Episode Transcript
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Columbus and Central Ohio have a richhistory of companies being headquartered here, everything
from technology, manufacturing, retail,insurance, and more. But what about
the leaders behind these companies? Whatmakes them tick? How did they get
their start? This is where youget to meet the captain of the ship.
Welcome does CEOs You Should Know andiHeartMedia Columbus Podcast. Welcome back to
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another brand new episode of CEOs YouShould Know and I Heart Media Columbus Podcast.
I'm your host, Boxer. Thisweek we're talking about the banking industry,
but more specific credit unions. Andwith nearly twenty years of leadership experience
in the financial industry, Derek Baileyis the president of tell Ohio Credit Union.
It's over a billion dollar financial cooperative. He was named president Backgut not
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too long ago, just last year. Derek Bailey, it is good to
have you with us, sir,Thank you, Boxer, appreciate been here.
Is this your first podcaster or ifyou've done many before? I've done
a couple. Oh, I'm notan expert, a professional addit bit so
all right, by the way,no one is an expert when it comes
to podcasts. I mean, seriously, Derek let's let's dive in a little
bit just what you do when whenyou see the title president of tell Ohio
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Credit Union, what is that exactly? What's your day in the life?
You know, my ultimate responsibility isto that of our members and our employees.
UM. I have a really reallygood executive team that handles the day
to day. A majority of mytime I've spent either dealing with board relations,
meeting with members. I still dothat on a day to day basis,
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or um. You know, justthinking about the strategic side of the
business. It's fun every day.No days to say, uh, my
schedule is one day I could bein Cincinnati, which is another one of
our market Cincinnati in Hamilton, Ohio. Or I could be in Columbus,
Delaware, meeting with small businesses,meeting with our members at events. It's
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just no day is the same,I'll put it that one. Do you
think when you get to an executivelevel, Derek, like you are?
You do you find that executives likeyourself do you have to be wired a
certain way to get to that levellike you are. You really do,
and it takes a lot of emotionalintelligence and you have to have a space
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where you could relax and unwind.I learned that early in my career,
to importance of just you know,meditation, just the importance of you know,
taking a step back and breathing.It's not easy, and you know,
some people say it's lonely at thetop, which it can be.
Is different when you have a peergroup, but once you take the role
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of president or CEO, you know, it could get a little lonely there.
But I do have a great supportsystem, you know, with my
wife, my family, and somereally really good friends and mentors that helped
me along the way. When youtalked about the the emotional aspect of it,
does that include is that by chance? One thing that popped in my
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head just being mentally tough by chance? Yes, okay, absolutely you have
to. But you also need aplace where you convent, right, a
safe place where you convent or whereyou could just relax. But you have
to be mentally tough. You know, people will say things that you can't
respond to in a way that youwould normally respond to. And that's just
not banking, that's just executives ingeneral, right, especially when you're ahead
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of a company. But you knowthere's also things about the job where I
would never change you know that.I think that makes you tough or just
in general in life. You justhave to sort of rise to that challenge.
It's sort of the competitive nature andexecutives that you find most often where
you know, just rise to theoccasion. So there is a real model
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aspect that I mean clearly. Imean not everyone takes seriously, but clearly
you do. Yeah, absolutely,yeah, Um, you know, I
view myself as a community leader.Um. You you know you you have
to take that seriously. There's alot of individuals there. We have a
lot of employees relying on some ofthe decisions that I make and that our
directors make. So you have totake it seriously, and you have to
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take it with pride and uh,you know, do your best to support
our members in the employees as well. Yeah, Derek Bailey is with us.
Who is the president of tell HioCredit Union. Just one more question
then, will I want to getto your life a little bit Derek.
Um, do you ever get maybeemployees or other people that will hit back
at you with a they'll come atyou with a question or I don't want
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to use the word disgruntled, butthey're just they're unhappy about something. Do
you have to take a deep breathsometimes and think about what you're going to
say before you say it? Absolutely? But you know, and I also
always remember one thing. I've probablybeen in there their shoes. Yeah right,
yeah, I think we'll we've allhad that day. U. You
know, you take a deep breath, you step back, you take time
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to assess the situation before you respond. But um, I think as long
as you always do what's right.Um, you know, with people with
with with our members, everything worksout. Well. Let's tell let's talk
about you a little bit and justI know you were born and raised here
in Columbus. Tell us about yourlife growing out? So great life.
