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“Bank Your Size” - The Community Bank Difference · Leaders in Lending

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You're listening to Leaders and Lending from Upstart, a podcast dedicated to helping consumer
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lenders grow their programs and improve their product offerings. Each week, here,
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decision makers in the finance industry offer insights into the future of the lending industry,
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best practices around digital transformation, and more. Let's get into the show.
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Welcome to Leaders in Lending. I'm your host, Jeff Keltner. This
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week's episode features my conversation with Ryan coax On, the VP of Guarantee Bank
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and Trust. It's maybe not a unique name of them banks. I feel
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like Guaranteed Bank is out there a few places, but it's a pretty unique
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story. Ryan helped start the branch of this bank in Austin area, grew
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it from just a couple of people and basically no assets to over four hundred
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and fifty million dollars in assets and loans, one hundred fifty million deposits.
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More than thirty people work in there. It's a really interesting story of kind
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of starting up a banking segment from scrap. We really dive into how they
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did it. Lessons learn things you would do different if you could. Biggest
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surprise, What was the most fun so kind of it's just exploring that kind
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of startup founder type story for early stage bank, and then also delve into
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Ryan's work in community development. He does that for the bank, and it's
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kind of broader reach outside of the Austin area, which I thought was really
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interesting. He is really focused on kind of workforce of the future development of
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that workforce, and that's I think, in a very holistic way as interesting
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construct to think of it in because really it's about people and how you develop
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in nurture and train people in communities. So I thought that was really interesting.
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And Ryan is one of the first people to described to me being a
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banker and particularly a lender as a very intimate job, and I thought that
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was a fascinating description. And you'll have to listen to the episode to figure
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out why he feels that way. So please enjoy my conversation with Ryan Coason.
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Ryan, thanks for joining us today the podcast. I really appreciate your
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making the time. Oh, thank you for having me. This is exciting
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in my first podcast. Your first part, well, I remember that we
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did our prep call and there was an ice storm and you had no power,
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So hopefully fingers crossed the technical gods shine on us today and we don't
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have any problems yep, yep, hopefully, or I think we're doing good
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in Austin now, So you know, fingers crossed. The fingers crossed.
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Well, I've started recently all my podcasts asking my guests kind of to give
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me a little bit of the background of how you got into banking and where
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you're at. It's not the most common, like childhood ambition for most of
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us to get into the banking space, and yet we all kind of found
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our ways here. And I always like to hear a little bit about the
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story of what brought you into the space. Yeah, mine definitely was not
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a regular story, but I love it no matter what. So I started
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out as a part time teller, and I only actually got into tellering because
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I was actually selling residential real estate. And then my mom came in one
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day and was like, hey, you kind of kind of gotta get off
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the insurance and so I was like, Okay, well, what can I
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get in at this time? And I didn't have my degree at the time
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that I could be like, this is a great profession and I can just
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kind of ride all the way through. And I chose banking and I went
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from part time teller to full time to personal banker to banking officer, did
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a little analyst work, and then in twenty seventeen, my boss and I,
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I took a leap of faith with him and I just went with him
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to start a guarantee banking trust in the Central text area. So this is
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a really interesting story because not many people kind of start a bank from scratch,
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or at least, you know, open up a bank in a new
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area. So walk me through what kind of what kind of banking services and
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what that was like kind of gone from zero to like you know where you
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where you're rinning an office where you're working out of a car and a Starbucks
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the way a lot of start startups to like, what what's the experience of
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kind of starting from scratch in this space? Yeah, so it was really
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interesting. I mean I always tell people it felt like we were in a
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startup yet we still had a three billion dollar bank behind us. And what
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I mean by that is there they had no locations here in the Central Texas
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area. It was so when we started, it was my boss and I
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in his child's playroom. They came and gave us all our equipment, and
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then we bought this little table from home depot that I would sit at right
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next to his and our phones were daisy chained to each other, and it
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was really like, hey, we're doing this. And then after that we
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actually went and got a Regus office and then we shared that and that was
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equally kind of horrible and great at the same time. I mean, when
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he when he got sick, I would get sick, and it's like,
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Wow, we're really in this box together. Were you in one, like
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one little room in reds or did you have did you get your It was
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one little room and you know, for a while it was just us working
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in there. And I remember we hired a lending assistant and and like he's
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like, okay, we have a lenit assistant coming in barn. We have
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this other little table, and so I'm like, I'm going to clean our
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little area so we can make it look like, you know, we're a
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big time and I guarantee she came in there was like this is the bank,
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So what have I done? What have I done? What have I
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done? And so then after that we did hire her, and then we
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went into a office building where we kind of the team went from the three
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to then I think we kind of packed that with five and then we got
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the building that we're currently in, and then we then spread out from downtown
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Austin to Lakeway, to Georgetown and to Westlake and we here we are now
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with thirty plus people in about four hundred and sixty million dollars in loans and
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that was since August twenty seventeen. That is quite the experience. What what
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kind of loans? Like, what's the what was the nature of the business
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that you built in terms of the kinds of lending the deposit It's like with
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the kind of customers you were serving, what was and I'll put this in
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there as a side that like, is where you ended up where you started
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aiming. I mean so often we hear about in the startup world to pivot,
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but the like, we had this this vision of where we were going
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to go, and then like you know, the market came and told us
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a little something different and we changed strategies. So I'm curious kind of like
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the nature of the kind of business you've built there and whether or not it's
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really what you intended to build or there were some lessons along the way.
