Published September 20, 2019

Building Bellingham Episode 3: Dylan Langei - Umpqua Bank

Written by Leo Cohen

Building Bellingham Episode 3: Dylan Langei - Umpqua Bank header image.

Dylan Langei, a local loan officer, sat down with Leo to talk about how he graduated with an MBA and nowhere to go, how he competed with longstanding veterans in the business, how the lessons of team sports inform his business today, and how we can face our fears through purposeful preparation. His story is especially inspiring for the young business person putting in countless hours and wondering when -or if- it will ever pay off. Now, still in his late twenties, Dylan is manager of the Barkley branch of Umpqua Bank, and he continues to embrace the learning curves of life.

Building Bellingham is hosted by Leo Cohen of the Cohen Group NW. Each month, he sits down with a business leader in our community, to learn how they overcame challenges, and what they’re learning along the way. The conversations get personal, and get real, and get practical for those who aspire to leadership and building into their own community.

A summer of travelling through Europe. One backpack, four t-shirts, and a new train, plane or hostel every two or three days. 22 years old, with a pedigree in Whatcom County banking and both an undergrad and MBA completed, Dylan Langei was ready to come back home to take the Pacific Northwest business world by storm.

"I thought that I wanted to go in the start up community down in Seattle - work at a place with ping pong tables and breakroom kegs, you know, all that fun stuff - 'cause that's what all my friends were doing."

But life doesn’t always go the way that we plan.

Legacy

Like many of us, Dylan grew up in two families. His structured life in Bellingham with mom and stepdad revolved around academics and sports. Once a year, Dylan made the trip out to Chicago to spend time with his dad, and he’d get a different perspective on life decisions and creative pursuits.

"I'd go there, and it would kind of open my eyes- like we would make skateboards...we would rollerblade, we would bike. It was more artistic, more free."

Both loving households provided Dylan with a legacy of entrepreneurial success, and a mindset of grit, resilience and persevering through the tough times.

"My parents were very hard-working, my grandparents were very hardworking. From my grandfather who still delivers patties and coconut water to my grandfather that started WECU, they're both unbelievably hardworking in their own way."

Great Expectations

Dylan graduated high school here in Bellingham, then went to Western, played university soccer, and completed both a bachelor’s degree and an MBA by age 22. He then grabbed a backpack and travelled Europe with a friend for three months before returning to Washington and applying with multiple companies up and down the I-5 corridor.

In his conversation with Leo, Dylan describes the difference between the incubator that college is for many (but not all) of us, versus facing the real world afterwards.

"When you're in college, I think you have a false sense of being an adult. I think that you think because you're on your own and you have your own apartment, and you live by yourself, and you pay your electricity bill that you're an adult… . Once you're out of college, you're kind of on your own. You've got to get your real big boy or big girl job- you've got to support yourself. And you gotta think about your future and your future family...."

Denial

Upon returning from Europe, weeks turned into months. Dylan applied to multiple organizations, interviewed, and ...nothing happened.

"On paper, I had a very high education level, and I was living with my parents... with no job and no job offers."

One of the frustrations anyone in this stage experiences is the passive denial. Studying the company, preparing for the interview, driving sometimes hours to get there - and everything seems to go well. Then getting a call that you’re overqualified or you don’t have enough experience - neither things you can really change. Rarely do interviewers provide a straightforward answer on why one candidate was picked over another, and even promising runners-ups aren’t usually told if they had a chance.

Weeks turned into months, and Dylan found himself working odd jobs - milling logs and painting.

"I was ready to get into something and give my heart to something, and really work my tail off for them, and I couldn't find anything."

At this point, Dylan was even open to applying for the obvious - a position at WECU, the well-known multi-branch local credit union started by his grandfather. He had the connections, and also the education to back it up.

But he wanted to do it on his own - to create his own name.

So he pivoted. Umpqua Bank at the time was a small bank, up-and-coming, and Dylan liked their business model. He didn’t have any connections with their loan department, but noticed on LinkedIn that a loan officer in the branch was celebrating her one-year. A congratulatory DM turned into a conversation, which turned into an interview with the branch manager:

"I wore my dad's suit. My dad is like a hundred pounds heavier than me. I wore his black suit - looked like a sushi waiter… . It was Seahawks Friday. She was wearing jeans and a Seahawks shirt and I'm wearing like this big puffy black suit, and just looked super uncomfortable… . And the rest is history. We talked, hit it off; she thought it was awesome that I wore a stupid suit."

