Independent Banker - October 2017 - 65

What is Small-Business Smarts?
For decades, journalist and regular Independent Banker contributor
William Atkinson has immersed himself in the worlds of banking
and small business. Here, he introduces the first of his new SmallBusiness
Smarts columns, which will offer inspiration and advice for
community banks looking to sharpen their small-business lending
knowledge and skills.
If there's a smallbusiness
lending issue
you'd like to see in a
future column, send
your suggestion to
magazine@icba.org,
subject line " SmallBusiness
Smarts. "
What does it take to succeed in building financially successful partnerships
with your community's small businesses? Among the most important factors
are a personal interest in small business and a genuine respect for small
business owners.
______________
$150 million in assets in 2011 to
almost $600 million today.
For those community banks that
could do with extra help, it might
be on the horizon. The Trump
administration has been vocal
about its desire to ease regulations
for community banks by rolling
back some of Dodd-Frank's more
restrictive passages.
And, in July, President Trump
nominated Randal Quarles for
the position of Federal Reserve
vice chair for supervision as part
of the administration's push to
relax regulations on community
banks. Quarles is recognized as
sympathetic to the banking industry's
belief that regulation impairs
lending. As of this writing, he is
testifying before the Senate, seeking
confirmation. Time will tell if
he, or whoever fills this spot, can
help clear the way for community
banks to not just survive under
regulations, but thrive.
I learned these lessons firsthand early in life. When my grandfather died in
1930, my father, who was 16 at the time, dropped out of school in order to take
care of his mother. He found employment as a bank teller in the small town
where he lived in Ontario, Canada. He ended up loving banking so much that
he stayed with it until he died.
As I was growing up, I noticed that my father spent a lot of time visiting
small businesses and talking with their owners. He wasn't always buying
something or doing business. He just respected these people and enjoyed
talking with them, whether they were customers of his bank or not.
While I didn't end up in banking myself, I have been a full-time freelance
business magazine writer since 1976 and have interviewed several thousand
small-business owners in that time. Like my father, I have been impressed
with their energy and fiercely independent nature.
I recall one interview with an electrical contractor in California. He had
started out as a one-man shop and built his business to a workforce of 200.
As we discussed self-employment, he said, wryly: " Self-employment is the
decision to work 60 to 70 hours a week for yourself so you don't have to work
40 hours a week for someone else. " That really does encapsulate the smallbusiness
owner mentality.
According to the US Small Business Administration, there are 29.6 million
small businesses in the US, which employ 57.9 million people-almost
half (47.8 percent) of the country's total private workforce. In addition, 98
percent of the 304,000-plus companies that export goods from the US are
small businesses, which collectively generate one-third (33.4 percent) of the
nation's $1.4 trillion in exports.
Small businesses have always represented a big potential market for community
banks: The latter make more than half of all US small-business loans.
These days, that potential is even greater. In the National Small Business
Association's " 2016 Year-End Economic Report, " 80 percent of small-business
owners reported being confident in the future of their businesses-a
nine-year high for this indicator.
In recognition of this potential, this column is designed to keep community
bankers up to date on small-business trends, to break down the challenges
and opportunities within these trends for community banks, and to share
relevant strategies for tapping into, and building, this market.
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Independent Banker - October 2017

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