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So, Um, I'm born andraised the Columbus, went to Growport school
system. So from elementary to highschool. Uh my mom and dad both
for from Columbus. They and stillreally really good values in me. My
dad gave me the work ethic,uh, waking me up five am on
in the morning on Saturdays, theclean would work, and all of that
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other stuff and doing long care.And when I look back, um,
you know, I knew I didn'twant to go into a blue collar field.
Not that there's anything wrong with it. I knew that I was going
to be into some type of serviceindustry, whether all banking or something like
that. Yeah, I'm glad Igot my hands dirty. You know that
work ethic translates well to what I'mdoing right now. That's the grit that
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you need as an executive. Uh. You know my parents is still that
into me with just not let metake it easy in life. You know,
we had fun, you know Ienjoyed life, but you know they
always kept good values, good morals. Uh. You know, preach doing
the right thing all the time.Wow. So and you've said this before,
but doing doing the right thing thatclearly was instilled with you at a
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young age. Absolutely, and ata young age and through some of the
mentors that I've met in life.You know, just always instilled if you
do what's right, if you're honest, everything will work out. You know,
you may not get the decision orthe result that you want right then
and error, but you know thatkarma comes back to you the right way.
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So eventually you graduate, Where didyou go from there? Yes?
Um, so with the University ofToledo for undergrad um. Right after that,
I went to South Florida. Iwas actually in the wholesale mortgage industry.
UM sort of missed home, youknow, the mortgage crisis came came
back to Columbus. UM decided toget my NBA Capital University, worked for
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a regional bank, and shortly thereafterI found the benefit of the Credit Union.
UM, you know, twenty thirteencame over to Ohio to help ramp
up the small business lending area.So it came over as a business lender,
was fortunate enough to do really well, and our current CEO sooner retired,
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Leslie Baumgardner. She saw something inme that you know, no one
that that company did, and shereally trusted me number one, and she
motivated me to to take it toa new level. Um. You know,
I helped grow the Credit Union toone of the top SBA lenders in
the state, which is rare forour credit union, UH and from their
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other areas, and eventually named presidentand then July first, I'll take on
the role of CEO. Well,Derek, can we rewind the the mortgage
mess was that? Were you atit in it during that time of what
was it two thousand seven, twothousand and eight, was that was that
the time or absolutely so. Thestart the trouble probably started late two thousand
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and six, early two thousand andseven. Um, and you know,
I was a whole seller, Somy my job was to go to different
uh, community banks, credit unions, mortgage companies and try to get them
to package their loans with the institutionthat I worked for. Um, those
were some of the funnest and scariesttimes, all at once. Right.
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So, so everything moved quick,right, So was home ownership. Everyone's
getting up, which is a goodthing, right, It's important everyone's getting
home. Um. The demand wasreally really fast, rapid growing. And
then all of a sudden, youknow, bank after bank after bank,
financial institution at the financial institution startedto especially the mortgage company started to fold.
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And for someone you know at thattime, I was probably three or
four years out of college, werestill young, right, yeah, and
I'm in South Florida, my supportsystems in Columbus, Ohio, so and
I could be life changing. ButI learned some great things. I learned
lessons that apply to this day.I learned the importance of making strategic decisions
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that are sustainable. I think wecan all learn from some of those decisions
in that industry, we're not sustainable. And I use some of those things
that I learned back then for ourday to day business to day and as
we make strategic decisions. Derek,looking back now, do you think and
it appears it's it's worked so farthat the FEDS and the banks work together
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to fix a lot of those problemsthat happen back then. I think absolutely,
And I will say this, Ithink the credit union industry has done
a wonderful job entering the residential mortgagemarket, and you know, more credit
unions are doing more home loans thanbefore, right. And now you see
the credit unions entering small business whichis important especially today where you see credit
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unions funding small businesses where you know, some of the banks you know,
just just not offering that access tocapital at the same rate of credit unions.
Yeah. So I think it wasawakening that you need diversity in your
banking system. You just don't wantlarge nationals, large regionals. There's definitely
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a place for credit unions, evencommunity banks to that matter. You want
that diversification in a banking system tobe healthy. Derek Bailey is this week's
guest on CEOs you should know andI heart media Columbus podcast. See is
the president of tell Ohio Credit Union. So fast forward, you come back
to Columbus. You you missed Ohio. Can't say I blame you one bit.
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UH never looked back right from SouthFlorida, you don't. You don't
miss the ocean or we visit allthe time. Good and there's always Lake
Erie if you need a watery.So you you come back. Your first
job would tell Ohio. The firstposition, yep. So I was in
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business banking. So I was inthe day to day of it. Um.
