A corporate CU CEO position opens as Miles resigns from top spot at Virginia League Corporate FCU to rejoin league

LYNCHBURG, Va. – David Miles, president/CEO of Virginia League Corporate FCU, is resigning effective July 31 to take a leadership position with the Virginia CU League. Miles, 42, joined the corporate in early 1997 just as NCUA’s interlock restriction had separated the leagues and corporates. “What needed to happen at that time was a smooth transition from being league managed to being independently run by its own CEO and board,” said Miles. He’s proud to say that did happen, but that to this day the league and corporate in Virginia have a very close relationship right down to sharing the same building. “We certainly accept the need for there to be separate management of league and corporate. I think credit unions want and need that distinction, but we remain closely associated with the league. While what we each do is different, the underlying goal is the same,” said Miles, and that is to help CUs succeed. The corporate was about $500 million in assets when Miles took over, and today stands at $1.2 billion. During his tenure the corporate saw significant gains in not only assets, but core deposits, investment management and operational efficiencies. When Miles became CEO he said it was strictly a matched book corporate, and didn’t have too much invested out on the risk curve. While still somewhat conservative, he said the corporate has a more active investment portfolio in order to try and earn money it can pass on to members. Virginia League Corporate is a pretty plain vanilla corporate in that it doesn’t offer services such as share draft processing and e-com services that other corporates have jumped on. It is one of the 19 member owners of CNBS. For Miles, this move will be like going home again. He was with the league prior to joining the corporate, leaving the league in 1997 as Director of Member Services for the league’s service corporation. Miles will return as SVP of Credit Union Development. In this position he will oversee planning, financial analysis, consulting, auditing, education and compliance, according to the league. He has 15 years of CU experience, working for two credit unions prior to joining the league in 1990. Miles said he wasn’t unhappy with the corporate position, but that a new management structure at the league presented an opportunity he couldn’t refuse. Rick Pillow took over as president of the Virginia CU League on Jan. 1, 2000 and soon after reorganized the league’s staff. “There was no dissatisfaction in any way with the corporate. I had to make an assessment with my career. Rick Pillow advanced the senior vice president management concept. There are a couple of vacancies there and I took a look at them,” said Miles. Under Pillow’s new management structure, the league has a number of strategic departments that are led by an SVP. Miles said the corporate’s board will hire a search firm to conduct a national search to find his replacement. Corporate CU CEO positions are becoming more exclusive all the time. With recent mergers dropping the number of corporates to 34 there are only 34 such CEO spots, and it could soon be 33 if the Nebraska Corporate Central FCU/SunCorp Corporate CU merger is approved. Miles said a trend of corporate consolidation is firmly in place. “I think it’s certainly a reality. Competition is good. I think it benefits the credit unions. That’s one side of it. The other side of it is there is room in the corporate network for the niche provider in those states where the member credit unions want to independently own and control their corporate.” [email protected]