On July 8th, John Link, Treasurer of Agriculture Federal Credit Union, and Michael Di Gennaro, a volunteer at Federal Reserve Board Federal Credit Union, both from Maryland & District of Columbia Credit Union Association (MDDCCUA) made a visit to Nicaragua’s Central Service Organization (CSO). The objective of their trip was to assist CSO with the process of forming a Nominating Committee and give a few pointers on governance. MDDCCUA and CSO have been partnered through World Council of Credit Union’s International Partnership program since 2002.
The big challenge here was finding a way to overcome Nicaragua’s unique credit union regulations. The pay-off would be helping to tackle one of the Nicaraguan credit union movement’s biggest problems with their governance. Due to some issues with governance, Nicaraguan credit unions typically experience high delinquencies and losses. Inadequate oversight has led to high expenditures in fixed assets, such as buildings and has resulted in a loss of capital.
Link and Di Gennaro had three days to gather information and construct a presentation to help Nicaraguan credit unions in the process of nominating qualified candidates for their boards. The presentation was presented in front of a group of credit unions. The first presentation was focused on “first principles” governance with a main message of “Boards Govern, Managers Manage, and Members Own.” The presentations also covered everything from the history of credit unions, volunteer and staff roles, and, of course, the Nominating Committee.
Link and Di Gennaro felt that they had reached the goal of helping the Nicaraguans overcome their misconceptions of the Nominating Committee and had given them a model from which they could produce positive results. However, the Nicaraguan movement must still form their concepts in order to overcome their unique institutional barrier.
Written by Josh Fetting, International Partnerships Program Specialist
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