Diana (Cochran) Shaner

I'm very self-driven - I push myself to be successful, not just for myself but also for my family, because I want them to see what success looks like, especially my daughter. I want her to know that you can have both a successful career and a family. I lost my mom at a very young age, but what I do recall from her is that she worked at a bank as an executive administrative assistant and worked very hard. I take those values with me as I grew my career. There was never a point where I thought, 'oh, this'll be good enough, I'll just stop.' You have to continue to grow, you have to continue to work at it. Even though she was here for such a short time of my life, she always showed me what that dedication looked like - she would bring me into her workplace and show me that she started in the mailroom at the bank and worked all the way up to executive administrative assistant. It was her example that drives me.

I've had leaders, especially female leaders in my past, that have really shaped how I am as a leader, and I've had some not-great leaders who have also shaped who I am as a leader - I think the influence works both ways, good and bad. Through good and bad experiences, these leaders taught me how to be a human, and be a leader, and get the job done. It's not necessarily one specific piece of advice someone told me, but rather the example set by leaders who demonstrated, through their actions both positive and negative, what kind of leader I wanted to become.

Very early in my career, this industry was very boys club-oriented, and it always felt like there was a limit of what could be achieved. I would say to young women that you should never let that stop you. Even if you feel like you might be out of place in whatever it is you're trying to do, whether that be because you're female, or because you're a different race, like, whatever the difference is - if you are grounded in what you are doing, then you're in the right place, no matter what everybody else looks like or feels like. Just continue. In my career, it has turned into me working with all women, and that's not even intentional - I didn't seek out a job where everybody was women. It just so happened that the group of women who influenced me my whole career grew also. None of us let it stop us, but all of our prior leaders were men. Now I'm surrounded by incredibly smart and talented women, and it's one of the things I enjoy so much about my career.

For foreclosure specifically, it's all of the constant legal jurisdictional changes. Every state has its own foreclosure requirements, and every state is always changing and updating, so it's always tricky to keep up with all those updates and make sure everything is running the way it should be, to the benefit of the borrower and to the benefit of the bank. Right now, we're also trying to grow and have had opportunities to hire new employees, but I'll be honest, it's kind of a tricky hiring environment right now. Having gone through COVID, everybody wants to be in a work-from-home environment, and the positions we normally hire for, while they can be done at home, are also highly collaborative. My current position is a hybrid role at the moment, but it's a struggle given that most people are still looking for that work-from-home environment. We're dealing with getting people who will not just take the job to take the job and then leave once they find something that's work from home.

Balance is very important to me in my work and personal life. I have younger children, and being a leader and having younger children can be a tricky balance. I always make sure to demonstrate for my team how I balance my life - I make sure that they see the dedication, but not at the detriment of my family. I come in and make sure that I'm focused and my work is getting done in the time that it needs to be done, and if something requires me to be a little bit more dedicated that week, then of course that might happen. But I also share my family with my team and let them know what's going on in my life. I feel like that's always been a key point in having a successful team. It's important that people see you as a human and as a leader and as someone who's getting the work done. If they can't relate to you in any way, shape, or form, then they can't be honest with you, and you're never going to get honest feedback from your employees.