I was fortunate enough to to youknow, win some really good relationships
and and grow that portfolio. WhenI got there was a very small portfolio
and we grew it um, youknow. And from there I was able
to to manage department. I wasnamed the vice president business Services, UH,
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grew a team, use my networkof UH local bankers and got them
to come over to the credit unionspace. UM. Fortunately there's a lot
of talent in Columbus, right,So it wasn't it wasn't hard to crude
talent. It was just once ourborder director said yes, we want we
want to be active in small businesslending. You know, we want to
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be a top ten SBA lender.Year after year, we made that decision
and the strategic plan and you knowit was my job to execute at that
time. That's incredible. So didwhen you landed at to Ohio did did
you ever at any point in yourlife think someday, I want to be
an executive. I don't want Iwant to be president? Were you was
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that on your radar at all?Absolutely? So, it's purposeful. So,
um, that was always my goalin life, whether you know it
was at a mortgage company or evenoutside of banking. You know, again
it's the competitive nature, get tothe top row. So I didn't see
myself anywhere else. And it's weirdto say that, especially being relatively new
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to this role. It was justa vision that I set out for myself
since a kid. One of mymom's friends she used to joke and call
me press because she saw that Ihad like that, you know, whatever
characters that you would see in leadership. And she would just always call me,
hey, mister pres. You know, I'm seven year or so,
eight years old, but you rememberthat stuff as a kid. Yeah,
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it sets a tone in your inyour head and gives you that certain type
of energy that you could carry throughlife. Derek. You know, for
those that are listening, and alot of people just don't know. What
is the difference between a credit unionand a bank. A credit union is
member owned, so we're not forprofit cooperative. We're a member owned.
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So you have when you go toget an account, to tell Hio credit
Union, you must open a shareaccount. The share account you have to
open with a minimum of five dollars. And it's been that way since I
believe nineteen thirty four nineteen thirty fivewhen the credit union at started and that
makes you a member. Once you'rea member, you're a member for life.
So the difference. We don't haveshareholders, so the decisions we make
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we have to. Of course,we have to make enough money to keep
the lights on and make enough profitto be financially sound and have enough equity
um. But we could offer betterterms, we could focus on community involvement
a little bit more um, youknow, better deposit rates, and we're
just member centric. So if yougo out to our operations center off of
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East broad Street on Outer Belt,as soon as you walk in, it
says people over profit Um. Andit's not that we don't need profit,
but it's truly people over profit.The people get you the profit absolutely,
and if you treat people well.Um. Had a friend told me,
you know, there's no such thingas sales, and you know it's all
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really about relationship. You know,no matter what you're looking at, Um,
you really have to dive into thatrelationship. Treat people right and they'll
they'll do business with you. Youknow, you don't have to try to
sell them a widget. You know, you don't have to do anything like
that. Those are transactional base.Yeah, you know the financial institutions in
the banking industry's relationship base. Youknow, Derek, I was thinking too,
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tell Ohio as a pretty rich history. It's been around a while.
Yes, absolutely, we're about tocelebrate our ninety a year. So wow,
we're gonna have a nice party.And the new headquarters as well,
so we'll have a nice celebration.It's there cake can we comment? There
will be caking. You can't comethere. So since nineteen thirty four,
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Um, we were originally the ColumbusTelephone Company. So when the Clumbus Telephone
Company M was around, that predatesOhio Bell ATNT we were at the credit
union for the Clumbus Telephone Company UMand a lot of people wonder about the
name tell Ohio. So back inthe seventies or eighties, we you know,
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decided to do branding at this time. I think Clumbus Telephone Company already
switched to Ohio Bell, and itwas just a play on words instead of
putting making it tell Ohio. Tookthe O off, just tell Ohio credit
Union, and we stuck with thatname ever since. Do you know how
long it took me to rehearse thatbefore you came in here today. Tell
Ohio, Tell tell Ohio, No, tell Ohio. Yes, yes,
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it did a little bit. Actually, I'm like, I don't want to
screw this up. Derek comes in, he will be turned off. It
won't be good. Uh No,that's that's a great history lesson right there.
I'll tell Ohio. I appreciate yousharing that with us. I know
we talked about, you know,tell Ohio being ranked number one with SBA
loans. How big of it?That seems like a pretty big achievement to
me. But how how big isthat? It's really big? So we're
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ranked number one amongst credit unions,So you know, there's a large regional
bank here, Huntington. Their rankednumber one in Ohio and in fact,
I know I think they're top fivein the nation each. Okay, but
amongst credit unions were number one.Um one of our greatest accomplishments. We
actually I think it was the SBAfiscal year ending in twenty one, we
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ranked number two, so it wasHuntington didn't Ohio in our market. So
that's really really tough to do.You know, we're local base. We're
in the Columbus and really northern Cincinnati, Hamilton, Ohio, Butler County markets.
