Episode 63 - Personalized Service and Financial Guidance: The Curious Builder with Steve Berg and Eric Britt
Episode #63 | Steve Berg & Eric Britt | Personalized Service and Financial Guidance
In this episode of The Curious Builder podcast, hosts Mark Williams sit down with guests Steve Berg and Eric Britt from Minnesota Bank & Trust to dive into the world of banking and building trust with clients. From discussing the importance of strong relationships in private banking to navigating client partnerships for large-scale projects, the episode sheds light on the essential role bankers play as trusted advisors, especially during times of change and growth in the banking industry. So, whether you're a business owner seeking financial guidance or just curious about the inner workings of the banking world, this episode has got you covered!
Listen to the full episode:
About Steve Berg & Eric Britt
Steve Berg is an experienced sales and management banking professional with a proven record of accomplishment within all aspects of the financial services sector for the past 27 years. A dedicated and goal-driven individual who is able to deliver products and services specifically tailored to high net-worth individuals, exceeding expectations, earning trust, and leading by example, all while making a significant impact to the bottom line.
Eric Britt has twenty plus years of leadership in commercial banking and nonprofit governance. He is engaged by recruiting & supporting successful teams, business development, and building brand recognition. I have served in leadership positions on several nonprofit boards supporting economic development, social services, education and the arts.
Resources
-
Mark D. Williams
Today in curious builder podcast, we have Steve Berg and Eric Britt with Minnesota Bank and Trust. And we had a great conversation about all the things that banking can do for a construction company, but just businesses at large. And one of the things that was really interesting to talk about is just how your banking partners need to be a part of your inner team. And that includes your lawyer, your insurance agent, your CPA, may be a building coach, and potentially even as Eric points out a secession planner. So I hope you enjoy this episode. And without further ado, let's talk to Steve and Eric. Welcome to the curious builder Podcast. I'm Mark Lindros. Today I'm joined with Steve Burke and Eric Britt from Minnesota Bank and Trust. Thanks for coming on, guys. Thank you. Thank you. So I've known Steve for a number of years now I've been with Minnesota Bank and Trust in the banker was before Signature Bank for well, my entire career. 20 years correct. And actually, my dad helped start Signature Bank way back in the day when Ken Brooks had first around it. So we've been there for quite a while, we've got a great relationship. And Eric, that's actually the first time I've ever met you. So nice to meet you. My pleasure. I wanted to bring you guys on for a number of different reasons. We have recently had on some lawyers, and we've had a CPA on previously. And I kind of want to talk about, you know, to our business owners out there, kind of like your leadership team, we hear a lot in the corporate world, or, you know, have your leadership team and like what does that mean, I think every business owner needs to sort of have their, let's say, five, sort of outside counsel. And I would say your banker is probably number one, it's probably one of the first people you ever meet when you decide to do a spec home or start a business, you know, a lawyer, your insurance insurance agent and your CPA and potentially a coach. And so as you're kind of one of the five, you know, most important pegs in any business, I really wanted to compare and contrast the construction world with other businesses that you guys manage. So with that kind of in mind, why don't you guys give us a brief intro to your yourselves individually. And then maybe a little bit of an overview of Minnesota Bank and Trust and then we'll we'll kind of talk about the banking world. Great.
Speaker 1 2:02
I'll start here. So first off, thank you, Mark, for inviting us over here to do this podcast. As mentioned at the beginning, we've known each other for quite some time and get involved with not only your business, but obviously with some of the clients that are building with you. So it's a great win win opportunity for us. We are super appreciative of the relationship and look forward to continue that because at the other day, it's a mutual play. Once you get that trust level booked up, as we know, that's the number one piece. I've been in banking for 28 years, so kind of been around the block when it comes to seeing and experiencing everything. And when I first cut my teeth, that ecologist started at TCF Bank, got to learn the ropes, but realize that it's all about relationship when I was there, I'd never had that connection with clients, it was always moving on to the next bank to get up in the scale. So I made a pivot about six years into my career, looking for Community Bank. And for those reasons, I've spent my entire rest of that career up to this point in that relationship slash Community Bank world or regional bank world. In really, at the end of the day, we're going to hear I'll probably say it, Eric will probably say it, it's relationship building, I want to know my clients, I'm in the private banking space. And really what I bring to the table that's completely different that we feel to everybody else is just a full on relationship. I know about people's families, people's kids. And at the end of the day, that should be what it's about, I want to know more than just doing a transaction for a client, I want to be there to help you plan out what your next step is. And with that I partner with Eric and Eric's team on a commercial side, when it comes to just anything within the banking sphere, even if it's not in the bank, hopefully, I've built enough connections where if you come to me, as you know, I'm being your trusted advisor. There's somebody that I know that I can constantly refer you over to but we want to be there to partner with a client on either side of that equation from either the private banking side, as mentioned to the commercial side. So appreciate the opportunity to be here. I'll turn it over here.
Speaker 2 3:55
Sure, so the trusted advisor concept, I mean, that's kind of the holy grail of what we're trying to do. I've been a banker, longer than Steve, pushing 40 years, and I've actually got clients who I've banked three generations. And that's truly, you know, that's what you want to do, where they where they come to you where you're not just a peddler of product, that you truly are a trusted adviser. I would, I would also suggest that in that group, that every private business at some point is going to sell right, either family or outside. And so they should have somebody on the team on the wealth management side succession planning. I think you should always be anticipating that thinking about that. I
Mark D. Williams<br> 4:42
wish we had met 43. So I wish we met when I was when I was three years old Eric because nobody tells you. You're a 23 year old kid when I was when I started my company about you know you're just starting a business and that's the last thing you're thinking about is 50 years or 40 years. To after hit career when you first start and one of my biggest regrets, I've talked about it many times in the podcast, and I feel like a lot of construction industry industries fall into this trap is, you know, we named it after ourselves genius move, you know, you know, and so, you know, anyway, it's a little late now for the rebrand and we
Speaker 2 5:16
say you could have Mark Williams and sons. True.
Mark D. Williams<br> 5:20
And I do have some son. So we'll see if we want to take it over. And it is interesting. I think a lot of our my contemporaries, you know, they they, you know, we've talked about that, and I think maybe a year or two ago, my common line to that was like, I sure hope that our show any interest, because I don't want to keep working that long. However, now that they're getting a little older, and I'm like, well, I could see it, that would be really fun. So I get to that point. Yes, exactly. I used
Speaker 2 5:45
to have a contractor customer who was ABC or Joe Blow and sons, and I asked him about his son's there weren't any, he just thought that made it sound like it was gonna last for longer. Great marketing.