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That change your direction a little bit. No, definitely, I think it
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wasn't what we intended to build. I mean, so my boss, Travis
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Brown, I will say, he is a genius. He has a genius
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credit mind, and so he did primarily commercial real estate lending, and so
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that was kind of our jump off. That's kind of what paid the bills.
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However, with me, I love being out in the community. I
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love meeting people, talking to people, and so a lot of mind were
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small business. And so when you think about it, it's kind of the
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best of both worlds. You have your big commercial real estate, sexy loans
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that actually pay the bills, and then you have the you know, the
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small business that are coming inside the bank and you know using the drive through,
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and you know, those are the people in the community. Is awesome
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to see them, you know, go from you know, a little architecture
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affirmed to a big one and that for me is everything. And so I
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would say that, you know, just the trajectory. I mean, as
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we look back, would we think just in five years we would be at
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four hundred and sixty million in loans just in the Austin area. Probably not,
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you know, you can't think that I think that's a lot of know
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how just on our part. And then I think Austin is just booming,
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and you know, everybody wants to live here, and so I think,
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I think it's a lot of things. Um, but you know, left
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the good times, roll left the good times role who I think I've spoken
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in a language in this podcast make some first day I want to ask you.
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You talked about your desire to get out in the community and kind of
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like, I think that really energizes you. And you had described the role
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of being a banker, particularly to small businesses when I talked to you earlier,
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as what you call an intimate job, which I thought was a really
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interesting description. I think a lot of people can view it as a very
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impersonal job in many ways, right, like mediated by piles of forums and
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kind of process and procedure. But you've viewed it as a very intimate role.
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So talk to people about about what you mean and why that's important to
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you and the way you approach that the banking you do. Yeah, So
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you know, my start of just being in the community stems from my father
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being a Baptist minister here in a suburb in Austin and you know, I
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was able to grow up in the church and see my mom and dad just
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really give their all making sure, you know, people had that foundation.
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So obviously they're in the community. And I always tell people, well,
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I'm not, you know, trying to do a sermon anytime soon. You
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don't want that. However, the need for just being in the community definitely
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stuck. I definitely draw just you know, power from within with that,
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and people are really just that energy that just gets me just just going.
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And you know, with that, I think, you know, I think
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we have a huge responsibility to our community to give back in so many ways.
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And I say banking is intimate because it is I feel like people come
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to you in good times, they come to you in bad times, they
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come to you in times of struggle, and they basically say, you know,
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here I am in a folder, this is my financial history, and
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here you go. I mean, I don't know many people that actually want
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to just give their whole financial history to somebody and just let your burn or
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you know, somebody just look at that, you know. And so I
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really think it's a very intimate thing because they're trusting you with, you know,
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something that they just don't talk about with anybody. I mean, you've
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always had that friend that's like, oh, how's the stock market doing?
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You know, my Ferrari goes, you know, one eighty and then you
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know they're looking at their actual online banking and it's like they can't even buy
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their Starbucks. So so you know, and that's why I just, you
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know, I'm I really really understand the trust that people give us as bankers,
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and I take it very seriously. Yeah, it's not and it's not
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even just handing you their lives and their financial history and a folder. It's
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handing it to you and asking to be judged in a way that I think
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it feels very uncomfortable. Right, they're kind of great. I can't teach
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how am I doing? Do I qualify or not? It's a very I
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think anxiety adducing thing for most people to do. Yes, And I mean
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you gotta think as bankers, that is what we are doing. We are
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risk management, and we are judging people, and it's just kind of like,
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you know, and that's one of the reason why I think, you
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know, that's why I think it's so important because that's a big job.
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And so you know that leads into the conversations that I'm sure wor'll get too
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well. I would ask this because you've got this unique experience of having grown
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this thing from you know, with the backing of a larger bank, but
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from kind of zero to four hundred and six. I would say zero to
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sixty for carnology before hundred and sixties is yeah, yeah, there are four
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sixty. There were four sixty in my card. I'n get that fast.
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But um, I wanted to ask, like, what would the you know,
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if you could think about the biggest challenge that came from kind of starting
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in the biggest like, um benefit, I think they are oftentimes like they're
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like you can think about the nobody knows who we are, whatever, the
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challenges of being kind of a startup. At the same time, there's a
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lot of advantages to that. And I'm curious, looking back on the past
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five years or so, what do you think were the biggest challenges and biggest
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advantages you've got out of being kind of a startup or a starting from zero
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kind of experience. Yeah, you know, the biggest challenges I would say
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is when we first first started, no one knew the name and Guarante and
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then I will say Guarantee Bank. There's actually a lot of guarantee banks out
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there, so people would be like, oh, are you guarantee you out
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of blah blah blah. No, oh I had a banking account with Guarantee.
