How CUs Can Attract and Retain Lending Talent

Commercial lending continues to be an area of opportunity and growth for many credit unions. Even though business demand is high, there’s a shortage of lenders and credit analysts entering the space, and experienced lenders are retiring more rapidly than new ones are coming in. This scarcity is the result of converging factors, including fewer students pursuing the career and higher salaries enticing lenders toward large institutions.

The commercial lending officer is a significant role at any institution. These individuals are responsible for sizable portfolios, bear the burden of portfolio growth expectations and are tasked with ensuring credit quality remains high – all the more reason credit unions can’t ignore this shrinking talent pool.

When recruiting new lending officers, credit unions generally either look at candidates with proven experience, or young and ambitious go-getters. The former often come from larger organizations that were privy to vast, innovative resources, and the latter have high expectations for technology in the workplace. Both groups, however, have one thing in common: They won’t want to work in Excel spreadsheets and shuffle paper, which is unfortunately still the norm for many credit unions’ lending processes.

So, what can be done? Updating commercial lending technology and processes can not only boost operational efficiency and accuracy, but is also a smart step for credit unions to make themselves more attractive to commercial lending professionals as they decide where to work.

Currently, a majority of credit unions still rely on siloed, manual processes and systems to carry their loans from application to funding. Stacks of paper literally get moved between desks, where files can end up getting misplaced, out of order or held up for any number of reasons. Communication between loan team members is tedious and possibly not occurring as frequently as it could. For the most part, there’s also a lack of transparency to know a loan’s exact status at any given time.

To address these challenges, credit unions should prioritize digitizing commercial lending. Digital applications, electronic forms and automated workflows together accomplish major improvements in loan efficiency. Loan requests are triggered as they come in. Documents travel through prescribed workflows that keep the loan team accountable for the accuracy, consistency and completion of data and decisions.

As a bonus, an often underappreciated benefit of technology is its ability to encourage wider collaboration. When an area of the organization – like commercial lending – can be centralized through automation, it adds a new level of visibility to each deal, to the loan pipeline and to how the portfolio is performing. Commercial loan officers are more inclined to call on their team for help navigating more complex loan scenarios, and can more easily keep the lines of communication open with underwriters or the credit team – even with member borrowers. Nothing boosts recruitment and retention like good camaraderie.

Once the technology is there, it’s time for credit unions to market themselves.

Local college recruitment fairs are a great way to interact with up and coming talent before they even graduate. One-on-one time is a great forum for educating students on the culture and greater mission of credit unions, as well as promote the technology that enables your specific organization to be a great workplace and give back to the community. Offering internship programs is another strong way to engage prospects, as they allow potential employees to experience firsthand what it’s like to work at a credit union embracing technology.

To appear attractive to all potential employees – new or seasoned – credit unions must do a better job at communicating their technology, practices and overall culture. Today, before anyone commits to work for any organization, they will undoubtedly perform basic Google and social media searches. A credit union’s website and social media platforms are great opportunities to provide details about its commitment to technology for work, and its desire to work closely with small businesses as they get their start and grow over time. Blogs and social media posts about technology updates, fun team activities or philanthropic efforts, and short videos detailing the credit union’s operations and events, are all tactics to help accomplish this goal.

As it becomes more challenging to attract and retain top lending talent, credit unions must focus on updating their commercial lending technology to be attractive to potential employees. Credit unions are great places to work, but they need to prove that it’s a misconception that they lack modern tools to get the work done. If credit unions apply the resources to boost their commercial lending process and take the appropriate measures to market their institution’s technology as part of its culture, they will be well-positioned to navigate the lender shortage for the long haul.

Patrick True is Risk Manager for ProfitStars Lending Solutions. He can be reached at rtrue@profitstars.com.