Imagine. Connect. Grow.

These were the words that animated the 2025 edition of CSI’s annual customer conference, CX25. From March 31 to April 2, attendees gathered in sunny Orlando to envision the future of community banking, forge powerful connections with peers and partners, and explore innovative paths toward growth for their institutions.

Over the course of three dynamic days, industry leaders and experts dove deep into transformative topics shaping community banking, including AI, open banking, personalization, fraud prevention and AML, and effective generational engagement.

But CX25 wasn’t just about business. Attendees embraced Orlando’s imaginative spirit and built meaningful connections during memorable experiences—from thrilling outings at Universal Studios to uniquely Floridian adventures such as tours of the Kennedy Space Center and kayaking excursions through the headwaters of the Everglades.

Attendees also drew inspiration from legendary boxer Sugar Ray Leonard, whose keynote underscored the value of resilience, determination, and a good corner—qualities essential not just in the ring, but in business.

CX25 marked a special celebration, too—CSI’s radiant Diamond Jubilee commemorating its 60th anniversary. This milestone celebrated not only CSI’s decades of innovation and service, but also 60 years of enduring partnership and collaboration with its remarkable customers.

Ultimately, attendees left energized, inspired, and ready to seize the future of community banking. While it’s impossible to capture every insightful conversation or impactful session from CX25 in one article, here’s a selection of key takeaways that resonated throughout the conference.

Can’t wait for next year’s CX conference? Missed this one? Either way, mark your calendar now for CX26, happening April 12-15, 2026, in Denver, Colorado.

The Theme: “Imagine. Connect. Grow.”

As CSI COO Linda Fischer said in her opening remarks on Day 1: “Everyone can feel that we’re at an inflection point—in our industry, in tech, everywhere.”

The intensifying pace of technological innovation has disrupted nearly every industry, and community banking is no exception. Combine this rapid technological evolution with shifting customer expectations, regulatory uncertainty, and rising competitive pressures, and it’s clear that community financial institutions face unprecedented challenges—but also unique opportunities.

CX25 emphasized that imagination and connection are key to navigating these complexities. Institutions must have the vision and foresight to anticipate the twists and turns of this evolving landscape and to proactively embrace opportunities, like responsible AI deployment and strategic open banking initiatives.  Equally critical is connection—building strong, collaborative relationships across the industry to share knowledge, hone strategies, and drive positive change. Together, these foundational elements will enable community banks to achieve sustainable growth, not just for the institutions themselves, but the communities they serve.

1. AI: From Hype to Deployment

We had to address the elephant in the room first. Those two letters—AI—represent a seismic shift in our industry (and nearly every other one, too), promising equal parts opportunity and disruption.

It’s a topic that’s everywhere these days, and CX25 was no exception. AI-focused breakout sessions were among the most popular and highest-rated, highlighting just how hungry community financial institution leaders are for practical insights and guidance on navigating this transformative technology. The data from CSI’s 2025 Banking Priorities report bears this out too: 33% of surveyed bankers chose AI as the top tech trend to watch this year, for the second year in a row. There’s uncertainty as much as interest, though—80% expressed concern over the technology.

That’s not to say community bankers aren’t already diving into AI. As former CSI president and CEO David Culbertson pointed out during his keynote address, many CSI customers are already harnessing AI’s potential to speed up back-office processes, enhance customer service, and deliver more personalized marketing to account holders.

CSI itself is making strides in bringing actionable AI solutions directly to customers. For example, CSI’s TruDetect AML software combines AI with traditional rules-based systems, ensuring scalable automation while maintaining the explainability and compliance necessary to avoid the pitfalls of “black box” AI models. David also shared news about an AI-powered upgrade coming to CSI’s Customer Resource Center, designed to expand and enhance self-service options for quicker, more efficient support. Plus, CSI is actively exploring AI’s potential to automate QA testing, accelerating the delivery of new solutions to market.