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No, that's not that one. So we had to get over that
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hump. And then then once we got over that hump, it's it's not
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the people that we maybe have banked in previous banks, but it's kind of
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that newer that newer set that would come in and be like, okay,
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so where is Guarantee And then that's when I say, well, you know,
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we're based out of Mount Pleasant, Texas. I will tell you not
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a lot of Austin Nights know where Mount Pleasant is on the map. And
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then I would say, because we didn't actually have a brick and mortar bank
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with our name on the side of it, it's just kind of like,
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okay, so we're giving you these things, y'all are opened these accounts.
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And mind you, in the early days, I would have to send all
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the stuff to College Station because that was the closest branch. They would open
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it for me overnight. The stuff back to me and then I would get
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it to my customers. So it was really like, you know what we
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spend in post said postage at that time, but it's probably crazy wow,
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But yeah, No, then I would say the physical building because you know
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there's something about you know, even if you never go to the bank,
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because most of your bank is banking is done online, people wanted to see
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that physical building. And I will tell you once we got into that physical
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building and we and to our luck, we got into an amazing building right
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in the heart of downtown. And right when you come in you can see
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the big G on the side of the building. And that's when people are
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like, oh, okay, you know it kind of like legitimized you,
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Like we're not just you know, taking this money and driving around and rain
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drovers or anything. How about the biggest advantages, like were you there are
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things you leap frogging in technology or experience where you said, hey, we're
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not tied down by the by the history of the past, and we can
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kind of do something different. It gives us a leg up on maybe I'm
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more traditional competition. That's got some of the some of the baggers come up
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with them. So I will say that as a bank guarantee. Bank and
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Trust does a very good job in terms of technology and or technology is really
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really strong. However, we're still that hometown bank that was founded in East
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Texas one hundred and ten years ago. And so when you combine those two,
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it's one of the greatest combinations that you can do. Because I will
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tell you, you know, I have no problem or any qualms with any
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banks, but I do think you should always bank your size. And I
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think a lot of times people will be at larger banking institutions and there are
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a small business and they don't feel that they're getting the service that they need.
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And so that was our kind of entree, if you will, saying,
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hey, look we have the tech that you want. However we can
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give you that same great service. Here's my cell phone number, call me
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when you need me. And I think those two combine really really gave us
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an edge on the market. And you know, I'm very just kind of
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thankful for that. And plus again we've been in business one hundred to ten
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years, so that would probably be another one that's a very strong is that
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our people know what we're doing. You know, they've they've been through the
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challenges in banking history and we're still standing to this day. And you know
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that's you know, that's kind of the success story in Texas alone. So
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you know, I'm very very happy with you know, our tech that we
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have here, our leadership that we have here, and just our people that
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we have. UM. I would say that would probably be the last thing
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is too, is we don't have a lot of turnover um. And so
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you know, when you get to know us. As for your small business,
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you're alway he's dealing with the same person. And you know that's a
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that's a fun thing when somebody calls and it's like, hey, we know
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what's happening in your business. We know where we're trying to grow you too,
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and I just I just love that. I love it. Let me
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ask you that just double click a little bit on the phrase you used,
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bank your size? What do you what do you mean that's I'm not that's
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a phrase I haven't heard before. I'm always looking for the little tidbits or
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soundbites, but like, interesting concept. What do you mean by you always
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want to bank your size? So I think so what I mean by bank
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your size is there will be some businesses and let's just say they just let's
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say you have a pie business and you really know how to bank some pies,
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and you do it very well. And however, you're just kind of
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starting out of your kitchen and you got your LLC. A lot of people
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will go to the bigger institutions to open up an account, and you know,
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I think that's good. You know that's probably right around the corner from
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you, so you know that's good. However, when you start needing that
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kind of everyday touch of like oh I need a cash just check here,
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Oh I need to make a wire here, Oh I'm ready for a small
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business loan. You know, a lot of bigger institutions don't pay attention to
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that very very important segment. And that's the you know, the small business,
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which I like to say is the backbone of America. And they don't
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pay attention to that. So you know, they'll end up getting denied or
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they won't get the service that they want, you know, as a small
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institution, because you you know, you are a small business, are a
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smaller institution, they'll give you all the time you want. I mean,
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you can go in there and they'll roll out the red carpet for you and
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say, hey, we love these pies. Let's not only do this,
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but I'm going to tell my friend about this, or we actually bank this
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other business that I want y'all to meet each other. And that's really community
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banking, right there, is that you're just kind of taking care of the
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size. And then I will say it goes to the other opposite end of
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you know, sometimes I think you know your business is you know, now
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it's those same pies, but we've based all this other stuff and now you
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have kind of a Walmart esque business that will probably be a good business for
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one of the larger institutions just because they will have the kind of capacity to
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really handle, you know, what you need. And that's why I say
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I never talk about bad about any banks, because I just think they all
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are great in our own type of ways. And so that's what I mean
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by kind of bank your size. You know, if you want, if
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you're a small business and you want that friend or you want that partner,
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come to a community. But I heard a really interesting podcast with an investor
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or something. Now I'm like talking about other podcasts on my podcast is bad.
