Gaurav Bhatia, CMO at PenFed, recognized that while his team excelled in communicating with current PenFed members, they needed an even more robust strategy to attract and engage prospective members. In addition, due to challenges presented by the pandemic, Bhatia and his team identified the need to evolve the digital customer experience and become more member centric. Bhatia wanted to supplement his internal team’s efforts with an agency who understands customer experience and could help PenFed leverage best practices in the rapidly changing digital space. He had worked with Mindstream on previous projects and was impressed by the quality of work produced, and knew we had the ability and expertise to help based on the member experience (MX), transformation that PenFed was seeking.

Another challenge for the PenFed team was that the pandemic made it more difficult to hire and onboard employees remotely. Through former projects, Mindstream had already established a strategic partnership with Bhatia and his team, enabling us to identify the gaps and integrate our capabilities for a seamless, timely path forward. Whereas previously it may have been more challenging to involve an agency in a particular project or campaign, now it’s become second nature with all teams working virtually, leveling the playing field between internal employees and agency teams. According to Bhatia, “Now, with both our internal teams and agencies working remotely, there’s less of a distinction between the two. Mindstream is embedded as part of our team, can fill in the gaps and can advise us where we need it.”