Throughout his remarks, David emphasized CSI’s thoughtful and responsible approach to AI—not “chasing shiny objects” or inventing solutions to non-existent problems, but rather ensuring each AI deployment meets real-world needs. He also encouraged attendees to dive deeper into AI governance by attending the specialized sessions offered at the conference. Establishing clear governance frameworks remains essential for managing risks, ensuring transparency, and guiding ethical deployment.

The bottom line? Community banks simply can’t afford to overlook AI. Generational researcher Jason Dorsey put it clearly in his special session: future generations—Alpha, Beta, and beyond—will perceive AI the way we view the internet today: invisible until it’s missing, and completely expected.

2. Community FIs Have Unique Roles and Challenges… but also Opportunities

In his special session, Dorsey shared a deeply personal story highlighting the critical role community financial institutions play in people’s lives. When Jason’s mother wanted to start her own business in Brenham, Texas, she faced rejection from bank after bank. Finally, one small local bank decided to take a chance and provided the loan she needed. Jason vividly recalled the anxiety of opening day—not one customer showed up. He remembered thinking: “We’re totally broke.” But three years later, his mother won Entrepreneur of the Year.

Inspired by that early support, when Jason and his wife Denise started their latest business seven years ago, they exclusively considered community and regional banks for their financing needs. Today, Jason proudly noted, even his daughter is an account holder at a community bank. He ended his session with a poignant expression of gratitude: “Thank you for all the lives you change, like ours.”

Stories like Jason’s aren’t rare, though they might not always receive the spotlight they deserve. As David Culbertson pointed out in his keynote, community institutions:

• Make roughly 60% of U.S. small-business loans under $1 million.
• Provide 80% of agricultural loans.
• Serve as the only physical banking presence in one-third of U.S. counties.
• Personally meet with small-business loan applicants 90% of the time, compared to just 40% for larger banks.

These statistics aren’t just numbers. They represent tangible differences in how community banks interact with customers, strengthening local economies and fostering personal connections.

Navigating Today’s Challenges

However, despite these strengths, community banks face significant challenges in today’s environment. Technological disruption from developments like AI can strain resources and budgets. Regulatory uncertainties and changes under a new administration (for good or ill) place operational pressure on already lean teams to adapt. Plus, shifting generational expectations are driving the need for seamless digital experiences and targeted engagement, often requiring substantial strategic investments. And competition from fintechs and larger banks continues to escalate, making the landscape more challenging to navigate than ever.

Leveraging Community Banking’s Strengths

But as CSI’s Banking Priorities research underscores, despite competitive pressures, 91% of community bankers remain optimistic about their future. This confidence is rooted in genuine relationships, local decision-making, and personalized customer service—distinctive strengths that form a moat the big banks can’t easily cross, no matter how often they try to present themselves as community institutions.

By combining this unique community role with strategic investments in technology and innovation, community banks are well-positioned not just to weather current challenges, but also to seize emerging opportunities for sustainable growth.

3. When It Comes to Generations, “One-Size-Fits-All” Doesn’t

Jason Dorsey’s session on bridging generational divides was a standout, earning top marks from attendees and clearly highlighting bankers’ eagerness to understand how best to engage different generations, both as customers and within their workforce. Drawing from over 150 research studies he’s led, Jason emphasized that acknowledging generational differences is critical for unlocking potential, improving communication, building trust, and effectively influencing across diverse age groups.

During his follow-up live appearance on CSI’s Banking on Community podcast, Jason reinforced the idea that a “one-size-fits-all” approach simply doesn’t work in today’s multi-generational environment. What resonates with one generation can provoke an almost allergic reaction in another—did you know that Gen Z hates the word “referral?”

Tailored Solutions for Lasting Loyalty

Accounting for these generational quirks gives financial institutions powerful ways to engage their current and prospective account holders across age demographics, but that’s just a starting point. Now is the ideal moment for institutions to actively explore new technologies that empower them to cater to distinct generational groups.

