SVP - Commercial Lending

Position Summary:  

The Senior Vice President (SVP) of Commercial Lending is responsible for the overall strategic direction, leadership, and management of the credit union’s commercial lending portfolio. This individual will lead a team to grow, manage, and sustain a diverse range of commercial lending services, ensuring profitability, regulatory compliance, and alignment with the credit union’s values and long-term goals. The SVP will work closely with senior management, the executive team, and other departments to support the credit union’s business development and growth initiatives.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

Strategic Leadership:  Develop and execute a comprehensive commercial lending strategy aligned with the credit union’s overall goals and objectives, focusing on portfolio growth, operational efficiency, risk management, products and services, and member service.

Team Leadership:  Lead, mentor, and manage the commercial lending management team, promoting a high-performance culture. Ensure the team is well-equipped to meet goals related to business development, loan origination, underwriting, and portfolio management.

Portfolio Growth & Management:  Oversee the expansion of the commercial loan portfolio, including owner-occupied real estate, investment real estate, small business, construction loans, C&I loans, asset-based lending, commercial leasing, and agricultural lending, while maintaining strong risk management controls. Identify and develop new business relationships and lending opportunities.  Monitor and manage criticized loans through detailed engagement with member, loan officer and potentially loan resolution team and or legal counsel as needed.  Provide potential solutions on criticized loans to return them to performing status or ensure as little loss to the credit union as possible.

Member Relationships:  Foster strong relationships with current and prospective members, ensuring the delivery of superior customer service and tailored financial solutions that meet the needs of local businesses.  Participate in community affairs that enhance the vision of the credit union as well as support our members involvement in the community.

Risk Management & Compliance: Ensure that commercial lending operations adhere to all regulatory requirements and internal policies. Work closely with risk and compliance departments to identify potential risks and mitigate them effectively.  Identify opportunities that will promote better risk management and operational controls within commercial lending.

Commercial Credit Analysis:  Analyze large commercial loan requests that are potentially complex in nature.  Identify challenges and/or opportunities to determine quickly, the viability of the request and its potential risk/reward for the credit union.  Helps the lending team when needed on how to structure and present such requests to Executive Loan Committee.  Is a key member of the Executive Loan Committee and actively participates in communicating the potential risks as well as the benefits of loan requests to other members of the committee.

Collaboration:  Collaborate with other departments, including marketing, finance, and branch management, to optimize cross-functional initiatives that drive loan growth, improve the member experience, and ensure operational efficiency.  Participates in initiatives to determine where the credit union should focus it efforts to better serve its commercial members.

Reporting & Analysis:  Monitor key performance metrics for the commercial lending portfolio, prepare reports for executive leadership, and provide insights and recommendations based on data analysis. 

Innovation:  Lead efforts to identify new technologies and solutions to streamline lending operations for both real estate and non-real estate loans and improve the member experience through industry leading products and services.  Monitor and evaluate current and potential data solutions that will improve the overall commercial lending process.

Community Involvement:  Represent the credit union in the community by engaging with local business organizations, chambers of commerce, current members, and other civic groups to promote the credit union’s services and mission.

Vendor Management: Oversee the strategic relationship with third-party underwriting partners to ensure alignment with organizational objectives, regulatory compliance, and performance benchmarks. Negotiate contracts, monitor service-level agreements (SLAs), and foster collaborative partnerships to optimize efficiency, mitigate risks, and ensure high-quality loan underwriting outcomes. Regularly review vendor performance, drive continuous improvement initiatives, and address escalations or discrepancies effecti