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But he made an interesting comment about some SaaS businesses where they really knew
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their market size and like, hey, we're going to work for you from
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excise employee to why and we kind of like we don't view it as bad
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when you hit why and you go somewhere else, because that's not our You
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kind of outgrown what we do and we that's not like it's churned and it's
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bad, but it's like we think of it as a good thing because we
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know our our spot, we know where we add the most value. We
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want to really serve those customers well. And if you get to the high
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end, the larger size and go we need a different set of stuff.
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Like that's okay. You know that you know your space, you fit it
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well, and you're kind of our you know, almost celebrating your customers moving
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past you because they've grown to a point that that's what they need you you
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are in a big way. And I almost feel like that baby bird flying
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out the nest, like you want them to spread their wings and fly and
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you're almost you know, in the you know for me because I've had a
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handful of customers do that, and you almost feel that sense of pride just
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because this is like you know, I remember when the big bank didn't want
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to give you the loan, and we were the first ones to take that
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chance and give you the loan. And we saw the loan go from twenty
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five thousand dollars until now you have million dollar loans. And that's one of
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the greatest kind of success stories that you can have. I mean, you
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know, for me, I'll tell you on the flip side, I'm always
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like, Hey, that money market account, you know, I can still
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have that here. So if you wanted to leave, you know, a
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couple of millions, look, you know, look that's when you go back.
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Hey, I do remember when you were little. Uh, But you
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know, I think it's I think it's a good thing, and I think
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it's bankers. That's for me. That's what you want to see. So
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I want to get to your role and kind of community development engagement. But
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but I want to ask one question because you before I get there, which
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is you talked about this is you said most of your partners. So if
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you want to duck it, that's fine. But you talked about building a
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big business in commercial real estate. That was kind of his you know,
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genius and credit risk and you were more on the SMB side, But it
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seems like this really interesting moment from a commercial real estate point of view as
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we see companies that you know, got a lot of real estate pre COVID
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are going through remote work or you know, this is shift in the nature
20:30
of utilization of office space. And I'm just curious if you've got any thoughts
20:33
on what the future of commercial real estate what's kind of shaking out over there,
20:37
because I don't I don't know how to make heads or tails of quite
20:40
what's going on. There's still a lot of building, a lot of places,
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but there's a lot of empty space, and I'm curious if you got
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any thoughts on like what's going to happen in the commercial real estate space over
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the next couple of years, because it feels like this kind of strange moment
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of dislocation in terms of what we expect the utilization of those kinds of spaces
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to be. Yeah, No, this this moment that we're sitting in right
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now, and this year that we're going to go through as bankers, it's
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going to be kind of a weird, quirky year just in terms of you
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know, loans that we were doing six two months to a year ago that
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we would have said, oh, definitely, yeah, let's go. Now
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we're kind of you know, pumping the brakes on it, saying, okay,
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let's let's look at this, but let's look at it in a couple
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other ways now that we have to. And you know, Austin is kind
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of tricky. Austin is a tricky one because, like we like to say,
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you know, we are going to be the last one's in, first
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one out in terms of you know, we don't want to use the recession
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word, but you know, hey, what comes what comes. And you
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know, so I think in terms of when you're talking about commercial real estate,
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it's one of those things you really have to pay attention to the articles.
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You have to pay attention to the news, you have to pay attention
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to the FED, you have to pay attention to all these things and just
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kind of make sure that you're really on top of it in that knowledge level.
