communities!“ — Percy E., BECU Employee
Employee Equity and Diversity
Employee and Culture Equity Commitment: We embrace organizational and cultural changes for our employees and culture, working together toward becoming a more inclusive and equitable organization.
Employee Representation
At BECU, we are committed to ensuring our employee base reflects the diversity of the communities we serve. To drive transparency, we update an internal dashboard for employees that showcases representation and employee demographics at all levels of the organization.
We value diversity in representation, approach and thought to drive the best outcomes for our employees, members and communities. We are proud of the progress we have made and are working to increase and retain BIPOC representation at our director and vice president roles.
Developed Multicultural Leadership Development (MLD) Strategy
Our new programs align with BECU's larger goals to support multicultural employees’ development, retention and promotion, starting with emerging leaders. The Multicultural Leadership Development (MLD) program is primarily focused on increasing representation of BIPOC employees and other underrepresented groups within BECU.
When all levels of employees reflect the communities we serve, we improve our members' financial well-being, foster diverse, inclusive communities where everyone feels valued and create a positive impact while addressing critical social issues, now and in the future.
Fostering an Inclusive Culture
We're transforming and strengthening BECU’s culture of inclusion, empowering employees with actionable guidance on personalizing, identifying, modeling and advancing inclusive behaviors. Examples from 2023 include:
- Introduced a new train-the-trainer model, to provide organization-wide workshops and develop leaders.
- Among our BECU people managers, 97% participated in a curated workshop on how to lead and support psychologically safe environments for all employees from different backgrounds and life experiences.
- Facilitated 19 implicit bias and microaggressions training sessions for employees.
Engaged Employee Resource Groups (ERGs)
Say “Hi!“ when you see our committed employees at events, festivals and more. BECU has more than 1,300 employees involved in ERGs, some of whom volunteered, sponsored, tabled and/or participated in over 78 community events throughout 2023.
As a result of their efforts, the Credit Union National Association recognized our ERGs with 2023's Dora Maxwell Social Responsibility Award. Named after a community activist who dedicated her life to credit union development, the award recognizes credit unions for their involvement in community projects and activities.
Expanded Our Equity Summit
This past year, we hosted our third annual Equity Summit with influential keynote speakers and workshops. The Equity Summit is a highly anticipated and impactful event for us to lean into innovation around diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI), strategic alignment and industry leadership, supporting BECU’s strategy and growth plans.
More than 1,200 BECU employees engaged in-person and online. As a first for BECU, we invited other credit unions' leaders and employees to join in, bolstering the broader credit union community's equity and inclusion efforts.
The Equity Summit's theme was “Elevate Our Commitment.“ Six virtual workshops covered ableism, gender inclusivity, DEI foundations, inclusive product design, artificial intelligence and serving multicultural communities.
“The talent within this credit union is beyond words. Go where you are not only welcomed — but celebrated. BECU knows how to do exactly just that!“ — Barbara M., BECU Member
Caring for Communities
Through our BECU Cares programs, we amplify the ways our employees support their communities. Every year, BECU directs dollars to causes our employees are passionate about. Between our employees’ and BECU’s contributions, we gave over $1.6 million to more than 1,700 causes.
By the Numbers: 2023 BECU Cares
Valued Employee Volunteers
BECU has a number of programs in place to support our employee volunteers. Up to 24 hours of annual paid volunteer time is just one of the many perks of working here. Our Volunteer Rewards program also grants $15 for each hour of volunteer service recorded by employees, which they can use to distribute to the nonprofit of their choice. Employees on nonprofit boards receive reward funds to donate in recognition of their service, and teams of five or more employees volunteering together can donate a reward to the nonprofit they served.
BECU directed more than $430,000 to nonprofits on employees' behalf through our volunteer programs.
A few of the exceptional nonprofits our employees supported through gift match and volunteering include:
- Maui Food Bank: Maui Food Bank was promoted by our Asian, Native Hawaiian & Pacific Islander ERG in response to Maui, Hawaii’s devastating 2023 fires. In the first eight days of crisis response, Maui Food Bank sent out 146,000 pounds of food. The organization worked with agency partners to distribute food for displaced families and sent produce to partners to prepare thousands of meals daily.
- Multi-Service Center: Many of our employees volunteered at Multi-Service Center in 2023, an organization that is working to build a future without poverty by creating pathways to help, hope and dignity for our neighbors in South King County, Washington.
- Unkitawa: This nonprofit, supported by our Native Indigenous Peoples ERG, uses traditional art, culture and ceremony to assist Indigenous communities in Washington and beyond.
Sustainable From the Inside Out
In addition to supporting sustainability through our giving and philanthropy, BECU partnered with employees to drive positive environmental, social and economic impacts throughout our organization. Through strategic planning, collaboration and innovation, we're creating a thriving and sustainable future for BECU, our employees, our communities and the planet we share. Here's how we made BECU a little greener in 2023.
Employees can access free online courses and book recommendations on conservation and other planet-friendly practices. Or they can dive into free LinkedIn Learning courses on topics such as general sustainability, sustainable buildings and sustainability at the office.
We also worked with BECU’s Environmental Sustainability Resource Group (a BECU ERG) on several small projects to boost organization-wide efforts toward wiser use of resources. Projects included creating sustainable work guides, event hosting and building green loan product capacity.
For example, each year, BECU employees volunteer at the Duwamish River cleanup event. This event has occurred since 2010 to serve communities disproportionately affected and exposed to water pollution. We look forward to continuing this important work in the years to come.
“We were so fortunate to be able to attend the nonprofit Sustainable Connections’ ‘Hats Off to You’ Celebration. Their ‘Think Local First‘ program, which encourages residents and visitors to support local businesses, aligns so well with BECU's core values. So glad BECU supports organizations like this!” — Jared N., BECU Employee
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