Mark D. Williams<br> 5:57
Yeah, I mean, you can market what you can sell, and you can sell what you can market. So I like that. Well, maybe before we go into a little bit more of banking, what is it about me and I'm just curious on the personality side of you, 40 years of banking is no joke. You can't do that without having a passion or an absolute whip behind you. So which one was it? Eric? What are you passionate about when it comes to like banking? Like what what excites you about it? Oh, I
Speaker 2 6:20
just like serving customers. I like relationship building. Being a trusted advisor, solving problems. Taking care of customers, it's it's a service business. I always viewed it as a you know, a profession. Although I realized that if you're a doctor, a lawyer, a CPA, you actually have to pass a test. But banking, banking, you don't you just have to have a smile and a shoeshine and you can call yourself a banker. I have, you have to have some aptitude for numbers. You know, bankers, like updating their personal financial statements once a week. And we have customers in it. You know, we begged them to do it once a year. So you have to enjoy numbers enjoy aptitude. But you lakes have to like serving customers. Yeah,
Mark D. Williams<br> 7:03
I mean, I think that's so how about for you,
Speaker 1 7:05
I'd say the same thing. And we really, as you heard me say, at the beginning, I realized that the connection with the person and to grow with them was what drove me is that I wasn't there just to solve a one time problem. And then they're gonna move on that one step that we help them with usually catapults into two or three others. And then as Eric mentioned, with generations of family, you start getting involved with kids, you start helping them plan for next steps going through college, or whatever it is, that's the passion play, you got to be in it for really helping those individuals, those families continue on through life. It's not just transactions should be
Mark D. Williams<br> 7:35
what percentage of your banking relationship. So we'll say businesses, how often are, as a general rule a meeting with you, and I'll just use myself in his example, because I'm talking about that you should do this. And I am a hypocrite, because I don't I basically reach out to you when I have a question, which is, I do have a lot of questions. So by that alone, I tend to I tend to reach out to you, you know, probably every other month or if I'm scheming up, then we'll go back and forth. But do you have any people that keep like, Hey, we're gonna meet every quarter? These are the things that we have coming up where you can actually be an advisor, because I assume you have, you know, I don't know how many clients have hundreds of clients. And so you can't actively know every single thing that we're doing, unless we're sort of inviting you in and telling you about it. How do you managed that relationship and imagine personality comes into it, some people only reach out to you when they have a need. And others, I think it'd be a huge benefit, and some just strategic sit downs. Walk me through a little bit about what you think would be good advice for business owners that are listening. But yeah, even for myself, I mean, this is something that I'd like to employ. Yep,
Speaker 1 8:38
I'll start real quick. And Eric can talk on the commercial side. So we're a private side, it's really understanding the cadence or the needs and desires of that individual. And what I mean by that is, it's what what do they feel most comfortable with. And sometimes we need to push where we're going to say, hey, at least at a minimum, for this first year, we're going to meet twice because I know you have these three things coming up, but we want to stay in front of it. We never want to react, we always want to be proactive, because usually when you're reacting to something, time is of the essence and everybody gets flustered and you know life goes on but you don't want to be behind the ball. So if we're proactively meeting with those clients, and at a minimum it should be a touch point of at least face to face once to once a year at a bare minimum. I have the I'd say connection with most of my clients that we connect by texts we connect by phone cell phone, it there's no more bankers, rules, bankers, hours. I wish Martini I was started at two everyday it doesn't it that's okay. Because I feel like I'm more connected with my clients that if something arises at 830, at night, they have something they feel is fraud, I want to know and I want to help them we want to get in front of that. Long story short, it really depends on the client. But that minimum piece should be every year at a minimum. We're trying to get at least quarterly touch points based on however the client wants that could be that text, it could be a call could be a Zoom meeting. It could be face to face, whatever that preferences. That's where we come from.
Speaker 2 9:58
So On the commercial side, it really depends on the size of the business. So if you're dealing with the owner entrepreneur, that's one thing, and then you get a little bit larger company, they might have a controller. So now you get to people that you want to get in front of. And if you got larger companies, they might have a CFO or controller, right. And so you have, you might have a different cadence for the different clients, I'd say on the commercial side, it's probably at least quarterly. Because we have fewer clients, they might be a little bit larger. And on some of them, it's monthly, because they're you're getting monthly financials, you want to touch base with them. But it's generally partly left up to the client. And then I guess if they're up to their eyeballs in debt with the bank, then the bank is probably going to want to talk to them more often.
Mark D. Williams<br> 10:45
How, from a an analysis, one thing I've really appreciate about Stephen are, you know, working together over the last couple of years is, you know, all the question, I really appreciate your emails, there's a sink two bullet points, which is how I like to read emails. And but it really helps, I can see like your logic crane going through it, and you have a very, I think, a very good I don't know if it's unique in the banking world, but it's unique to me, you have a really nice way of breaking down numbers in a way that you can sort of understand in a business sense. I'm curious, how often do you have to explain this to business owners or most business owners are obviously going to have some sort of financial literacy that they're going to kind of get it. But I guess walk me through a little bit of like, how do your clients respond to you when you do that? How often are they like, oh, man, thank you versus them not having any idea what you're even? Yes into them? And then need more of a, you know, in person sort of walkthrough on it? It's
Speaker 1 11:38
a great question, because over the years, I've tried to perfect what what does a client really want or need? I think that's the biggest play together react to each client. What are they doing right now? Are they just kind of just leveling things right now? Like, hey, I kind of want to see if this would work in the future. If they're at a point. And let's just say it's purchasing a property. And they want to know, what is their cash flow look like? Or how is this going to impact my daily, you want to get into the weeds a little bit to make sure that you're, you're guiding them, you're helping them you're answering directly their questions, but you can't bore him with a whole bunch of verbiage, you got to keep it simple. You got to keep it succinct. Got to keep bullet points. That's my play. But it's one of those pieces where people appreciate that they want to be able to see it is we talked about the trusted adviser, on my opinion is somebody should be coming to me looking for a solution. How do we get there. And my job is to give them a high level overview. It's kind of like in my my family house with my wife, she's in it. She wants to know what's going on. But if I start going on to the details, she's gonna be like, what are we doing tomorrow, she comes to me, she says, give me the three level bullet points of what that conversation was about, or what we want to do if it's financial planning, buying a property, and she just wants to be informed, but not to the point where it's overbearing, or it's too much, because that's where you get the deer in the headlights look. And you really don't want that. So I've always found it, keep it clean, keep it simple. If you need to go deeper, that's fine. But don't try to do a whole book in an email, get to your point, answer it and go forward. So it's
Speaker 2 13:01
