Who Needs Digital Transformation in Syndicated Loans? Relationship Managers.

Technology is Changing Ways of Working

The $5trn syndicated loan market has tended to operate much in the same way it always has over the past 25 years or so. 

Corporate bankers negotiate loans with the CFOs and corporate treasurers of mid-sized and large companies, lawyers go back-and-forth on contracts and operations teams manage the loans through the lifecycle on the banks’ books. 

Not much has really changed over the decades (except maybe the demise of faxes and in-person ‘signing parties’). However technology is now accelerating at a massive pace and there are several ways software is making syndicated loans more efficient and future-ready. But who for?  

Other big and small companies, particularly in the tech sector, have adopted software to increase collaboration between individuals and departments and digitalize the end-to-end management of daily workflows.  LPA’s Contract Navigator has been created specifically for the syndicated loans and trading agreements markets.  

Front Office Bankers Need Digital Transformation in Syndicated Loans

Relationship Directors, Relationship Managers, Senior Bankers, Managing Directors, these are the people responsible for dealing with the bank’s clients face-to-face. 

They regularly talk to and meet with CFOs and corporate treasurers. Typically they manage a portfolio of about 20-30 corporate clients with complex needs, delivering the ‘whole of the bank’ across a range of products and services, not just syndicated loans. 

What are their needs? 

These bankers are ‘people persons’, they don’t want to spend a great deal of time learning new software and tools and won’t use software to do something if it is quicker to do it the ‘old’ way. 

They need to minimize time spent on low value activities that don’t serve their clients or deliver on their portfolio growth objectives.  

They want technology to give them better insights and overview of their portfolio, get deals processed faster and more efficiently and connect the Deal Team so that everyone is in sync and collaborating to deliver value to clients. 

These bankers are ‘people persons’, they don’t want to spend time learning new software

What are their needs? 

Instead of using spreadsheets, databases or other ageing forms of software, modern approaches to software development provide easy oversight of the banker’s portfolio with an easy-to-use interface. 

From a dashboard or Hub view the Relationship Director can see his/her entire portfolio in one place, where the main exposure is, what’s going on in the deal process and all the related correspondence and documentation.

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Other big and small companies, particularly in the tech sector, have adopted software to increase collaboration between individuals and departments and digitalize the end-to-end management of daily workflows and longer projects. 

Digital transformation in syndicated loans for them means taking out the inefficiencies, speeding up processes and improving collaboration between the deal team and other bank departments

Banks are only now starting to bring their own systems and processes into the modern software age. 

Relationship Managers

Summary

Front line bankers are the ‘face of the bank that they work for and their role is fundamentally a ‘people’ role. 

Digital transformation in syndicated loans for them means taking out the inefficiencies, speeding up processes and improving collaboration between the deal team and other bank departments such as Credit, Middle Office and other execution or service teams.   

In another article we shall look at the Middle Office department and what digital transformation in syndicated loans looks like for them.