Director Agricultural Lending Support

About Our Opportunity

The Director Agricultural Lending Support provides direct leadership to effectively establish, and maintain, along with key business segment leaders, a comprehensive body of work, management strategy, that defines priorities and timelines consistent with association goals. The leader is responsible for functions related to the Association's management and documentation of core lending processes, business and system support, quality review and operational process improvement. This role leads team members responsible for management and collaboration with agricultural business segments and support services focused on enabling effective and efficient support, and continuous improvement of credit delivery systems.

At Farm Credit Mid-America, Directors provide leadership to their team of individual contributors, ensuring the effective delivery of services and achievement of organizational goals. This role focuses on coaching, developing, and empowering team members to deliver exceptional experiences while maintaining operational excellence. Directors maintains accountability for team performance, facilitate workflow and processes, and collaborate with other departments to drive strategic initiatives. Directors are pivotal in fostering a high-performing, customer-centric team culture.

How You Will Spend Your Time

• Provides day-to-day oversight and leads team members and self by modeling values, inspiring a shared vision, and encouraging continuous learning and development.
• Defines team operating standards, monitors internal procedures and processes and ensures compliance with regulatory requirements to manage operational risks.
• Develops and implements strategies to achieve organizational goals.
• Monitors market and other relevant changes, adjusting plans to address resource and operational challenges, as appropriate.
• Uses data-driven insights to make informed decisions and effectively address challenges.
• Establishes and maintains trusting, collaborative relationships with internal and external stakeholders.
• Collaborates with cross-functional teams to recommend and implement improved processes and tools that facilitate operational excellence and enhance the customer and team member experience.
• Participates in committees, projects, and strategic initiatives to support the overall customer experience and drive organizational success.
• Provides leadership to the Agricultural Lending Support Team; instills a participative work team environment and develops the team and individuals through coaching, training, as well as ongoing performance feedback.
• Delegates, tracks, monitors, and communicates projects and/or daily tasks including staff scheduling.
• Exercises management authority in performance reviews, pay decisions, recruitment, discipline, and other employment decisions.
• Maintains business and industry knowledge and process development capabilities.
• Provides leadership for both enterprise and departmental process initiatives ensuring coordination and collaboration of the organization’s resources while modeling a continuous improvement framework, including service management, content health and process integration.
• Partners with business leaders to create and lead a quality assurance strategy focused on implementing and maintaining a comprehensive quality assurance framework that remediates operational gaps and mitigates association risk.

Minimum Education & Experience

Bachelor's degree in agriculture, business, accounting, or related field and a minimum of five (5) years of progressively responsible work experience demonstrating transferable skills relevant to the role. Retail and/or credit loan origination process and/or records information management, loan accounting or banking preferred.

Mental & Physical Requirements

While engaged in this position, team members will routinely sit, use hands for tasks, and communicate orally. Standing or walking is frequently required, while occasional demands include reaching with hands and arms, and lifting or moving up to ten pounds. Vision requirements encompass close and distance vision. The work environment typically has a moderate noise level. This role may entail a blend of mental and physical capabilities, requiring strong mental acuity, problem-solving skills, and occasional physical tasks such as standing, lifting, or extended computer usage. Some roles may require physical or mental requirements related to driving, such as a valid driver's license, and the ability to drive a long-distance. Reasonable accommodations will be considered for individuals as requested.