Dive Brief:
- Navy Federal named its chief operating officer, Dietrich Kuhlmann, as its next CEO, effective March 1, the credit union said in a press release Wednesday.
- Kuhlmann, a 35-year Navy veteran who retired in 2018 as a rear admiral, replaces Mary McDuffie, who announced in September she would step down from the top post at the U.S.’s largest credit union.
- The COO role is the same steppingstone McDuffie used to ascend to CEO in January 2019. She served a six-month stint as the credit union’s chief operating officer in 2018, according to her LinkedIn profile. McDuffie joined Navy Federal as vice president of marketing in 1999.
Dive Insight:
Kuhlmann, who has been Navy Federal’s COO for two years, next week will take the helm of a credit union that, under his predecessor, has grown its membership by more than 5 million people, and nearly doubled its assets — to $170.8 billion from $96.9 billion.
Kuhlmann has no shortage of budgeting experience, either. In his last military role, he served as programming division director for the chief of naval operations, taking responsibility for the Navy’s five-year, $800 billion capital allocation process.
He joined Navy Federal in April 2019 as executive vice president of branch operations, according to his LinkedIn profile. As COO, he has overseen operations across the credit union’s campuses in Pensacola, Florida; Winchester, Virginia; and San Diego, the credit union said.
Ed Cochrane, Navy Federal’s board chair, characterized the credit union’s executive search as “rigorous.”
“Dietrich has shown an unwavering commitment to both his country and to his fellow men and women in uniform throughout his extensive career,” he said in Wednesday’s press release. “These experiences make him the ideal person to lead this institution, and we know he will continue to serve our members superbly in the years ahead.”
Navy Federal grew its loans by nearly 14% last year and added more than 1 million new members in that time frame, thanks in part to ubiquitous advertising. The credit union expects to add at least nine new locations in 2024, the institution’s vice president of membership told Banking Dive recently.
Among the challenges Kuhlmann will face is an allegation that Navy Federal discriminated against Black and Latino mortgage applicants.
Plaintiffs sued the credit union in December, citing a CNN report that found a nearly 29 percentage-point gap between Navy Federal’s rate of acceptance for Black mortgage applicants (48.5%) in 2022 and White ones (77.1%). Latino applicants fared only slightly better than Blacks in the CNN analysis, at 55.8% acceptance.
Navy Federal, in response, emphasized that it ranks third among the top 50 mortgage lenders in percentage of loans made to Black borrowers, adding CNN’s analysis “[does] not appear to have considered several key credit criteria that all financial institutions, including Navy Federal, rely on to assess mortgage applications,” including credit score, available cash deposits and relationship history with the lender.
McDuffie, for her part, called Kuhlmann “a leader of integrity with a powerful sense of duty and purpose.”
“I can think of no better individual to steer us into the next phase of growth and further our mission to serve Navy Federal Credit Union’s members and their families,” she said.
Kuhlmann, in turn, said he is “tremendously grateful” to take on his new role.
“This is an incredible opportunity to continue my career of service to our military community, and I’m eager to build upon the progress Mary has championed on behalf of our members as CEO,” he said.