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It's really high. Again, you know, I don't want to toot
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my bank's horn, but that's one of the things that they are really really
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kind of good at in terms of just we have the right people in place
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to make sure that every one of these things that I am talking about,
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we have somebody paying attention to. And so those are one of those things
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that really really helpful when you have the right people and right people in charge
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and right people looking at the things, and guarantee Bank and Trust does a
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very good job of that. And I will say that, you know,
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there are times that I think, especially like right now, there's a lot
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of banks kind of going and blowing and they're like, hey, we want
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to give you this interest rates, and you know, they're trying to get
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market you know, get market share, and you know, we're like,
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hold on, you know again, we're about relationships. So that is what
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we are really focused on right now. It's not that where Okay, we
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just want to do alone and you don't have anything over here. You know,
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this is a this is a back and forth, This is a give
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and take. This is a relationship that we want again. Kind of the
23:03
thing that we've been echoing through the conversation is we want to see you go
23:07
from you this over here, and we want to help you get to that
23:10
next step because when it comes to times like these and other banks are trying
23:15
to take market share and they're trying to give you a better raid or they're
23:18
trying to do these That's when that loyalty comes back and play and says,
23:22
you know what, Ryan was able to get me through times that nobody else
23:26
wanted to get me through. And so now just because the rates a little
23:30
better at somewhere else, I'll pass because guess what, my bank has tried
23:33
and true, and I believe in these people, just like you know we
23:37
believe in their businesses. Hey, Sarah buch here, the VP of Consumer
23:44
Landing at First Federal Bank of Kansas City. A few years back, our
23:48
executive team knew we needed to grow our unsecured personal loan portfolio, so we
23:52
turned to Upstart. Three years later, I am proud to share that we've
23:56
scaled our loan volume target from five hundred thousand a month twelve million a month,
24:00
and acquired over a thousand new customers. If you want to hear more
24:03
about our partnership, check out the full case study on Upstart dot com forward
24:08
slash Lenders. Once again, that's Upstart dot Com forward slash Lenders. All
24:15
right, let's get back to the show. Maybe that's a good point to
24:18
transition to. You know, you've had a role in the kind of the
24:22
community development engagement of both in the kind of Austin area part of the bank
24:26
that you started, but I think also in the larger institution. Talk to
24:30
me a little bit about how you think about what that role is and what
24:33
your objectives are. I think it's it's a really interesting aspect of banks for
24:36
the community banks. I mean, it's kind of like the heart and soul
24:40
of the banking industry is kind of engaging with the community and both financial in
24:44
other ways. But how do you think about what your objectives are and what
24:47
you're trying to do in the context of community development within the bank. Yeah.
24:52
So back in November of twenty twenty two, my bank came to me,
24:56
by my surprise, it was like, hey, we got this new
25:02
role that we think you would be perfect and we've never done it here at
25:04
this bank and we want you to do it. And that is the first
25:08
community development officer for a Guarantee bank and trust. This is something that I've
25:15
been doing since I've started, and that's just being in the community. I'm
25:18
always here there. I'm probably out at least four to five nights a week
25:23
just in different avenues in the community, just because I think you know,
25:30
if we're gonna I really take the word community seriously. If we're gonna be
25:33
a community bank, we need to be in the community. And that looks
25:37
like a lot of things. That's giving my time, talent, treasure,
25:40
all those things and making sure that, you know, guarantee banking is doing
25:45
their job. And so when they came to me and gave me this,
25:48
obviously I said yes. Obviously, I was like, oh my gosh.
25:52
And then so they basically were like, hey, we love what you're doing
25:56
in Austin. Now we want you to do it in all our metro areas.
25:59
So now you are over Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, in Houston
26:03
and everywhere in between. And you know, that's a big responsibility. You
26:07
know. I was so happy, and I remember they told me and then
26:10
I closed my office door and I was like yes. And then I'm like,
26:12
oh my gosh, I am I gonna do this. You gotta be
26:15
out two days a week, not ten days in the week to be out
26:17
and about in the different communities anymore. Ran you gotta you gotta pick and
26:19
choose correct what you know, what does that look like? And so then
26:23
I thought to myself, like, you know, what I know what that
26:26
looks like, that looks like exactly what we're doing here. And you know,
26:30
so one of the things that I've been fortunate is UM the Association.
26:33
I work with Texas Bankers Association in a big way and I'm on about three
26:37
different committees with them, and that works throughout the state of Texas, just
26:41
you know, kind of lobbying for community banks and making sure you know the
26:45
avenues that we want to take. We have all the banks kind of in
26:51
one voice, and then we can actually take that fight to Washington if we
26:53
feel that you know, the policies that we are trying to change, we
26:59
can tell the laws. Actually that's where I came back from from a day
27:02
ago. I was in Washington, DC meeting the one hundred and eighteenth of
27:06
Congress the new freshman, the freshman congressman from Texas. And so why those
27:14
relationships are important is because obviously, if you want something, you know,
27:18
change, you might have to do with policy wise. So that's why that's
27:22
important. But it gives me an opportunity to talk to all our different markets
27:29
and say, oh my gosh, you know, we're focused on these areas.
27:32
So at the bank, we are focused on financial literacy and education,
27:37
affordable housing, in economic and workforce development. So corporately, those are kind
27:41
of our big things that we just kind of focus on. Every other market
27:47
can have their own things, and they're great nonprofits like Habitat for Humanity or
27:52
if you have a ballet there, or you know anything, dogs and cats.
27:56
We love it all, we love it all, but probably those are
28:00
the things that we focus on. And I will tell you one thing that
28:03
I truly, truly love is I've been able to meet other community development officers
28:08
at other banks, both large and small. And the cool thing about that
28:14
is, you know we're not actually working against each other. We're working together.
