Our Members
Steve Gogolak, First Citizens Bank
Steve attended his First F4FW gathering at Fenway Park. It was the first Yankees v Red Sox game with fans in attendace in 2020. Steve rode the storm at SVB and today holds the role of Managing Director, Digital Strategy at First Citizens Bank. He shared his amazing family story with our Friends.
Samantha Pause, Mascoma bank
Sam is the Chief Innovation and Branding Officer and plays a critical role as Mascoma migrates their core platform from Jack Henry to Thought Machine. Sam was the champion that lead Mascoma to Certified B Corp status, She shared this story during a fireside chat at the 2021 winter meeting held at the Von Trappe lodge in Stowe, Vermont.
jim Slocum, One United bank
Jim is the CIO of the largest black owned bank in the USA. He started as a collegiate intern with the bank and has built an innovative technology stack optimized for delivering financial wellness to his customers. Jim’s unique advantage? His mastery and strategic usage of Salesforce as exemplified in this video testimonial.
Scott Blake, Bangor Savings Bank
Scott attended his first meeting in Newport, RI 2021. As the CIO, he leads a crackerjack technical team that does crazy things like building a custom CRM platform at the bank. His weekends are spent actively with his wife Liz. In the winter they ski at Sugarloaf and in the summer they sail out of the Boothbay Harbor Yacht Club. Scott and Liz are heavily involved in the club and several other nonprofits.
Desiree Wolfe, Hudson Valley Credit Union
Desiree attended her first meeting in November 2021. She started with us as at Webser Bank and then joined Salesforce.com. Today she holds the role of Chief Experience Officer at the fast growing Hudson Valley Credit Union. She shared her mothers ‘unbanked’ financial journey as a Jamaican immigrant in the Bronx. She was part of a Susu, a neighborhood savings program that ultimately funded Desiree’s private schooling.
Kevin McQuire, Cambridge Savings bank
Kevin was hired as the CIO and first met the group at Robert Redford’s Sundance resort in the Wasatch mountain range of Utah in February 2022. He has since taken over the role of Chief Customer Officer. At our April 2022 meeting, Kevin shared the defintion of a Busker and how he and his friends formed thier band Busker. Kevin led the technical rollout of the highly successful, digital only, Ivy Bank.
Traci Michel, Metro Credit Union
Traci observed the F4FW from a distance during our early years. As the COO of a credit union in the process of a core migration, she was unable to attend. Upon completion of her COCC migartion, she joined us at our NYC 2023 meeting held during the Finovate conference. She has been an active contributor to every meeting since. Traci likes that we schedule meetings before new years so she can lock us into her schedule!
Raphael Reznek, Mascoma bank
Raphael is redesigning how technology can be built at community banks. He is an innovator that came into banking asking ‘why?’ to every challenge the core banking platform presented. As the CTO, he is tightly aligned with Samantha to understand their market, and the use cases that need to be mapped and improved. Together they have built a reusable platform ‘Core Switch’ that removes the friction created by core platforms.
Sandra Klausmeyer, Bangor Savings Bank
Sandra is the SVP and Director of Strategic Initiatives at Bangor Savings. A graduate of the University of Maine, she is passionate about lifting the financial wellness for the entire state of Maine. It’s no coincidence that she is on the leadership team at a bank that has won the JD Power award eight out of the last nine years
Reviews
Sue Burton, DCU, SVP Digital
“What I most appreciated from this gathering was the opportunity for meaningful conversations with peers across a broad range of financial services and wellness providers from around the globe. I enjoyed learning about Attune’s approach to financial wellness scoring and how this differs from some more labor and data-intensive approaches across the credit union landscape. I was particularly encouraged to learn about their integration with Medallia / Member Loyalty Group. I enjoyed speaking with Rich Dorfman about the evolution of Customer Experience strategy and delivery at Eastern Bank and I think Virginie Nowak blew my mind with a demonstration of what is possible in the world of mobile universal banking and financial services demonstrated by Access Bank in Nigeria. While the Nigerian market differs substantially, I am inspired by the way they have challenged conventional thinking to provide financial value to their customers. Terrific and energizing
conversation all around and who doesn’t enjoy a sunset boat ride after a thunderstorm?”
Rich Dorfman, Eastern Bank, Director of Experience
“Something always magical happens with CX-minded folks get together and share their experiences, best practices, and well, even the challenges CX teams have to overcome in helping their respective organization become ever more customer-centric. And that magic was magnified many times over when our intimate, informed, and inspiring group gathered for a delightful boat cruise on the Boston Harbor followed by one of the more memorable dinners (meal, conversation, and connections) I can recall. Thanks to Dan for pulling this together… I am not only grateful, but I feel I came away from the experience as a better human being!”
Friends For Financial Wellness 