For example, as David Culbertson highlighted, CSI’s upcoming Family Wallet solution offers a platform for families to instill good money habits early and give kids some (supervised) financial independence—as well as an opportunity for banks to create lasting loyalty in a new generation of customers. Additionally, advanced data insights and targeted marketing solutions enable personalized communication, allowing banks to build more authentic connections across segments like generation.

4. Criminals Have Leveled Up—Financial Institutions Must Too

In 2024, fraud cost U.S. consumers a staggering $12.5 billion, making painfully clear the urgent need for proactive defenses for financial institutions. But fraud isn’t the only threat out there—fraud, money laundering, and cyber threats collectively form a dangerous landscape for both community FIs and their account holders.

As David Culbertson highlighted in his keynote, nearly 80% of fraud incidents now originate through digital banking channels. At the same time, rapidly evolving cybersecurity threats continue to test the limits of existing defensive measures. Compounding this issue, community institutions must navigate complex regulatory environments where AML compliance remains both resource-intensive and critically important, especially given the high rate of false positives that strain analyst resources.

Given this reality, it’s no surprise that breakout sessions covering the latest developments in these three threats drew big crowds and great reviews at CX25. Criminals, empowered by AI and operating in increasingly sophisticated spaces (like crypto), have stepped up their game significantly.

Transforming Financial Crime Prevention

But AI isn’t just a weapon for criminals. It offers some tantalizing benefits for financial institutions looking to defend themselves and stay compliant.

False positives are one of the most significant hurdles in fraud detection and AML processes: analysts currently spend between 30 and 70 minutes investigating each alert, and more than 95% of these alerts ultimately prove unnecessary. AI-driven analytics and monitoring can dramatically reduce these endless false positives, allowing analysts to focus on genuine threats and more complex investigative tasks.

AI-powered solutions don’t just improve operational efficiency; they also help tackle staffing shortages. David noted that over half of financial institutions report difficulties staffing their AML compliance teams adequately. By automating routine tasks and filtering out irrelevant alerts, AI can ease staffing pressures and enable existing teams to work more strategically and effectively.

Staying Ahead of Cyber Threats

The U.S. faces a similar shortage of cybersecurity professionals, making effective cyber defense increasingly challenging. A talent shortage couldn’t come at a worse time: cyber threats are becoming more sophisticated, leveraging advanced techniques and technology, including AI, to bypass traditional defenses. That leaves institutions vulnerable to ransomware, malware, and other threats.

But AI can be a shield as much as a weapon. Advanced AI-driven solutions can detect subtle anomalies and emerging threats in real-time, improving institutions’ response times and reducing vulnerability to cyberattacks. AI tools continuously learn and adapt, providing dynamic protection and enabling cybersecurity teams to proactively manage threats rather than merely reacting to breaches.

Institutions are clearly intrigued by the potential benefits of AI in protecting themselves and their customers: according to CSI’s 2025 Banking Priorities survey, a whopping 91% of bankers expressed interest in deploying AI specifically to tackle financial crime. AI-powered solutions do, however, require solid governance in implementation, or risk creating new problems.

5. Open Banking: Still a Strategic Priority

Open banking has been a hot topic in financial circles for years now, and CX25 showed it’s still very much on bankers’ minds. The breakout session “Seamlessly Integrating Fintech” was among the highest-rated at the conference, reflecting continued enthusiasm for this evolving field.

That enthusiasm aligns with insights from CSI’s 2025 Banking Priorities report, where 28% of respondents identified Open Banking or Banking as a Service (BaaS)—a key application of open banking—as their top technology trend to watch. While 28% might not seem overwhelming at first glance, remember that respondents were choosing from a broad array of important trends, including showstoppers like AI. The strong showing for open banking, even among such high-profile competition, underscores just how vital banks see these capabilities.

In his live appearance on Banking on Community, Emmett Higdon of Javelin Strategy provided additional insight into why open banking resonates so strongly. He highlighted that when digital banking experiences fall short in functionality or ease-of-use, customers naturally turn to external fintech apps—often specialized “one trick pony” solutions—to fulfill specific needs, drawing away deposits and engagement from community FIs. However, this often leads consumers into “app fatigue,” overwhelmed by managing multiple apps that address single issues individually. This quickly turns into a lose-lose situation, for banks and consumers alike.