28:18
So if something cool comes up in Fort Worth and says, hey,
28:22
where you're trying to do affordable housing here, you know that bank may may
28:26
only be able to give twenty five thousand to that, and so then you
28:29
take my twenty five thousand, and then Bank of America comes and says,
28:32
hey, we're going to give a million dollars. We can really make some
28:36
good magic happen in techs serving our communities. So that's why this role is
28:42
amazing. Obviously, I get to talk to people, not just in Austin,
28:47
but around you know, around Texas now, and it really I mean
28:52
basically, they really just gave me a bigger runway. And so I am
28:56
so just you know, thankful to them being able just to make my impact
29:00
bigger. And that's it for me. That's all I want. I just
29:04
want to do really good work and I want to be very impactful. So
29:10
I'll ask two things to fall up on that. Because you mentioned a couple
29:12
of things. Affordable housing, I think a lot of people are familiar with
29:15
kind of like the it's a well worn path in terms of what we do
29:18
and how you support that. But the topics of financial literacy and education I
29:23
think is one at least I find difficult and I we've often compared to like
29:27
getting people to eat their broccoli, like people don't always want that education.
29:30
And you know, like even me or my kids, I got to try
29:34
to force feed my kids financial education, saying grow up smart about different products.
29:38
Have you. I'm curious if you've seen things at work in that space,
29:41
because I feel like it's a space where we all know the information that
29:44
needs to get conveyed, but the ways that make it engaging and where the
29:48
community really embraces what you're doing and you can actually drive successful holds. I'm
29:52
curious of what you've seen or what's worked well for you in that space,
29:55
and a similar question around workforce development, I think, but I'd like to
29:57
start with the financial education as well as it's like near and dear to my
30:00
heart that I feel like and I think it's a practically criminal that we don't
30:03
have real financial education part as part of our educational attainment for everybody come out
30:08
of high school. You don't know anything about basic financial products, interest rates,
30:11
market. I think that's criminal, to be honest, because it's such
30:15
a critical life skill and just would love any insights you have on what's been
30:18
effective at helping you drive real results in because I think it's such an important
30:22
thing for us as a country to get better at doing. No. I
30:26
couldn't agree with you more and so there's a lot of things in there.
30:30
But yeah, so with the financial education piece, it's it's such an important
30:36
piece, and like you said, why is this not taught? My CEO
30:41
even told me that he's like, you know what, Ryan, I would
30:42
be willing to put a whole lot of money if we could somehow get this
30:45
in schools and he was just kind of saying it. But I took it
30:49
and I'm like, hey, if my CEOs is saying that's what he wants,
30:53
let's make it happen. So literally I sat there, Yeah, let's
30:56
go do it. And I sat there and I'm like, how am I
31:00
going to make this happen? Again? I leaned on Texas Bankers Association,
31:03
and I said, and I talked to, you know, the CEO,
31:07
Chris Furlough, who I love and he acts as a great just mentor.
31:11
I don't even really make a move without askually talking to him. But I
31:15
talked to Chris and I said, hey, how do we make this happen?
31:18
And He's like, hey, we know enough people where we can.
31:22
And so with Texas Bankers Association, I'm a part of American Bankers Association too,
31:26
and so we have now kind of set a plan in place where we
31:32
are going to work with the state of Texas in terms of getting a couple
31:37
of school districts and using them kind of as you know, kind of a
31:41
program to see, Okay, we want to put financial literacy courses in here.
31:45
Let's kind of see how this takes off. And so I will tell
31:48
you right now with that, a lot of states are paying attention to Texas
31:56
right now, just because we have the tools we have of what we need
32:00
to make that happen. Until we went into a couple of school districts and
32:05
said, hey, this is the course courses that we need you to teach.
32:09
And I will tell you this came from somebody that's very important to me,
32:14
and you know a little genius herself is my wife. We were literally
32:19
sitting at this conference where I was receiving an award, and so she was
32:22
there and they were talking about financial literacy and you know the state of Texas,
32:30
and she used to work for TA Texas Education Agency and she's like,
32:34
of course. She goes in and she's like, right, well, why
32:36
aren't y'all doing this? They already have courses here. You could just put
32:38
those courses together and we can do teach something. And I'm thinking, yeah,
32:44
that's what we were doing already. You're just saying it out loud,
32:49
but really, she literally, I will tell you how that went. That
32:52
conversation went between me and her. She told me I was kind of like
32:54
blown away. And then I called Chris Furlough and I was like, hey,
32:58
Laura, just thought about how we were going to do this, and
33:00
we thought of a plan, and that's how we got the curriculum. And
33:05
then we're gonna put it in you know, these kind of school these school
33:08
districts that we think would it work, and we're just gonna see how it
33:12
works. And you know, I think it's actually is going to work.
33:16
And so a lot of other association presidents around the nation have actually started talking
33:22
to Chris and saying, hey, we like what y'all are doing over here.
33:24
So you know, before you know it, it's gonna you know,
33:27
kind of catch like wildfire. And then again that's where no one, you
33:30
know, these members of Congress can help too, because they actually have big
33:34
microphones and you know they can they're the ones that are appropriating the money.
33:38
And so that's just kind of how it works. So I cannot wait until
33:43
you know, this really gets off the ground and I can go back to
33:45
my CEO and say, hey, you said you would love to do this.
