Earlier this month, over 3,700 Jack Henry™ Connect attendees took over the Gaslamp District and Convention Center in downtown San Diego to celebrate a conference like no other – and to say the vibe was electrifying would be an understatement. For the first time ever, we brought our bank and credit union clients together at one conference as an extension of our commitment to strengthening connections!
To help me recap the event and highlight a few of the most impactful moments, I turned to the people I connected with both at the event and on social media through #jhconnect22.
Here are some of the top moments from this year’s Jack Henry Connect conference:
For the first time in two years, we were reunited face-to-face. Attendees were excited to be back and meet with industry experts, explore what’s possible in the world of fintech, and learn from the Jack Henry team.
We kicked off the week with opening remarks from David Foss, Board Chair and CEO of Jack Henry. Foss offered insight about where Jack Henry has been, where we are going, and how we’re better serving our customers. After 46 years of supporting community and regional banks and credit unions, connecting them with the technology needed to move their businesses forward remains at the forefront of our strategy. Foss also shared our commitment to R&D, noting that 14% of Jack Henry’s revenue is reinvested in various technology priorities.
Our first keynote speaker, Chad Littlefield, Co-Founder and Chief Experience Officer of We and Me, Inc.,
was then introduced by Foss. Littlefield is known for his We Connect cards that help people bypass superficial questions and engage in deeper, more meaningful conversations. His work inspired Jack Henry to turn what was formerly known as the “Customer Corner” into the “Connection Corner,” where we developed our own conference cards (some directly from Littlefield) tailored to the work banks and credit unions are doing in their communities every day.
Hundreds of visitors stopped by Connection Corner each day to participate in thought-provoking activities and share their stories with us! Afterward, everyone was encouraged to color in a corresponding section of our Connecting Possibilities mural! Thank you to everyone who came by to connect and learn with us.
The summer was full of big announcements from Jack Henry! Leading up to the conference, we announced our refreshed brand focused on strengthening connections and going to market as one unified company – Jack Henry. We celebrated the acquisition of Payrailz, a next-generation, AI-driven, cloud-native digital payment platform and had the opportunity to officially welcome them as Jack Henry associates at Jack Henry Connect! And just as we were packing our bags for San Diego, we announced the plan for our new financial crimes platform – a cloud-native platform powered by Fendzai’s AI/ML engine.
Did you think we were going to stop there? Not a chance!
At Jack Henry Connect, Ben Metz, Chief Digital and Technology Officer, took the stage Wednesday afternoon to discuss our relationship with Autobooks. He highlighted what’s happening with business payments through third-party apps and the opportunity to compete. Steve Robert, President of Autobooks, also joined Metz on stage to share additional ways we’re working together to help fight financial fragmentation, decrease dependencies on third-party providers for your business accountholders, and enhance their relationships with you – their primary financial institution!
During that same session, Metz announced our strategic relationship with Finicity and Mastercard® to provide outbound account access for all accountholders at one all-in price of 15 cents per user – with the ability to add any number of accounts under that same price.
He then asked the audience, “What if we could find a computing platform that checked a series of boxes, including loving our community financial institutions as we do?” Turns out, we found that platform!
Live on the stage at Jack Henry Connect, we announced Jack Henry and Google have collaborated to form a strategic cloud relationship, making Google the primary public cloud provider for the heart of our system! This relationship will help financial institutions innovate even faster to meet the evolving needs of accountholders.
Metz then welcomed Stacy Trackey Meagher, Managing Director of Google Cloud, and Jess Turner, Executive Vice President for New Digital Infrastructure & Fintech at Finicity and Mastercard, to talk about building relationships and furthering innovation in the fintech community.
This is a direct quote from one of our clients on LinkedIn as he shared photos of our live LEGO® build. LEGO artist Brandon Griffith joined us on-site to interact with attendees and show us what connecting possibilities is all about. He worked on a live build of our new logo that was over four feet tall and had stations for attendees to add their personal touch to ‘main street’ and contribute to the eight-foot Connecting Possibilities sign.
It was so wonderful to see grown-ups breaking from their busy day for a bit of fun! Not only did they get to play with LEGOs and color a mural, but they also walked along the water, road bikes, danced on 360⁰ selfie stands, competed at cornhole, and searched high and low for the vendor they heard was giving out ice cream bars.
In addition, hundreds of attendees participated in our Step into Financial Health challenge on behalf of the 166 million Americans who are considered financially unhealthy. At the end of the week, we brought our friends from the Financial Health Network on stage to present them with a check for $10,000 as our conference charity to further their work of improving financial health for all!
We noticed several themes emerge during our time at Jack Henry Connect – all of which are top of mind for banks and credit unions alike. It appears you’re all wondering how you can increase efficiencies across your organization, improve the financial health of your communities, reduce fraud and risk, increase revenue, improve your accountholder experience, and meet the needs of commercial accountholders. Be sure you’re subscribed to FinTalk and check back in the coming weeks as we tackle each of these topics in our post-Connect blog series!
It was wonderful to see so many of you at Jack Henry Connect. And for those who couldn’t attend, we hope to see you next year.
Save the date ... our 2023 Jack Henry Connect will be held October 16-19 in Indianapolis, IN!
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