commercials, I would just Marshalls the same. But I think if you're dealing directly with the owner, entrepreneur, that's where a private banker, like Steve can really add value, right? So if I'm talking to a CFO, they're already they're probably more you have more financial acumen than I do, right. So in some cases, you can be almost an order taker, with when you're dealing directly with the owner entrepreneur, who doesn't have the benefit of a controller or CPA, they really are relying more on the banker to give them good advice that is actually
Mark D. Williams<br> 13:30
really helped. I was going to ask you what the difference between construction lending and Residential Lending is, but I think you just answered it, Eric, is that I mean, obviously, we're a small company, right? We're a team of three or four. And even at our biggest, you know, let's say we're five or six, you know, well, we have, you know, someone who's very good with numbers in the office manager role slash controller role. I mean, they are not a CPA, or CFO. And so I imagine, one of the things that we've tried to do is align ourselves with different companies that help us with our books, or people that help I'm really more interested in now in my career after, you know, 20 years of the strategic side of things, which I don't know why I never thought of that years ago, because I would have been very helpful, but I'm thankful for people like Steve that can really sort of break it down. Because, you know, I'm good at building homes, I want to be good at selling. And so you know, no one person could be good at everything. And just like you need your CPA or insurance agent, I mean, sort of need a team around you. Correct? Yeah. In terms of like lines of credit, short term loans. For those out there that don't own a business, can you just go high level a little bit? I mean, I'll just use my kind of lead with this, you know, for 20 years, I never had a line of credit. I mean, I essentially ran a cash business. I was very uncomfortable with that. I feel like personally, and I've spoken about this on the podcast that I probably hindered my own financial returns by being so debt averse. That being said, I don't have a lot of debt. So it allows you to have a little bit more flexibility, but you look around and you see people doing a lot of spec homes or land development, and you kind of it's not that you're envious. You're just more like oh man now I get it. I see that opportunity there. And Steven, I've just talked recently about kind of my desire to gamma get back, even though interest rates are relatively higher than they were, you know, several years ago, historically, they're not crazy. And so the idea is, okay, what does this look like? Walk me through the businesses that maybe will to stay on construction for now. But we can talk globally about all businesses walk us through, like, how does a business know? What kind of line of credit that they want? How big does it get in terms of percentage? And how as a bank, do you judge who's safe and who's not safe? I always kind of been mystified by that, like, early on in my career, I didn't have a family didn't have much. It was like, I remember other people, it used to bother me so much, you know, I'd have a home that was actually sold. And the bank used to actually require me to get a co signature, I'm like, the house is already sold, like, how many signatures do we need on this? And I get it. Now, in hindsight, I was 23 years old, you know? And I'm like, okay, yeah, you can see now why the probably wanted some additional collateral. Anyway, big question. But how would you unpack that a little bit? For the audience?
Speaker 1 16:02
Yeah, I'll start real quick. And I think this is the bit more towards Eric side. But you heard me say at the beginning, I've always taken a proactive approach with my clients. So they may come to me and say, hey, you know, everything's going great at work and whatnot, but you never know what could come up, or there might be an opportunity that it may be, I'll step back a little bit here. A lot of my private banking clients have been very successful, and they have a wealth management account, they have investment accounts, they have some rainy day or emergency fund money, this liquid, but that money should be proactively working for them. If there's an opportunity, and doesn't matter what that opportunity is buying something investing in something. The the worst thing in my opinion to do is just go out there and liquidate a stock position, for example, because they've been very good savers, they have no debt, liquidate it cause a tax obligation just to buy something that could be beneficial in the long run, because you can strategize then with that trusted advisor in the wealth advisory space to say, okay, maybe we shouldn't just liquid everything, there's a strategic way to liquidate this to be tax advantage or tax harvest properly through this process. So my point is be proactive and get some type of line of credit set up in the private space, you know, maybe that's $100,000, maybe it's 50,000, we kind of analyze what that is based on someone's financial position. And it doesn't have to be secured possibly, it's unsecure, whatever the easiest possibility is, we try to be proactive to get it there. So that way, we are not reactive, like you've heard me say before, so a little different on the private side. But Eric, if you want to step into the commercial side,
Speaker 2 17:30
sure, you know, startup businesses or new businesses that's challenging. On the commercial side, you're looking for historical financial performance. And if you're just starting up, you don't have that, right. You haven't sold your first house. But there are programs with the Small Business Administration, SBA, that encourages and sense the banks to take a little more risk to create jobs. Credit card is an easy way to, for a new business to start out, get a credit card, gives you some working capital, because you can charge things, pay certain bills, and then you'll have to pay for the bill for 30 days. So you've presto, got working capital. And for small loans, generally, we're underwriting it based on the personal credit score of the owner anyway, right. So it's a pretty quick turnaround, we're not doing a lot of analysis. Once you get a little bit bigger, then we're looking at the assets of the company, the cash flow, the the earnings, and what hard collateral there is to support a line of credit
Mark D. Williams<br> 18:28
when you're doing the loans. And it's been a while since I've done a spec home, I think it's been 13 years. In I remember, maybe at the time, walk us through a little bit, you know, you always hear builders talk about oh, my banker made me do a personal guarantee, at what point does a loan or a company get big enough that they either don't need a personal guarantee? Or walk us through? Like, how does a bank and not just your bank, but most banks, like how do they look at that because a lot of people get, you know, concerned about like, Man, I mean, the reason I'm taking this, I mean, I'm already a business. So if you're in business, you're already at risk, because you're a business owner, you signed up for this, I guess, if you didn't Well, welcome to The Club. And so anyway, as you go through that you're like, Okay, well, not only is my business essentially going to be liable, but now the bank has also saying that if your business didn't really come through, then you personally are. And, you know, obviously, as you have, let's say multiple LLCs are different landholdings. I mean, you do this for a variety of reasons. One is to kind of, you know, you know, strategically have different businesses, but also I've heard of people, like if you're a builder in particular, you know, I want my land business to be in an LLC, so that if something happened to my home business, my land business is not in jeopardy, or vice versa, you know, and so I guess, a little bit of Church and State dividing some of your risk. Walk us through that from the bank's point of view when you're talking about personal guarantees, and kind of the nuance of that. Sure. I
Speaker 2 19:49
mean, the bank kind of looks at it. The opposite from you. They figure well, if you're the owner, you're driving it, you're making the decisions. You can Roll it, it's, it's almost more of a psychological thing than anything else. If there's a hiccup in one part of your business, they want to make sure that you're still at the table and you're going to do whatever you can to complete the house, we don't want to come and finish and construct a house, right? So it's pretty common for personal guarantees, you have to get to be a certain size, where you're throwing off enough cash flow that you could really tap the capital markets. And then you can argue, well, we don't really need a personal guarantee anymore. Like, what number? What
Mark D. Williams<br> 20:32
liquid threshold would you even be talking about?
