Andrew Vanjani knows the future of credit unions is tethered to technology and keeping up with the breakneck pace of digital change is key to success.

A member of the board of directors at $242 million asset OAS Staff Federal Credit Union in Washington, D.C., Vanjani has played a transformative role in building the technology infrastructure that keeps the credit union a member-centric financial institution.

“There are a lot of credit unions our size that don’t provide the level of technology that we provide today,” Vanjani says. 

Technology is especially important for OAS Staff Federal because 42% of its members reside outside the U.S. The credit union serves employees of the Organization of American States, National Geographic Society, Development Bank of Latin America, Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture, and other organizations.

“We have a lot of members in Latin America, and we weren’t providing the major services that they expected,” says Vanjani, who is assistant cabinet secretary for operations of the State of Maryland’s Department of Information Technology (IT).

Vanjani took a leading role in updating the credit union’s core system, which provides members the services and products they expect while improving employee efficiency, cutting operational costs, and improving the member experience.

He also led the effort to adopt a new online and mobile banking platform that integrates many key technologies, including a new bill-pay service, peer-to peer payments, wires, ACH, account aggregation, and budgeting tools. He also collaborated on an effort to rebuild the credit union’s website, transforming it into a fully web responsive and accessible site.

“We want to leverage data that helps us transform our credit union to make better decisions and further engage with our members,” Vanjani says.

OAS Staff Federal also is looking to the future and examining emerging technologies such as intelligence automation and blockchain. It is a founding steward for a self-sovereign identity project called Hyperledger Indy and one of some 70 stakeholders in CULedger.

“We are visionaries who are looking at the latest and greatest technologies,” Vanjani says. “What better place to be than in a credit union with a board that’s very forward-thinking that allows us to invest in emerging tech?”