LYKKEN ON
leadership
Great Leadership Breeds Great Leadership By David Lykken
I
AUGUST 2013 n Iowa Mortgage Professional Magazine n
NationalMortgageProfessional.com
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have written before about the changes that have taken place in recent years with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the negative impact those changes have had on the prevalence of wholesale and correspondent lenders in the mortgage banking market. I have pointed out, as the wholesale channel has fallen from a peak of controlling as much as 65 percent of all loans originated, to less than 30 percent, and eventually, dipping below 15 percent, the greatest impact has been felt—not by the big banks—but rather, by the independent mortgage bankers. The health of independent mortgage bankers of all shapes and sizes is directly correlated with the health of competitive secondary markets. Make no mistake; times are tough for the independent mortgage banking industry. On the surface, the outlook is
bleak. If there was ever a time an independent mortgage broker could fall prey to seeing themselves as the victims, it is now. It can be easy to point to the changes that have befallen the industry and bemoan our helplessness. It can be easy to throw up our hands in defeat. It can be easy to give up. We have every reason to do just that. But, as the overused saying goes, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” When backed into a corner, great leaders don’t surrender to circumstances … they fight their way out. If the dismal outlook for the industry has been created from the top down, it is most assuredly going to be reversed from the bottom up. For this article, I don’t want to write about secondary markets, per se. I don’t want to discuss how and why things are worse than they were before. Instead, I would like to take the next few paragraphs to discuss how independent mortgage bankers might adopt the attitudes and behav-
iors necessary to revive a hurting industry. Change starts from within. What needs to be happening on the inside for that change to occur? Let’s explore it. The first reaction we might have to changes in the mortgage banking industry is to adopt the belief that there is only so much money to go around. We may begin to say to ourselves, “If I am to succeed, I must overcome my fellow independent mortgage bankers.” We may begin to think that the business is a zero sum game and that, if we are to survive, there simply needs to be fewer competitors. There are two ways of looking at the world: Through the lens of scarcity and through the lens of abundance. Scarcity is the “zero sum game” mentality. It is the belief that the pie is shrinking and the only way for us to have more is to take a bigger piece of it. We see this mindset, not just in the mortgage banking industry, but also in the world at large. Every day, we are bombarded with news about things that are going wrong with the world. It is a rare thing to hear something good on the news. As the old media saying goes, “If it bleed, it leads.” The stories we are told are those consistent with the idea that the world is getting worse off and there is less for us to live on. We go into panic mode and begin to think that we must grab all we can to survive. That’s the story we’re told, and we so readily buy into it. Abundance is the opposite. When we adopt an abundance mindset, we believe that the pie can become bigger and, therefore, we can all be successful. It is the belief that there is plenty to go around and that one
person becoming successful does not necessitate another failing. When we look at the outside world, despite the fact that everything we hear on the news is entrenched in negativity, the world has indeed improved in many respects. As author Peter Diamandis has pointed out, the last century has brought us a large number of improvements as human beings: The average human lifespan has doubled, the average per-capita income has tripled, and the child mortality rate has decreased by a factor of ten. The costs of food, electricity, transportation, and communication have all declined dramatically in the last century. In many ways the world is better than it ever has been. If we look hard enough, we can see the same thing in the mortgage banking industry. There are things that have improved. The world has gotten better. As Proust has said, “The real voyage consists not in seeing new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” Perhaps we need to start looking at things differently. Perhaps we need to start looking at how the pie can grow, rather than how we can get our piece of it. That’s where true leadership begins. Great leadership breeds great leadership! As independent mortgage professionals who want to see our industry thrive, we must be willing to help others succeed. We must be willing to share best practices and teach one another how to grow our businesses. The true leader doesn’t seek to create followers; the true leader seeks to create more leaders. That’s where renewal begins. Think of an outstanding athlete. How does he or she react toward his or her fellow athletes? Does the star