Speaker 2 20:34
It depends on it depends on the industry. And I guess on the construction side, I can think of contractors we've got who are, you know, a revenues north of 100 million, and they're, you know, rock solid balance sheets and plenty of collateral, and many years of of earnings. So they can probably, competitively argue that they don't need a personal guarantee that the business stands by itself, but, but a banker would likely most likely ask for one they're always going to ask, they're always right. That's the negotiation thing of saying, yeah, what would be so just for those listening? You know, I
Mark D. Williams<br> 21:15
mean, maybe there is some, you know, builders out there that are over 100 million, but I would imagine a lot of them are, let's say, you know, let's 4 million, 8 million, right? 15 million, 20 million, 30 million, let's just say anything under 30 million, you're going to ask for a personal guarantee, you're gonna require it, not even ask for it, because I think it's based on your smiles. We're asking you for it regardless. At what point would it sort of be like, No, we need one or we're not loaning it?
Speaker 1 21:42
I would say definitely, you know, when when you're developing a relationship, that's obviously the play where there's not a background or experience plays. So we're definitely going to be asking for that personal guarantee at the beginning, to really make sure that there's that connection point that if we don't know who you are, or we haven't worked with you enough as XYZ company construction company, we didn't know how you operate, we know how to how when we ask you for something, because we're trying to help you and you don't respond to us for three weeks to because we need that updated documentation for financial play, or just review, that also that's going to be concerning to us that what our brains are always what's going to happen next, what's the next problem that's going to come out of this versus trying to work with that client? If they're responsive, then maybe you've done five houses, six houses, 10 houses, and everything's worked to date, the bounces? are growing businesses growing, you come to say, hey, can we move on to the next step with our relationship? Of course, let's take a look. And entertainment. And
Mark D. Williams<br> 22:35
I liked that answer, because you're really talking about reverse relationship just watches what the whole thing is based on I mean, I want to build a home, I want to have, you know, our biggest differentiator in building a home is the same thing, like a lot of people can build your high quality home. But you know, what's the experience going to be like, you know, during this process, as well. So I certainly appreciate that I can understand too, that after decades of working together, or whatever the relationship is, you know, I also appreciate a bank sort of, in some ways, being a safety net, like I tend to be an extreme optimist. And so in some ways, the people on your team need to sort of help you have some reality checks, too. So I would appreciate a bank, or in Steve's case of not just saying yes to everything, but also as a trusted partner. I think that's the whole point. If you surround yourself with five, you know, yes, men and women, how does that really help you if you decide to do something really dumb? And so I mean, with with that kind of in mind, you know, how? I mean, do you guys have any stories of basically people who have asked you for advice, and you've maybe encouraged them to do something they didn't want to do? And it worked out? Well, or anybody that came forward and said, Hey, I want to do this. And you're like, No, I think in these are the reasons why you should have redirected them.
Speaker 2 23:42
I can think of one back in like, early in my career, where client had a home equity line of credit. And this was, you couldn't tap it, you had to call the banker to access that maybe we didn't have ATM cards or something. But the guy was in Vegas, and he was on a losing streak. And he gets a hold of me, and he wants me to send him the money. And I just, I wouldn't do it. And I don't think that was even legal. Note, I said call me in the morning. Call me in the morning. I would not do it.
Mark D. Williams<br> 24:14
That's nice. That's actually pretty good. I mean, that was actually even an figure child could even pick that one out like good call, Eric. Yeah, you know, we're not freeing this up right now, you're probably not in the best state of mind. Right? Yep.
Speaker 1 24:24
It really comes down to the couple stories I've had, and maybe I'll just hit on. One is, you just have people that are too reactionary. You kind of know that read at the beginning, where people are just like, it's like a shiny little object. I want to get that. And it's the people that are making those quick rash decisions where they're not thinking it through. You know, you just got to try to talk them delegate and say, Hey, here's what I would tell you to do. You make the ultimate decision, but I don't think this is the best course of action for you to take at this point. And it's their choice, but if I'm a trusted adviser, I shouldn't be telling him like you said, I should be told no, I don't think it's in your best interest for Are these reasons? And that's the biggest play for me?
Mark D. Williams<br> 25:02
How often? How often do does a good banker reach out to their client and say, Hey, I, you know, I've observed your cash flow. And, you know, I have, you know, I have some questions or, you know, you're using analytics in some way to reach out to them either with an opportunity, either, and I don't know how often I don't even know what's allowed and baking, like, if you had one client to, you know, provide, let's, I'm just a builder. So let's say you had a, you know, a window client, I mean, how often does the baker played matchmaker have certain line up relationships, maybe more in the commercial world? I don't know. But how often are you guys looking and kind of reviewing kind of your assets and holding and saying, oh, no, I need to reach out to mark because I'm either seeing something as sort of a metric as a red flag, or be, you know, hey, wow, you know, they're getting to have maybe too much money at the bank, you know, maybe they need to invest it and look at some opportunities, almost the role, I mean, the the an active role as an advisor, granted that hopefully, that's coming up in your quarterly conversations, I would assume. But I mean, how often does something like that even occur? From
Speaker 1 26:03
a private banking standpoint, that's where those annual semi annual meetings really come into play, like you mentioned, Mark, for really the next step, it's making sure that I have those outlets there. I don't know if I'm proactively looking to do matchmaker all the time. But ultimately, at the end of the day, if there's a need, and there's a connection point, I should be making an introduction, because I hear you say, Hey, we're going to buy a new property, and we're looking for existing, I've got two or three private mortgage bankers that have been connected, I've been connected with for 20 years that as soon as I hear that, I'll be, you know, the next part of the conversation is, hey, I
Mark D. Williams<br> 26:38
should introduce you here in you know, and this major kudos to you personally, Steve, but I mean, I've done this for, as I mentioned, 20 years. And, you know, you have led to two direct builds, right, built homes, and I'm just gonna put a lot of pressure on the bankers out there, or the builders right now are going to call their Baker and be like, Hey, Mark, has gotten to build jobs from his banker, or what have you done for me, but, you know, that was pretty special. I mean, you had to, I think it was a mutual I think it helped both parties. I think one one client of yours had a kind of a bad run with two other builders, and they kind of came to me. And, you know, if this person is listening, I really do think he's amazing. And you cannot use that. I mean, he's a bear know that he's a bear. And like, if you go into a cage with a bear, and don't know, it's a bear, like, you're gonna get mauled. And there's that lion that, you know, like, the guilty flee would no man pursue with, it's in Proverbs, but like, you know, if you're honest about what you're doing, you have really nothing to fear. And I was like, Bring it on. And he ended up being one of my favorite clients, he was so respectful. So matter of fact, to the point, and, but I remember looking around being like, man, if this goes sideways, like I'm gonna get my stomach down. But I mean, as long as the he appreciated, brutal honesty, and anyway, I think very fondly of him because it went so well. And, anyway, now, I want to call the guy and take him out for lunch again. But actually, we have a standing date, once a year, around Fourth of July, I go on his boat, and we just reminisce and you would know who this is. And it's just a Huda character of a guy. And so I think I told him that one time, and I said, I was able to kind of joke with them. I think I even told them, I said, No, I used to send them like little gifts of the bear like mauling somebody. And I was like, I mean, I know who you are. And he's like, I appreciate that. He's like, we're gonna have a great relationship. And he was always super gracious and great. So I mean, don't be afraid of someone that maybe don't fear the bear don't feel the bear. Just make sure they have lots of salmon. And, you know, I mean, the bears do eat a lot of berries and just don't go around them in their hungers are. So anyway, I love it, I kind of derailed the oh, just that your bakery can obviously be a source of income, I mean, the BC a wave playing matchmaker to lead us Yeah,
Speaker 1 28:47
and really just finding those connections, if we're doing our trusted advisor role properly, we should have those connections where I'm listening to our conversation. And if I hear something that can be beneficial, it's either at that point or planting that seed for next time that we talk, you know, to make sure that you've been going down your pathway properly, to make sure you're on track yourself
Mark D. Williams<br> 29:05
question for you, Eric. So I'll just use the maybe an example that I'm thinking of, so I would like to, let's say, buy a building or build a building and and I know three or four other businesses that would like to do it together. But let's just say I don't and I would come to you and I say Eric, you know what, I want to build like a five unit office building, you know, it's way beyond my punching way to do it alone. But I think this is a valid business move and yada yada yada. I need some other I either need some funding whether it's you know, private capital or something within your bank or you know, any other any of your other clients that are also looking to do something similar. How often does that come up in commercial because it feels like you know, like movies that's like, you know, MGM or Lionsgate like these movie companies do like deals together. And you essentially be a broker. How often does a does a company come to you and ask for other partners to let's say, get it you know, Some sort of deal off the ground.