Seamless Integration for Competitive Advantage

Open banking directly addresses this issue by seamlessly integrating financial services and data into one unified experience, simplifying consumers’ financial management significantly. Higdon emphasized the importance of clearly communicating these integrated experiences’ benefits. Customers often don’t fully grasp open banking’s potential because banks haven’t effectively illustrated how these services can meaningfully enhance their daily financial management.

Breakout attendees expressed particular excitement around solutions that offer easy fintech integration and streamlined access to innovation. By leveraging open banking strategies, community banks can swiftly adopt innovative solutions without extensive in-house technology builds, simplify customer experiences, improve security, ease compliance burdens, and position themselves strategically for future growth.

Bonus Takeaway: Personalization is the Name of the Game

In his keynote, David Culbertson emphasized that personalization is key to building and maintaining retail relationships. Given how costly acquiring new accounts can be—$1000 per account, according to Deloitte—and how critical deposit growth is for community banks.

Maybe counterintuitively, the rapid advancement of technology actually empower financial institutions to be more human-centric than ever, allowing them to anticipate needs and deliver exactly what customers (or prospective customers) are looking for.

This focus on personalization fits perfectly with community banks’ strengths: close relationships and genuinely individualized customer care. By tailoring interactions to each customer’s unique situation, community banks double down on their competitive advantage, something larger institutions often struggle to replicate.

CX25 attendees seemed to agree, expressing interest in personalization-focused solutions. Breakout sessions on targeted marketing, customized account onboarding, and tailored engagement strategies were popular, as were sessions on individualized overdraft limits and small dollar lending solutions matched directly to customer needs.

The Personalization Gap

But as Emmett Higdon bluntly pointed out on Banking on Community, truly effective personalization remains elusive in the industry: “Folks often ask me, ‘Who’s doing a really good job of personalization today? Who should we look to as a north star?’ And I say, ‘Honestly, nobody.’”

That means there’s a huge opportunity—and plenty of urgency—for community banks to step up and fill that gap.

Data-Driven Personalization Strategies

Ultimately, getting personalization right comes down to effective use of data, a resource many financial institutions have in abundance but struggle to leverage fully. Thankfully, advancements in technology, especially AI-driven analytics, now make it easier than ever to turn data into actionable insights.

Behavioral analytics, for example, can reveal customer preferences that people might not even realize they have, allowing banks to make exactly the right offer at exactly the right time. Similarly, advanced analytics help banks identify and reach valuable prospective customers just when they’re most likely to be receptive.

Ultimately, personalization gives community banks the tools to do what they do best: build authentic human relationships. It’s about delivering thoughtful, relevant interactions that keep customers loyal and drive lasting growth.

Looking Ahead: Imagining the Future

CX25 made one thing abundantly clear: community financial institutions are at a pivotal moment, navigating both exciting opportunities and real challenges. From harnessing the potential of AI and open banking to understanding generational shifts, tackling evolving criminal threats, and leveraging personalization, the conference provided a clear roadmap for turning industry changes into strategic advantages.

While these industry-focused discussions were central, attendees also took away powerful lessons from Sugar Ray Leonard’s keynote, highlighting grit, vision, and teamwork as enduring pillars of success.

At the heart of every conversation was a shared understanding that, despite rapid technological advancements, the true strength of community banks remains deeply human. The ability to imagine boldly, connect authentically, and grow purposefully is a powerful way to make a lasting impact on the communities and customers you serve—not to mention good business.

As CSI celebrated its Diamond Jubilee during CX25, it was a reminder of the importance of collaboration and innovation that has guided community banks through decades of change. And a roaring good time to boot, as anyone present can attest.

Missed CX25 or already eager for more? Mark your calendar now for CX26, April 12-15, 2026, in Denver, Colorado.