ROSE WHITNEY

SECU MD

Rose Whitney has built a career around one guiding question: how to help people grow. As market manager for Southeast Maryland at SECU MD, she has turned that ethos into a measurable record of advancing the people around her.

Over the past year, Whitney mentored three assistant managers and helped all three secure promotions to branch manager. Their work together concentrated on the skills that separate capable managers from effective leaders, including coaching, crucial conversations, business acquisition and strategic planning, alongside accountability and time management. Across the last two years, members of her team have accounted for 33 promotions in retail banking.

Whitney points to the launch of SECU’s first business roundtables as her most consequential professional achievement, a series she led to gather critical feedback ahead of the credit union’s revamped Business Banking launch in the fall of 2025. The events drew more than 70 attendees to five financial centers, where owners, nonprofit leaders and executives supplied the data and perspective SECU needed to serve members and deliver competitive industry products.

That commitment to serving others runs through her approach to mentorship, growth and retention alike, reinforcing SECU’s “people helping people” mindset. She works consistently with development and optimization teams so the organization knows how best to back its colleagues and the members it serves.

Her service continues outside the credit union. As a board member and treasurer of TCP Youth Empowerment, Whitney assumed responsibility for its yearly golf fundraiser. Under her direction, the tournament committee expanded to eight members and revenue climbed more than 20% in both of the past two years, putting the event on track to raise $75,000 or more in 2026.

Whitney describes her career path as one centered on developing others and multiplying leadership, and treats relationship-building as the foundation of both.