Written By: Seth Harrill
The last 10 weeks have been an awesome experience. I honestly did not know exactly what to expect when I started this journey but I knew that it would be a valuable learning experience that I could reflect on for a lifetime.
When I was notified that I had been chosen as one of Carolina Farm Credits summer interns I was super excited and determined. I noticed right from the start that Carolina Farm Credit had a lot to offer and I was confident that I would make the most of the opportunity.
I was fortunate to have an awesome mentor who allowed me to be by his side at all times. This really helped my learning experience because he always included me in everything he had going on. He also introduced me to many really nice customers so that I could immediately start making positive relationships with them. Farm visits to check up on customers were also something that we did in our spare time. For the most part these visits were to either close loans, get appraisals, or to get paperwork filled out.
Most of the valuable information I learned was obtained from work that was done in the office. Every day I spent time with my mentor in his office listening to phone calls and other customer interactions that occurred. He also let me observe him work through loan documents. I also got to watch as loans were processed and finalized which is an extremely important part of the loan process. On top of that I was able to sit in with a credit analyst and watch as he worked through an ACE file. After I watched what was done in the ACE file I was able to open a new file and work through an ACE file on my own. My mentor also let me work on loan documents as well which really helped me retain what I was learning.
Overall, the experience that I had this summer was extremely valuable to me. I learned so much about the loan officer position and what it takes to work at Carolina Farm Credit. I’m extremely thankful for this opportunity and all that Carolina Farm Credit has done for me. Even though I was just an intern for the last 10 weeks, I know feel apart of the Farm Credit family and I can't thank everyone enough for making me feel so welcome.