Chief Operating Officer Toni-Ann M. Sforza talks about Municipal Credit Union’s commitments to total rewards and diversity, equity, and inclusion.
By Debbie Bolla
HRO Today: What’s the biggest challenge you are currently facing and what are your plans to overcome it?
Sforza: Right now, driving and leading culture change is a top priority for us. To ensure MCU establishes itself as a high-performing organization, we started with focusing on our employee experience, identifying the components that employees seek when working together to create a culture of high-performing individuals. These components include purpose, value, recognition, development, and accountability—to each of which we apply specific standards and metrics.
One example of how we drive these components is our employee engagement calendar. Through the calendar of engagement events, we let our employees know that we are constantly thinking of them and investing in them—especially in terms of their development—which leads to succession planning and career growth.
HROT: What impact has the transparency and communication around the total rewards program had?
Sforza: I’m happy to report that our enrollment in the company 401(k) is best-in-class, as is our enrollment in medical benefits. Here are a few highlights for both benefits and our company 401(k) since we began a focus on total rewards.
- Benefits.
- Approximately 6% growth in medical benefits enrollments over the past two years. Some of the enhancements to our benefits include a transition from a three-tier to a four-tier cost/contribution structure including salary bands for non-union staff to assure equity, and enhanced vision and hearing benefits.
- Introduction of voluntary benefits such as enhanced life insurance, enhanced disability, and more.
- 401(k) plan.
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- Participation in our company plan increased from 67.4% at the beginning of 2022 to 95.1% as of the first quarter of 2024.
- Contribution index in the 401(k) increased from 19.8% to 24.5% during the same period.
- Average 401(k) account balances increased by 57.12% year over year from 2023 to 2024.
HROT: Can you tell us more about your strategy around DEI and how MCU’s leadership is 63% non-white, and 83% of promotions in the past year have gone to diverse individuals?
Sforza: Being based in New York City and operating throughout the city’s five boroughs means MCU inherently has one of the most diverse member and employee pools anywhere, but numbers like ours are not necessarily reflected in our peer institutions in New York City and New York State—they come about as the result of a relentless focus on diversity as a business imperative.
We also show our employees that diversity is valued from within, having established five (to date) employee resource groups (ERGs) and an employee diversity council to facilitate support and funding for them.
By concentrating on individuals’ abilities and working to eliminate unconscious biases, leaders at MCU are better able to focus on hiring, retaining, and promoting the best-qualified and most promising individuals. MCU strives to ensure that we are fair at all levels, accomplishing this in many ways. For example, MCU ensures compensation is driven by an individual’s job responsibilities and mapped to industry standard, and MCU requires all leaders receive training in behavioral interviewing techniques to ensure fairness in the interviewing process.
HROT: What is your favorite way to spend free time?
Sforza: My number one way to spend my free time is with my dog, Delilah.
Toni-Ann M. Sforza is the former CHRO and current chief operating officer at Municipal Credit Union, a not-for-profit financial institution and credit union.