Speaker 2 30:01
Sure. So there's probably a distinction between what we calls CNI, lending commercial and industrial. So think of manufacturers, wholesalers retailers, and cre commercial real estate, and even more specifically, investment, real estate. So there's a couple we have a couple of investment real estate bankers in our group. And that's what they do they have relationships with developers, sponsors, that world's really changed over the last 20 years or so. But yeah, if you came to me and said, Yeah, I'm looking for some partners, I would just get one of those guys to talk to you, because they have the contacts in the industry. Yeah,
Mark D. Williams<br> 30:39
again, playing no different than someone saying, hey, you know, I need a really great cabinet guy. I mean, it's comment who, you know, back to the relationship piece, like seems like every good business always comes back to relationships at some point, if I was going to do a development, so this is actually kind of a fairly close, ideal that I would like to know the answer to. So I see, you know, a larger development, a smaller one I get, you know, maybe it's a one off two off, you know, a lot split, something like that, you know, I'd work with Steve, let's say we find like a 50 lot development way too big for Mark Williams custom homes. But let's say I have four or five builders that I really trust, and I want to work with asked me high level, how would something like that work? You know, let's just keep it for because it's simple. And we're going to come I assume we walk us through that we come to the bank, each one of us that have our business, Performa, and our you know, balance sheets, and just letting you know who we are. But we want to do a bank loan, because all four of us together are going to be stronger to borrow this money to develop because you see these developments, you know, this development is sponsored by you know, so and so walk me through the mechanics of how something like that would work. Because I have to imagine it's kind of messy, because any partnership can be kind of difficult. In this case, you're talking about for, you know, it's not a partnership within one company, you're talking partnerships with other companies to do a common goal. Does that happen or not really,
Speaker 1 31:59
it doesn't, it doesn't for your account. Let me go high level here for two different pathways. And Eric jump into because this little bit more on the commercial space. But because I do a lot of the residential construction side, I know enough to be dangerous here, it depends on what relationships been built already with their bank, for example, there, there may be maybe they're with Minnesota bank interest, for example. And even though two of the four partners have banked with us or have bank with us, they may be coming to us and we can get introduction, but we may already feel comfortable with the two existing relationships to be like, let's just take a look at all the financials from those two new parties. And really, at the end, they just come up with a common goal or those other parties that don't have a connection with us maybe want to continue using their existing bank to leverage some type of investment tool, even if it's off to the side to be a fallback. So there's kind of two different ways. And I'm going to keep it high level there. Eric, if you have anything else. Sure.
Speaker 2 32:50
So I can tell you that like land development loans, so you're talking about buying it and doing the improvements, right, and then building homes on it like buying, you know, 50 acres tearing down a home? Yeah, the roads, that whole thing, the planning, the whole cementing, it used to be I think that most banks did that. Now very few do it. I think there's more on the community bank side. And then there's just banks that are specialized, where there's hard money lenders, so you're gonna pay more money, but commercial banks have really kind of pulled out of, of the land development type projects, just to be honest,
Mark D. Williams<br> 33:23
when you say hard money. Explain that a little bit. You just saying like, basically, you can borrow this at a set rate? And that's it?
Speaker 2 33:28
Well, they're not bankers there, you know, so their cost of funds are higher. So it's just more expensive. And they're really just looking at the asset. Right? They're going to take a mortgage just like a bank would. But it's going to be pricier, higher fees, higher rate, but they can get it done. I
Mark D. Williams<br> 33:46
see. I mean, is that what is the difference between hard money lending and say, venture capitalists or like a private investor,
Speaker 2 33:53
or they'll be similar? Similar, it's just that they're specialized on real estate projects. Okay, direct or private equity might be any sort of industry, you know, high tech, medical, you name it.