Game of Loans

The business model that attracted Dylan is one that rewards high achievers - but if you don’t produce, you don’t get paid. 100% commission jobs hold plenty of risk, and there’s a certain amount of fear that goes into it, especially when you’re first starting out- it takes time to build relationships and earn referrals.

Dylan dove into the grind. He capitalized on the complacency that more established loan officers might have, and branded himself as the one who would answer the phone when no one else did. Need a preapproval letter at 7pm on Saturday night and your preferred lender isn’t responding? Dylan Langei at Umpqua will.

"I worked seven days a week. I was the first one in the office and the last one, even though I had the least amount of business. There's always something you can work on to get better and be better.”

Relationship building is a snowball effect. It takes time to connect and maintain connections with real estate agents, insurance providers, financial advisors, accountants, and all the others that become referral partners with loan officers. Dylan refers to it as “serial dating” - always meeting new people and trying to make a good impression, then being sure to keep in touch later on. There’s an inherent paradox in referral-based industries: when you network really well, your business increases, and suddenly you’re so swamped with work that you don’t have the capacity to work on your network.

Around the office, this model and work ethic leads to mutual respect among the colleagues at Umpqua Bank. Each loan officer has built their business from scratch - each one has been through the process and put in the time.

When you work every day, and when you’re putting in long hours, it’s important to like the people that you work with - you’ll see them more than your friends! Dylan is a strong proponent of being himself at work; while every sales or service job has its chameleon requirements, we can stay true to the core of who you are.

"You lose a little sense of your identity when you just work, and you just focus on work, and you go home and watch Netflix and go to bed."

So once his business was up and running, Dylan shifted to add back an old pastime and a new challenge - playing soccer for Bellingham United.

"I always want to be on that learning curve, I always want a challenge. I think when I start plateauing on that learning curve, that's when I get complacent, and I get bored, and I slack."

Lessons from the Team

Dylan has played soccer since he was a child, including a year for Western. His experience with soccer has been more thant a yin-yang exercise for his busy life. The team sports mindset works not just on the field, but also in the office.

"You start to understand how to understand people's strengths and weaknesses, and obviously you have different positions on the field....it's important to learn that it's not just a solo sport, and you need other people to win and succeed.”

It also teaches the value of a strong culture - the bond that a team shares means that people are cared for and supported, and that bond doesn’t break even after a game-losing slip of the hand, as in a story Dylan tells about the 90th minute of a final:

"We played our hearts out, we got unlucky; it happens."

That same culture comes into play in a team at work. Culture isn’t always built from the top down; it’s something each person can influence.

"All the team sport philosophies and building that culture: it truly has filtered into what I do day to day, even before I was the manager. I think you don't need to be in a leadership role to build a culture and inspire people…. I think you can still be inspiring, you can still build a culture, without the title, without the manager position."

Facing Denial . . . Again

Four years into his tenure at Umpqua, opportunity knocked. The branch manager was promoted to regional manager, leaving space for promotion. Dylan had considered this possibility, but the idea was something in maybe the 10-year plan; certainly not the 4-year plan! But opportunities like this don’t open easily or often. If he passed on it, it could be another decade before he’d get the chance.

"I was back to that moment after college where I had gotten denied, and denied, and denied. And I did have this thought in my head that "if I don't get this position, I still work here". This is going to be a different level of denial than 'Okay we don't want you to work at our company. Later'."

He decided to go for it. And this time, he won.

Fostering the Culture

Now, still in his late twenties, Dylan is branch manager at the Barkley Umpqua Bank. He’s learning to juggle that role along with still being an active loan officer. His goal is to maintain that strong team culture that his predecessor created.

"We're in our busiest season ever right now; Umpqua's going to have one of it's biggest months in the history of Umpqua Bank for home lending, and we're all kinda freaking out.... You have to just remind people why they're here, what they're doing and why they're doing it. If you don't have that culture to lean back on, I think you can have problems with your employees."

Dylan Recommends

At the end of their chat, Leo asked Dylan for his top book recommendations. Dylan referenced James Patterson’s works, and his favorite podcast - How I Built This (which is also a Cohen Group fave!) - then went on to talk about what he’s learning from Susan Scott’s book Fierce Conversations.

"I have trouble having the tough conversations,... I've now created a system "I think, I feel, I need". Thinking through those before having a tough conversation has really helped me break through...."

Final Thoughts