Michael Kukla

About Michael Kukla

I am a senior financial services executive with more than 20 years of experience leading growth, developing high-performing leaders, and delivering best-in-class member and client experiences within credit unions and banking organizations.My career has been built on driving results through people—building strong leadership pipelines, fostering engaged, accountable teams, and aligning strategy across lending, credit, and relationship management functions. I bring deep expertise in credit and lending solutions, business development, and consultative sales, with a proven ability to translate organizational objectives into scalable, member-focused outcomes.I am known for my collaborative leadership style and for successfully partnering across lines of business to deliver integrated solutions for both consumer and commercial members. By balancing disciplined execution with a service-first mindset, I help institutions strengthen relationships, improve performance, and drive sustainable growth.At the core of my leadership approach is a commitment to developing talent, elevating the member experience, and creating cultures that consistently deliver value—for members, teams, and the organization.

Experience

1. Director of Branches

   Consumers Credit Union

   Apr 2021 — Present · IL, US

   Welcome to Consumers Credit Union (CCU) where our mission is to empower our members to live better lives.We’re a financial institution just like a bank, except not exactly. Banks have customers, but because we’re a not-for-profit, member-owned credit union, we have members. And because we’re not a bank, we don’t drive up profits just because shareholders demand it. Instead, we focus on driving up member happiness through low loan rates, high deposit rates and low- or no-fee products and services. We focus on things like transparency, simplicity, helpfulness, integrity, positivity and inclusion – and we always put our members first.

Education

• Northern Illinois University

  Bachelor of Science (BS), Marketing

  2005

• University of Wisconsin-Madison

  Graduate School of Banking, GSB Graduate in 2015

Skills

• Cash Management
• Credit Analysis
• Commercial Lending
• Wealth Management
• Loan Origination
• Branch Banking
• Mortgage Lending
• Retail Banking
• Retirement Planning
• Deposits
• Cross Selling
• Consumer Lending
• Underwriting
• Banking
• Home Equity Lines of Credit
• Credit
• Portfolio Management
• Loans
• Lines of Credit
• Branch Management
• Small Business Lending
• Mortgage Banking
• Commercial Banking
• Refinance
• Relationship Management
• Series 63