So to be able to compete withbanks at that level, you know,
it's amazing, but we focus onit. It's on purpose, it's
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intentful. We get it. Ifyou give small businesses capital, guess what
they're going to employ people? Thosepeople are going to come and get deposits,
are they're going to make deposits andcome and get loans and mortgages.
So without small businesses, this economywill fall well. And it just sounds
like such a tremendous undertaking of blood, sweat and tears, and maybe incredible
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marketing on top of it. Imean what's all involved to get that ranking,
like like pull back the curtain,Derek, Yeah, it's um really
good marketing or we have a youknow, our our head of marketing is
we were probably on the forefront ofhow to do digital marketing the right way.
So we led with digital and thatgot the introductions right, you know,
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that got the phone ringing and eventuallywas relationship. And then another thing
that we did, and this isyou know, just by sheer chance,
you know, with COVID and whenPPP first came out, we were one
of the first financial institutions, ifnot the first, to actually fund the
PPP. Long wow. So wewere funding before the national banks, before
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the regional banks, before community banks. That's incredible because that from what I've
read and we've talked to other people, that was not an easy process to
get going. That was very tough, and you know, you got to
think about the mental stability of yourstaff. Everyone's scared at that time,
no one knew so, but wemade an effort. You know, we
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all got into the office, wejust spread apart a little bit and we
said, you know what, wegotta we gotta make these loans. So
that really opened up a lot ofsmall businesses eyes to what tell Hio can
offer and now, um, weare, you know, one of the
brands of choice when it comes tosmall business lending. You know people are
referring to us deals. Uh,you know we're getting small business after small
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business coming over. I mean Iwould say small to medium sized businesses because
you know there are some larger companiesthat we bank as well. That's incredible.
I didn't know. By the way, one of your products that you
have is insurance. Yes, yes, so we UM. One of the
things you can do is a creditunion. You can have a credit union
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service organization. We call them qusos. So we have a QSO that sells
insurance to our members, and that'sanything from general liability, business insurance,
uh, the whole suite of products. So we do offer insurance. We
do offer life insurance, investment services, and wealth management as well. What's
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your Derek, what's your core revenue? Is it? Is it personal banking?
What what are you Who are yourbiggest customers? Is it? It
is really a blend. I wouldsay small business and residential mortgage accounts for
the majority of our revenue. UM. The majority of our members are total
membership base is by far still consumersrights, individuals, personals. Um uh.
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We still do a lot on thepersonal side. There's some very unique
products that we offer. Um Ithink we have one of the best residential
mortgage departments and services in the cityin my opinion. UM I think once
you come to us, especially forpurchases, if you need the purchase of
the house and you have that strictdeadline, you know that that contract date
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that you have to hit, Ithink there's no better place to go than
tell Hio. Um Our mortgage loanofficers are local. You can walk in
a branch, you can set anappointment, you could go to tell Hio
dot org, pick who you wantto talk to, and you get that
local expertise. Because we're not infifty different states. We know Columbus,
we know Greater Cincinnati. So arethose the two main areas that you're in
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tell Ohio is Columbus Greater Cincinnati?Yes. So credit unions are chartered,
so you have to have what's calledcommon bond. Originally, our common bond
was we can only serve the members, excuse me, the employees of the
Columbus Telephone Company. In the nineties, we were able to apply for a
common bond based on county. Sonow you know we're in certain counties that
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you can only do you can onlyoffer members loans in those counties, which
fortunately, you know, the Columbusmarket is a great market to be in
as a high growth as we allknow, so there's no lack of market
share. I'll put it that way. Yeah. By the way, side
note, it's so funny Derek there you say telephone because I said it
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over the weekend of my ten yearold son, Dad. What's a telephone?
Well, back in the day,there was a rotary. It's like
anyway, Okay, back to thepodcast, Derek Bailey is with us.
Who's the president of tell Ohio.What are you doing for the future.