Mark D. Williams<br> 34:02
We had, you know, this was a question that came up, we had Chris Anderson on maybe 1020 episodes ago, and it's really interesting. He does accounting book work for builders all across the country. And he had basically said that a healthy construction company from what he saw, ran a 20% margin 10% overhead 10% profit at the end of the year, according you know, he, let's say has 500 you know, different books that he's looking at and talking to other businesses. And I thought that was really helpful for him to sort of talk high level comparing, you know, every mark is going to be maybe slightly different, but that's a healthy business, as your business owners or sorry, as bankers on your side working with business owners, what do you see a healthy company like kind of rates of return and investments and let's let's keep this, you know, obviously not the 100 million example because, you know, I love it when people say, Oh, we solve our problems, the quantity or you know, but I don't that doesn't really relate to me, you know, you build a handful of homes but let's just say you know, you're a company of Let's say 40 million or 30 million or less, walk us through like other, you know, spaces, whether it's retail, obviously construction, what are some observations that you've seen in terms of like, what is a healthy profit margin? Sure. And I'll hedge this with this. I feel that building in particular, I think, I think for whatever reason, we under charge for the amount of risk that we take, and I remember a CPA years ago, told me, he goes of all my clients, he said, builders take more risk with less return than any other business I've ever looked at. So with that kind of lead in, what's your assessment of that,
Speaker 2 35:36
you know, I can start with this. So every industry is, is different. So bankers, we do have access to industry information with a roll up, you know, so if it's transportation, or if it's food, or I can think of one company that's in the functional beverage space, I didn't know there was such a space. What is a functional? Well, it's like, you know, flavor shots, or something you can see. And the margins on that are just crazy. Oh, here's another one. Like, what are they? I'll think of another one, craft craft beer. So you go buy a craft beer used to be five bucks, now it's six, seven bucks, the cost to make that is very little, it's just water and you know, little barley. So it might be a 90%, you know, gross profit margin. But then you've got the capital costs with all the equipment, so forth. So it, we look at it, we'll we'll compare your business to others in the industry. And when we're having those preliminary conversations, we might say, Okay, your gross profit margin is higher or lower than these similar type companies in the same industry, we'll just start poking at that or asking questions. And your overheads is too high, or it's too low or whatever. So we'll try to add some value that way. Are you
Mark D. Williams<br> 36:59
looking at like historical country wide data, city data? Or not city data, but state data? Are you looking at only within your own company data? In order to find out some of these numbers?
Speaker 2 37:08
Now? There's usually there's it's nationwide sort of publications that are provided that are industry specific. Okay, that answered my question as far as the return, you know, honestly, that's probably the difference between a commercial banker and an investment banker, we just want to get repaid, right? We want to get our principal back a little bit of interest, we want, you know, we want you to succeed. But I've never felt like maybe it's different in the private banking space, that I'm not going to tell you whether or not it's a good investment. Right? I just because that's really more on an investment banking perspective. And maybe, you know, your accountant, whatever, if you do something crazy, I might, you know, wave my hand like if you're gonna if you're in Vegas, and yes, yeah, no, buy companies No, just hard. No, I'll
Mark D. Williams<br> 37:54
be in the morning,
Speaker 2 37:55
like, but in general, I mean, so you, I guess, your client, they would have to understand, that's what the commercial bankers paradigm is, they're just trying to get their principal back, they don't want to take a lot of undue risk. That's why they want, they're looking at the profits, they want collateral, they want personal guarantees, because they, they don't want to lose their principal.
Speaker 1 38:17
It also been real quick, too, I think Mark, you've mentioned it, the thin margins, possibly in construction. Since I see the consumer side of it, I'm sitting on their side of the house, kind of just trying to help them go through a cost of everything that we're going to help them along the way, you know, this is their big ticket item in their in their entire lifetime, right? If they're building a two to $3 million property. And those numbers when it comes to profit for builder overhead supervision, when you're dealing with two, three $4 million properties, even though at the end of the day, they're financially sound, they've, they're shrewd, they got there for a reason, they'll look at the number, it's a big number when it's 10% of a build, right? And they'll look at that, and for them, that could be a hindrance, possibly the sell through I think, is what we try to do. And I think what you try to do is that of course there's got to be some type of profit for me in here because I'm going to help you build your dream and that's selling that message to the individual that there's a cost to do everything you know, if you take their whatever their businesses, they have their own profit margin, they're trying to make money you're doing the same but you're also they're partnering with them on this wonderful opportunity for their dream home to be built. And I think once you educate them that what I'm going to bring is your trusted advisor Amina you Mark Williams to the table I would be so much more appreciative if I knew that I have a partner in this building of this house because you don't want to have a problem come up work really I'm just trying to cut margins and do whatever I can to build your house and I'm gonna move on it's back to that hold trust advisor I know I sound like a broken record, but at the same piece in your aspect even though it's a big number. Why is it a big number here's I'm gonna
Mark D. Williams<br> 39:48
do for you in not I mean obviously if you're doing a fixed bid, you know the client necess isn't necessarily in your kitchen cooking trip, but on what can you think of any other business that ends up being so more transparent in how it accumulates at costs than building is like, you know, I was thinking about like, you guys are both struggling right now like, No, we don't already. Like, I mean, I was telling someone the other day and I was trying to explain, you know, there and we won't go into this podcast, the whole difference between cost plus and fixed bid and all the pros and cons, and you could almost do an entire podcast on that rarely, and it'd be helpful. But, you know, in short, it's like, you know, you go to the car dealership, and you know, they do a very good job, of course, you know, listing out their options. But it's not like if they do like the heated seats, like, oh, you know, what, how much does the wires cost in this? And what's the labor? And what's your margin rate? Like, that's just not expected? It just seems kind of crazy to me that the most expensive thing that most people ever buy, want to know, every single cost on it? And yet, why that's sort of normal for us to also share that. And I don't know, like when that became a thing, or if it's always been that way.
Speaker 2 40:50
Yeah, I don't know. You know, the suorin construction state and all the subcontractors, so they know exactly what you know, you're having to pay, and then you build on your profit margin, or 10%, or whatever it is. Right. Right. Yeah, it is very transparent.
Mark D. Williams<br> 41:05
Yeah. But I mean, what other Is there any other industry you can think of? That's like that, that
Speaker 2 41:08
shares all their cost of goods sold? Yeah. Yeah. Not many,
Unknown Speaker 41:11
if any, that I can think of that. Right.
Mark D. Williams<br> 41:13
I mean, that's okay. Well, I'm not sure if that makes me feel good or bad. A couple sort of banking questions, just in general, and this is, you know, why is this kind of like shooting down myths? So why do a lot of people and maybe I'm obviously in business, so I don't feel this way, but I feel like there's a perception, and maybe it's a perception of people that are business owners? Why do people have a bias against banks, like, especially like in the news media, you have a lot of bias. And this is not meant to be a political conversation, it can easily go that way. But like, from the standpoint of like, you know, there's a lot of speculation about Wall Street and like, you know, down with Wall Street, and that's a whole ideology, but in general, it seems like a lot of people just don't trust banks. Like, where does that come from? Like, why? Why would that be? Because as a business owner, like, I need your help, as we've already said, We're telling business owners that are listening this podcast, like bring your bank are in closer than however close they are now bringing them in closer, because chances are you haven't talked to him in the last month would be my guess. And so how do you dispel this rumor that, you know, you hear this thought like, oh, you know, I don't even know where this you know, picture comes from, but like a rich Fat Cat, like, you know, in every company, or every business has stereotypes builders have stereotypes copier salesman, car salesman, why? Where does this banking myth come from? And how often do you run into it?