33:50
Boom, we got it, you know, and again you can see
33:53
and you can see how excited I am about it because you know, it's
33:58
important. And another thing you said it is affordable house One reason why affordable
34:01
housing to me is important is because I don't feel that anybody will care about
34:07
financial literacy. If you have nowhere to stay, that's fair, you know
34:10
what I'm saying, Like that that goes, that goes, keeps on going
34:14
down on the list because you're worried about how am I going to take care
34:16
of my family? And the thing is, you know, in America right
34:20
now, housing and four one case, those are some of our biggest ways
34:24
that we you know, we get wealth. And so if communities don't know
34:30
about these things, you know, that's not going to happen. And my
34:34
whole thing in life is I don't want it to be where I'm sitting there,
34:40
you know, reflecting on life and I'm saying, wow, I've done
34:43
this, I've got to do this, I've got to go places around the
34:46
world. Is that really fun? If I don't bring anybody with me sort
34:52
of speak in terms of if my neighbor can't do that, or the neighbor
34:54
down the street can't do that, it's really not you know, it's it's
34:59
really sad in a way. And so that's our job, you know,
35:02
your job, my job to make sure that you know your neighbor, your
35:07
community member has the tools that they can to fly. And so, you
35:14
know, affordable housing is one of those things that it's really hurting our bigger
35:19
cities. You know, I will say that a lot of frontline staff and
35:23
most industries can't live within the city anymore that they're working in, and so
35:30
we have to figure this out. And so one thing that Guarantee was allowed
35:36
me to do is we actually did a million dollar investment into Austin affordable housing.
35:42
And so what that looks like is there is a private group of investors
35:45
in Austin that have purchased multifamily units and they are then renting them out to
35:52
frontline workers. So you're our nurses, our teachers, and they are putting
35:59
it at a rate where they can actually afford. And so with that why
36:04
they're actually can afford this rate, we're putting through the financial literacy classes.
36:07
So not only that money that you're saving, we can actually put that to
36:12
work, and we can then get down payments and we're working with people on
36:15
down payment assists and it kind of just snowballs into the thing to where now
36:21
they can afford a home for their family and then they have financial literacy and
36:25
then they're going to be great people to contribute to our workforce. And then
36:30
you know, then the economic stability happened. So that's where when we talk
36:36
about the areas that Guarantee is trying to make an impact in, that's where
36:40
they all kind of go together. And I hope you can now see kind
36:44
of the bigger picture of what the plan that we're kind of attack or to
36:47
speak. It's I love how it all connects together. I do want to
36:52
double click a little bit more on the last area you talked about, and
36:54
then then Wenna have to write the same up because we're running over I'm sorry,
36:59
which force development and is when there's souch so much interesting things to talk
37:02
about. Is just stuff happens, And it's fine, there's it's a beauty
37:06
of podcasts. There's no like, there's no set time period. You've got
37:09
to be done before the commercial break and the next show. We get to
37:12
go as long as we want. But what are your priorities or what are
37:15
you seeing in terms of workforce development? Because I feel like the nature of
37:17
work is shifting so much. This idea of how do we develop the workforce
37:22
for the future and for what's what's coming down the pipe. It's such an
37:23
important one. What are you guys areas of focus or what are you doing
37:27
on that front? Yes, I was just so. I was just talking
37:30
last night to somebody in there just uh. We were talking about how a
37:34
lot of these jobs with these skills are really kind of going away. Because
37:38
I will tell you, the tech industry has done a really good job of
37:42
marketing themselves saying, hey, come be in tech. I mean, obviously
37:45
that works because of these big paychecks that they are offering, you know,
37:50
college graduates right out the back. So I see why it's working. What's
37:53
happening is that our skilled labor force is kind of going away. And so
37:59
if we take banking for instance, you know, one of the biggest things
38:02
that I want to make sure that it happens is that I see more people
38:07
of color in my industry. And then I would say that's one and then
38:12
one A would be women as well, and not just women in the industry
38:15
in terms of oh Ryan, but are we have like seventy five women working
38:20
at this bank? No, no, no, no, I'm talking about
38:22
women in leadership that gets to that executive level. And so one of the
38:27
things that we're doing in banking is at Texas Southern University in Houston. They
38:32
have opened the first banking program at HBCU in the nation and HBCU historically Black
38:40
College University. And so when I saw that they were doing that, and
38:46
actually TBA Texas Bank Association gave the first hundred thousand dollars of seed money for
38:52
that and now I think they've raised over four million. And well, so
38:55
when I saw that, I came, you know, came to my bank.