What is the future of tell Ohioand credit unions? You know, it
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really comes down to a really greatservice. Um, we don't we believe
that the branch network's not dead.You know you see certain financial institutions closing
branches. We're going to expand.Um, we are going to double down
on a small business. This isjust the beginning. So you know we're
gonna do some innovative things. Weare a community development financial institution. Uh,
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and with that certification means is youknow, we focus on low income
areas, but it's not just throughpersonal loans or home mortgages. It's really
you know, whether it's funding adevelopment project that's in a load of modern
income area, funding a small businessthat's in a low income area. We
are doing that on purpose, thatthat's part of our core strategy. So
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we're going to continue to do that. As you know, we live in
a tech driven world, so ofcourse we're we're getting there, so we'll
still focus on technology. We'll dosome digital things as we've always done,
but we'll never take out the humanside of our business. You know,
I don't want a whole bunch ofartificial intelligence running our business. For tasks
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and for certain things, you coulduse AI in digital, but when it's
time to have a conversation about yourfirst home or starting your business, or
you know your business is in arough place, it needs to be human.
Face. Thank you, Derek,thank you. That is a breath
of fresh air to hear now.I think we all know that. As
we learn more and more about AIand things that can do to make our
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life more efficient, I don't Ijust don't think anything will ever be able
to replace it, depending on whatit is, the heartbeat, face to
face, human to human contact.I just don't see anyone ever replacing that.
Absolutely. I think there's something aboutwhen you have someone else, another
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human helping you out, there's anenergy, there's something that you just can't
especially if you're nervous about something,you can't replace that. And I hope
it's never replaced or never tried,you know. I think there's a place
for everything. But ultimately, weneed to employ people. So we look
at ourselves as you know, doingwhat's right for our members and also doing
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what's right for our employees, andwe'll continue to do that. I like
that. By the way, youwon me over a little bit earlier with
investing in low to mental income areas. I can't tell you how many times,
you know, trying to figure outhow to lower crime in the city
and how to fight that, oneof the things that comes up is there
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are people in Columbus that feel likethey are left out. There are pockets
of Columbus, and if we caninvest the thought processes, if we can
invest in those areas, they won'tfeel left out and they'll feel there's more
of an appreciation like, okay,I'm a part of the city too,
absolutely, especially responsible investing right affordablehousing, which we know as a hot
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topic in Columbus. Yea, againpitting small businesses in those communities. So
if you have certain areas where youknow people the only job is at a
corner store or you know, sometype of retail store, imagine if there
was a manufacturing company paying livabol wagesthat you can walk to because you don't
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have transportation and they're right there inyour community, or a tech company or
you know. And I think you'restarting to see some of that stuff in
Columbus, which is which is greatto see. But I think the key
is just you know, those dollars, those resources. You have to be
purposeful about it. Absolutely well,Derek, look as we wrap up,
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got to ask you, I knowyou're about to move into some new office
d Eggs. Clearly you're very excited. I saw you doing the happy dance
earlier. So, by the way, Frankly, that's a beautiful area what
they've done right across from Kasi.It's a beautiful area. And you know,
when we first looked at the site, it was a couple of years
before we decided, you know,we passed, and then we started to
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think more about it, thinking abouthow downtown is the expansion, where do
we want to be and you know, with the river filling more like the
central part of the new landscape ofdowntown, I thought that was important for
us to take a second look.Then we started thinking about it. You
know, Franklinton is what the oldestsettlement in central Ohio. We're on the
oldest credit unions. What better placeto be, right, So, yeah,
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it gives a lot of history,it sits well with our brand.
There's a lot of entrepreneurs in thatarea. It's vibrant. It's just a
great place to be. And right, you're right by the way. Forgive
me. That new area is calledthe Peninsula, right, yes, yeah,
some people are fighting that, LikeI'm gonna still call it Franklinton.
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I'm like, well, peninsula isthe new word. So eventually it's going
to take over. Yeah, soit's as Siota Peninsula. But you know,
you walk just like a block overit. Right, there's the Franklins
sign. So you know I'm fromColumbus is Franklinson. Yeah that's awesome.
Hey, what do you do becauseyou're the president. You're a very busy
(27:36):
guy. What do you do inyour spare time? I know you mentioned
family, So family, I tryto golf. I need the work on
it. Uh. Got a lotof co workers to have a lot of
jokes about my golf game. ButI'll get better. So golf and back
to South Florida. My best friendlives in South Florida. Okay, my
goddaughter, So my wife and Iwere down there often. We love to
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travel, but outside of that,just hang with family. Well. Derek
Bailey, President of Telhio, congratulationson your success. Really good to finally
get you in here and talk toyou and have you on this podcast.
Appreciate you being here there. Thankyou. Proving CEO as You Should Know
is hosted and produced by Brandy Boxer, a production of Ihartmedia, Columbus