SAN FRANCISCO — It's time to rethink how you view Gen Y. More than just being an elusive but necessary target market for membership growth, Gen Y also represents the talent pool of the next generation of credit union leaders-provided they're interested.

"We as an industry overall haven't done a good job engaging people out of college to think about a credit union as a career path and we really should be hiring summer interns," said San Francisco Fire Credit Union President/CEO Diana Dykstra. "It is unfortunate but for the most part they are discounted and we baby boomers forget we changed the world in the '60s and '70s and its time for us to give up some of that control to give this dynamic group that knows exactly what they want a chance."

Encouraged by Filene Research Institute's CU Tommorrow Driver Ben Rogers, Dykstra has recently hired her first summer intern Whitney Darwin, who is an MBA student at Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business. So far, through its MBA initiative, Filene has helped place three promising students in credit union internship or jobs this summer and according to Rogers plans are underway to expand the program for 2009.