Speaker 2 42:36
I can, well, they used to, I was at a well, a succession planning conference last year, and the business owners stack ranked all their advisors. And the bankers were at the bottom. And we used to be above the lawyers. And like, somehow now, and I think a lot of it is all the mergers and acquisitions, and there's turnover. And maybe there are some bad actors out there. I mean, the fact that I've had relationships for three generations, I mean, you you have integrity, trust, right. That's what we strive for. That's why we're in the business. There aren't enough good movies about bankers, they're always about evil. You know, we need to boucherie on Wall Street, right? The only good movie about the community banker is gotta be It's A Wonderful Life of the Jimmy Stewart, where he's at the savings and loan, he's at the Building and Loan, you know, and he saves the day. And so
Mark D. Williams<br> 43:30
really, the bank, you guys need to collectively go to Hollywood and start pitching some more positives. Yeah,
Speaker 2 43:34
but who wants that doesn't sell. Wow. Interesting. Yeah,
Speaker 1 43:38
I'll interject something here that that I found in today's day and age, it's hard to move your banking account, maybe that's the best way to say it. And the reason I mentioned that is that a lot of stories and conversations when I'm introduced to somebody, and we get to talking, it's all about trust and rapport. We don't only talk about bank at the beginning, when you get to the point like where are you at now, what tool services, a lot of times we find that these clients have been at Wells Fargo and US Bank and I bring up names just because they're readily known. And they're convenient. They're phenomenal. Their online banking is phenomenal. However, that's what they're good at. They're good for the masses. And when someone started at the save right out of college, that was their first bank account. And they built and they grown and they didn't need a lot when they were younger. When they get to that point where they're more successful in their life and their career. And they realize they need that trusted advisor that we keep going back to, they may pick up a phone call to one of those larger institutions and find out they're just a number they don't have a connection built and usually that's the point where they need something relatively quick. And our hole plays a if you're happy with that and you don't need a lot of services. We're never going to talk bad about another counterpart because they probably have some benefit there. But if you are experiencing issues and you're starting to get successful, you run a successful business. That's that point where you're not getting that added benefit that value to sit down with a banker, trusted advisor doesn't matter of the trust advisors. We spoken to, to really dig in deep because there's other components that can help you grow your business. And that's where we feel we bring in and the community bank regional bank role that Eric and I have played in, during most, if not all of our careers, that's what we bring to the table that we feel is different than just the convenience of having an online banking tool. We have all that too. But we take it one step further, because we bring the value add, when it comes to that relationship.
Speaker 2 45:24
You know, the, during the PPP, the pandemic, when the government said, Hey, here's this new program and banks, can you please stand this up? I mean, if you didn't have a banker, a human being you could call if you were at one of the big banks, you're just calling in, I mean, they were, they were out of luck. So that was kind of our finest, I wouldn't want to go through it again. But it really helped. It really felt good. You know, we were the only ones who could deliver this program, the sky was falling. And, you know, we we helped our customers talk
Mark D. Williams<br> 45:57
a little bit, you know, in the remaining time here, 13 minutes, tell us a little bit about the industry of banking. You know, how do I mean, high level? I mean, if I was to answer my own question here, how do banks make money, you know, you borrow it at one rate, we charge an interest that's higher than what you're borrowing it at. That's our margin you make, you know, on your margin, which, by the way, is probably pretty low. It's very low. And so speaking of low margins, maybe the CPA for the bankers I like. So walk us through like, like, like, just banking in general. You know, recently, you guys, it's pretty hot off the press. Actually,
Speaker 2 46:33
you guys just was merged or later announced a merger with another regional publicly traded bank. And
Mark D. Williams<br> 46:40
now what is the I don't know the answer to this? What is the difference between a merger and being bought out? Samantha?
Speaker 2 46:46
It is semantics, you know, there's somebody it's, it's going to be somebody stock and somebody's brand. In this case, the merger is between two similar size regional publicly traded banks. So it's not a giant bank gobbling up a small one. So it's at some merger, there will be, you know, interplay between the two teams, but at the end of the day, it's the bigger bank, it'll be their brand and their stock.
Mark D. Williams<br> 47:11
Right? And why, what are some of the advantages of a bank? Like when a bank first starts, you know, that a small community bank, most likely, they go to pass clients, like, signature bait, you know, first started? And Signature Bank was around for what? 15 years? Ish? And then they sold out to Minnesota Bank and Trust merged or however you want to say that? What was the, I guess, just walk through your bank? Specifically, what was some of the things at play? Why do that? And then why now? It's been, what, eight years, nine years? And then kind of do it again. So it's kind of sizing up? Is it just becoming a bigger, you know, and has more capital, so could do more funds? I mean, there's got to be some pros here as well, right? 100%, it's
Speaker 1 47:51
kind of visa scale as you continue to grow, and go up channel be able to service a client longer in the duration of their lifecycle, because our legal lending limit continues to go up. So you don't have to start with a small business client, get to a point where you max out with that client can no longer lend them more money.
Mark D. Williams<br> 48:07
What do you mean, what do you mean by that? Exactly?
Speaker 1 48:08
Yeah, based on the size of a bank, there's usually a legal lending limit that says that the bank per one entity or entities has a cap as to how much we can lend to each one of those, it's more internal risk, as well as external review. And I can let Eric go into that a bit more. But really, at the end of the day, we're trying to find more ways to bring stuff to our clients, more benefits, more services, more products. And I think that's as smaller banks realize the world of compliance continue, especially on the retail side, or private side, it's tough to stay on top of all the rules and regulations. And if you go wrong, or go haywire and forget something or do something wrong, or heaven forbid, underwrite something and you miss something, and all of a sudden, you're in review from FDIC or OCC or whatever comes through reviews, you could get fired, and that could take you under.
Mark D. Williams<br> 48:56
So if I no longer take you under potentially it based on the severity
Speaker 1 48:59
or what if you're egregious and going over and doing it over and over again, there's certain things that come in. There's been a lot of factor too with Eric mentioned earlier, our margins are thin. You mentioned it, too, that some banks have just gotten to that point where like it's too razor thin for us to keep going in the shareholders maybe went through the whole pandemic and we didn't know what we're doing. There was razor capital, and now it's time to move eyelets cash in their chips and just try to move on. That's where those community banks start. And it all depends on what the makeup and the goal was. But Erica, let's
Speaker 2 49:26
jump in. You know, there's since Signature Bank was started, I think there's been one de novo new bank started in Minnesota entree bank. That's right. Yeah. In like 20 years. Oh, wow. Because that rare event? Yeah, it's really rare and part of it is I think the minimum capital requirement, the regulator's will require is is like $20 million. So you and your friends have got to come up and get 20 million bucks, and you're just not going to get the kind of return that you probably can make building homes so it's not as lucrative. And that's why you we're seeing more consolidation in the industry because margins are being compressed the cost of technology compliance talent, right, the overheads is getting higher. And so I think you're just going to see more and more consolidation.