38:58
It was like, hey, I know the first place that I want
39:00
to write a check too. And you know, they just gave me those
39:04
role in you know, November December, and they're like, okay, let's
39:07
let's go. And so I explain that to them. And why that's important
39:10
is because not only do I want to write a check to the program,
39:14
but you know, I also want their interns. You know, I want
39:17
I want you know, young men and women come and say hey, look,
39:22
come come intern here. I want to get you used to working in
39:24
a bank environment. And then after that, you know, once they graduate,
39:29
I want them to say, hey, come back here, come work
39:31
for here. You know, some people might want to go to a bigger
39:34
bank or any kind of bank. But at least that is helping, you
39:37
know, the industry as a whole, because I do know that like a
39:42
lot of banks, we're having trouble hiring frontline workers. And again that goes
39:46
back to that affordability and all those kind of problems. However, I do
39:52
think if we start putting money into places, into universities, into programs that
39:58
can help that that's one way of many that can help us with this whole
40:02
workforce problem. And I think every industry probably has something where you couldn't pour
40:09
money into it in terms of helping. And sometimes it's just not money.
40:14
I know that you know, at Texas Southern and probably a lot of other
40:16
banking schools, they would really love the help of some of these seasoned bankers
40:21
coming in here and saying, hey, can you teach class on credit or
40:24
you know, financial analysis. They're going through all that kind of stuff.
40:29
And so again that's kind of my PSA in terms of, hey, you
40:32
don't have to just give your money, but you can give your time as
40:36
well. And so yeah, no, workforce development is just it's huge.
40:42
But again, if you look at that kind of circle graph that I'm saying
40:46
it all kind of relates to each other and all makes sense, and if
40:51
we can do it all together, we can definitely uplift these communities that we
40:55
live in, because you know, I love to say that, you know,
40:59
if you can see, you can be it. And I think a
41:01
lot of these kids coming out of some of these communities they didn't really know
41:07
that banking was an option because, like you said, when we started,
41:09
like people just kind of fall into it. And so I've decided, hey,
41:14
we have to do a better job of marketing ourselves. Yeah we might
41:16
not be as sexy as a tech company, but we can also promote stability.
41:21
You know, as all these layoffs happen in the tech industry, you
41:25
know those aren't happening in the banking industry. And you can still make some
41:30
really good money in the banking industry, and like I like to say,
41:34
you can have a meaning and a purpose and help out your community. So
41:37
I think it's a way and win. And plus you get to work with
41:38
people like Jeff. Come on now, who don't want to do that?
41:45
I can think of a few, but I think it's a good point in
41:46
the role. Ryan. I appreciate all this. I also have I got
41:51
three standard questions I ask everybody at the end of the podcast. If you
41:52
don't mind, I'm gonna throw them at you now and see what you got
41:55
for. Yeah, you're ready, my lightning round. All right, here's
41:59
a one. What's the best piece of career advice you've ever gotten from My
42:02
dad? He would always tell me, Hey, I don't know everything about
42:07
everything. So when you get somebody in front of you that's willing to teach
42:10
you about something, take it their advice. Sit there, pen and pad,
42:15
let's go. All right, take your opportunities to learn. I love
42:19
advice from parents. I think it's some of the best best to we get
42:22
on the show. Second question, what's the best piece of advice you've gotten
42:25
about the banking or lending space in general? Always be a learner, I
42:30
mean, always be a student. Always be a student ready to learn.
42:34
I was actually just sitting at a dinner the other night and I had the
42:37
just pleasure of sitting with four bank CEOs in me, and I told him,
42:45
I said, I am not taking this opportunity and not asking y'all question.
42:49
And you know, one of them, and actually it was Jeff Austin
42:52
out of Austin Bank out of Jacksonville, Texas. He told me he's like,
42:55
you know, always be willing to be a learner, and he is
43:00
so right. I'm ready just to soak it all up, all right,
43:04
lots lots of emphasis on learning. And my last question for you, what's
43:07
one bold prediction for the future. Something we can bring you back and hold
43:10
your feet to the fire. See if you got got your prediction right,
43:14
But something you know, buld prediction of what's coming down the pipe, what's
43:16
coming down in fine Well, what's coming down pike? And banking is it
43:20
is no longer gonna look like banking of yesteryear. Banking is going to look
43:25
very differently. That could be That means the workforce is going to look differently.
43:30
That means the customers are going to look differently. That means our train
43:35
of thought of how we you know, got this far from for one hundred
43:38
and ten years. That means that you have to be progressive enough to say,
43:43
hey, we see this coming and we have to be ready to kind
43:45
of pivot, duck and weave. And like I said, our bank is
43:49
doing a very great job of that. And so I guess that's not really
43:52
a prediction, that's what is going to happen. But I think if you
43:57
kind of stay true to values and make sure you're just really kind of charting
44:02
the course, you'll be just fine. And if you're a constant learner looking
44:07
for opportunities to learn and being willing to take notice when you find them,
44:10
then you're probably going to be good on well served by that in changing environment.
44:15
You got it all right, Ryan. I appreciate your joining us today
44:17
and sharing your perspective. This is a fascinating conversation. Thank you, Thank
44:21
you for making the time. No, thank you, Jeff, this has
44:22
been amazing. Thank you for the opportunity. Upstart partners with banks and credit
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45:40
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