Mark D. Williams<br> 50:17
So there's less banks today than there were 10 years ago. Sure. But
Speaker 2 50:21
we still have, you know, if you go to Canada, there are five banks five, and I don't know, I mean, there are probably 500 in the state of Minnesota. So we're still a long ways away from having national banks. So
Mark D. Williams<br> 50:32
that was interesting. The first so I know somebody that it may be, what if you open up another branch? So this particular bank, I think, has opened up like two or three branches in the last four or five years, which is not a new bank. So it's been 20 years since a new bank started? What is the difference between a new bank and starting a new branch,
Speaker 2 50:50
you can always open up a new branch. And in fact, I think the regulator's like it because you're going into new communities and accepting deposits lending out. So it's not a big deal. It's just bricks and mortar. And that's kind of a dirty word in banking. Now, because most people don't go into the bank that much. It's all online, right? You don't need as many tellers. I remember when I started my career, the drive up on you know, on Pay Day, the cars would be around the block. And now it's just everybody's, you know, paycheck is auto deposited. So it's just you don't need as many branches.
Mark D. Williams<br> 51:26
I mean, you guys do have good deli chocolate in the lobby. So the bank and I haven't been in a long time, I used to always go in there and grab an apple, just because I used always be like, Well, someone I want to reward the one person who's putting out apples, instead of eating those chocolates. So Well, that's pretty interesting. What other advice would you give people as they are either starting a business in terms of like, when they approach their, you know, when they approach a bank and saying, you know, hey, this is, this is what I would like to do, because I think in the very beginning, you know, we obviously started somewhere, and my relationship really started on a relationship that, you know, in this case my dad had, right. And so a lot of people get referred to a bank. But, you know, you see people out there, whether it's a change now, we had a change, Ryan, you know, shout out to Ryan Ryan was great. He was, you know, my personal banker for a long time. And, you know, when just like any sales rep, we've talked about this a lot on the podcast, my relationship, really, with housing, or with Minnesota bank, and trust is with you, Steve. Right. And so it's kind of interesting that, you know, as the companies get bigger, in some ways, the relationship between a builder or any company gets smaller with their specific person, like, if you were to leave and go somewhere else, it's like, there's that doors open. Now. That's true of any business because it ferric fro of a relationship is it's very sticky. A con of it is if you are the parent company, and Steve leaves, it's very sticky, there's a good chance that Steve could take me with him. Right, potentially, uh, how do banks sort of manage that? I mean, how does any businessman Yeah,
Speaker 2 52:55
well, it's interesting. So we've been reaching out to our key clients to alert them to the merger news, we prefer that they hear it from us, rather than hearing it, you know, although it's hard information goes out so quickly. And like every customer I talked to, they said, okay, okay, that makes sense. Okay, I can, I've never heard of that bank, but that's fine. What are you going to stick around, right? Because that's important to that thing. Because you know, you know, you know, their business part of it is who wants to retrain a new banker on their business, because every business is unique. But then you've built up trust over the years that you've got them through tough times and delivered for them. One thing that we do try to do is introduce people to different folks at the bank. So on the commercial side, we're primarily lenders, but then we have the whole deposit the treasury management piece, and those are our partners. So hopefully, they know a lender, they know a treasury management person, maybe they know a private banker on the ownership side. So if they know multiple people and one person leaves, they're less likely to just bail.
Speaker 1 54:00
Right? One of the other pieces going back to the economies of scale, as we're growing. If we're doing our job to the bigger the bank doesn't always mean a bad thing if we're Community Bank first. And that's kind of a mentality, which is what our merger position is going to be. We want to be able to be holistic for that client as offers many things. And it does go down the sticky path, of course, but if you can come to one location and get a credit card, we have our own internal credit card program, which most banks are sighs don't. We have wealth management, like Eric said, where you can be at any stage of your business and we should have all those tools underneath one exact one roof versus you just kind of piecemealing one piece of the bank inside here. And then I get to refer you to somebody else outside. So as you get bigger, you have that benefit of being able to expand that relationship with a client in house. And we've already got those tools there ready to go for when that client hits that milestone hits that next stage in their career, their pathway, whatever.
Mark D. Williams<br> 54:56
Well, interesting. I mean, we could talk about a number of other top So as we come up here, at the end, I was like to kind of edit a little bit was just some personal stuff. You know, I'll start with you, Eric. But you know, what are some things that you do to sort of, you know, further your own education, whether it's banking or business or, you know, basically what keeps you going, and you've been doing this for 40 years. And you know, here you are getting, you know, agreeing to a podcast, you poor guy. And I mean, you clearly love what you do, what are some things that kind of feed your feed your engine, both either personally or professionally.
Speaker 2 55:28
So in terms of reading, I mean, honestly, I read, I still read newspapers, although I guess I don't read the actual newsprint now. It's all electronic, I try to read a lot. And you can get a lot of information about the industry and the economy. So I still enjoy it. The industry, to me is fascinating. I mean, every day, yeah, I enjoy the work, I enjoy the variety of it, I enjoy the service aspect of it, we manage all kinds of risks. In my role, I lead a team, so then you've got individuals at different stages of their career, and you're trying to help them develop, I find that very rewarding. And, of course, the relationships I have with the clients over the years. Obviously, yeah,
Speaker 1 56:13
I'd say the same thing. I'm kind of a sponge, when it comes to the technology side, I love how technology has been able to make our lives easier. So I always tried to stay in front of it. And we're never gonna, in the banking world have the most cutting edge technology, we're always slow to adapt. But if you kind of stay near the top, there's ways that we can make it better for our clients. So I always want to be on the forefront of what's going on. That's what kind of drives me current events are needed, just so you can have a normal conversation because you've heard me say at the beginning, I usually when I first meet a client, we're not talking products, we're talking about backgrounds, who we are what we're doing, I'm building that trust level up. And just to be kind of versed in all different topics and know enough to be dangerous, you know, the master of you know, some type of product is good. But if you can't just go outside that space and know a little bit of what's going on, then you kind of just look like you're just there for one purpose only. So I try to be at least up to date on things as well, as you heard me say with the technology play. That's kind of a fuel for me. Sure.
Mark D. Williams<br> 57:08
And for those listening if they want to weather your business or just want to reach out personally, what are some of the best ways to get a hold of you? Would it be through LinkedIn? Would it be just as I probably the easiest,
Unknown Speaker 57:18
I have a LinkedIn Sure. Yep. Yep, same,
Unknown Speaker 57:20
LinkedIn is the best. Alright,
Mark D. Williams<br> 57:22
we'll have that in the show notes. Again, I want to thank you guys for coming on and really appreciate it and thanks for tuning in to the curious builder podcast.
This episode is sponsored by:
