Banking For Life | Chai Patel

Alan
Welcome back. I’m here today with Chai Patel. Chai is the Senior Vice President of science bank and she also leads the business development as well strategic partnership. Chai welcome to the show.

Chai
Thank you for having me.

Alan
It’s quite a mouthful of all these titles. But the bottom line is you hold a position of significance with science bank today. I like to take a step back, though, and have you give you a background how you got into where you are, and you know the road that you traveled?

Chai
Yeah. So I arrived, I was born and raised in India. I arrived at Boston Port at age 17. From there, I worked into family businesses going to work to get my undergrad degree in finance and computer science. I worked in my aunt’s motel. I worked in retail food business, I worked in convenience stores, gas stations, a lot of businesses that my family owned.

Alan
So motel convenience stores, yes. Station, your your family must have quite a few business. Yes, they do. And it’s and you came into the port of Boston then?

Chai
Yeah, correct. We traveled from I’m part of I’m from Gujarat, India. And we traveled from there to Mumbai and Mumbai to London, London to Boston. That was my first airplane trip by the way.

Alan
Did you find that the business aspect coming very natural to you very natural entrepreneur?

Chai
Very natural. Correct. Very natural. I could drop into a business. When I show up at the airport, I want to run the airport. And I show up on the plane I want to run the plane and so today comes very natural.

Alan
So try with with your schooling as 17 Were you through your schooling or did you continue on here in the US?

Chai
Yeah, so I was I was finished with my my high school in India, but my uncle thought it would be a good idea for me to go back to school here in United States, because most of my education was done in India, in in Gujarati language. So he thought that I needed English background. So I graduate till this day oldest graduate of Attleboro high school at age 19.

Alan
Okay, and then in terms of furthering studies, and you did you venture right out just you’re working in the family business?

Chai
Yeah, so working family business, and I was going to college, part time Community College and, and the bug was just there. And one day I decided that I wanted to carry on and I was really good in school and left Boston area too. Texas debt in Texas where my aunt had Montel and just went there and went and pursued a degree in finance and computer science.

Alan
Finance and computer science. So it’s so so that brings us fast forward. How did you get into Zions Bank?

Chai
So to Long story short, I went to work for JPMorgan Chase private bank in Dallas, Texas, did really well moved close to my parents moved to DC area with HSBC Bank and in their embassy banking. From there I made my newly minted Colonel husband. And we traveled out to Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, where I worked for Bank of Hawaii and ran their family office, business and wealth management. And from there, we went back to DC and my husband was moved back to Hill Air Force Base in Utah. And that’s when I found my new home which is Zions Bank, I was in youth I was on a nonprofit charity with someone from the bank. And he recommended that I go talk to President CEO with my resume and I did and I was hired on the spot.

Alan
So you know, you’re coming into Utah, but you had a whole lot of entrepreneurial background there. What was the transition like stepping into the role of Zions Bank that you’re doing today?

Chai
So so the business I run business channel I run today is a brand new business for the bank. No financial institutions done something like this. So it’s pretty much like my uncle or my dad or someone from my family, opening a door to whatever business that is. So I am I’m out there here I am in Fremont, California talking to you. It’s it’s still nerve racking. I’m still opening doors to that brand new business line selling myself when I need to training people who sell so it’s it’s everything that entrepreneur does I do with this particular business line within the financial services industry.

Alan
And this new business and you’re really working on helping to private companies with stock trans stock tracking in their their shareholder offices?

Chai
So with this new business line I’m part of Zions corporate trust. Corporate trust has been around 60 years, working with public companies managing their shareholder records, 1099 payments, they’ve been processing, those sorts of things. And we were looking at the business to see how we could grow it. And we’re going into direction where we’re offering same services to private companies. So anywhere from managing cap tables and cap table structures, to shareholder structures to shareholder record keeping an ownership, dispersing dividends. Then following up with the tax related documentation, whole gamut of things we do for private companies.

Alan
I’m visiting here today with Chai Patel. She’s a senior vice president at Zions Bank Chai I need to take a quick break. But we’ll be back after these messages. I’d like to talk more about this Dziedzic partnerships that you’re establishing today at the bank. Wonderful, thank you so much. We’ll be right back after these messages.

Alan
Welcome back. I’m here today with Chai Patel, senior senior vice president at the Science bank and also as leading up the strategic partnerships for the bank. Chai before they before the break, we’re talking about some of the services of Zions provides in one of those would help on the corporate record keeping and more particularly in the area of their stock stock register. How do you determine what what’s a good client versus one that you’d rather not deal with?

Chai
Yeah, so the good clients are private equity firms venture capital firms. Firms with the high activity are good clients. We love family businesses, family businesses are great client. However, recently, we had a case where we had to turn down a family business family business had not kept up with their shareholder records in over 50 years. And situation was just too complex for us to go and clean out and resolve so But anytime records are moderately complex, and we go in and we if we feel that we can resolve and add everything up, at the end of the day, we accept the client. But there there are clients that are just too complex and present a lot of liability for us to go in and clean up the records.

Alan
When you’re working with your your clientele. Is there a value added or how you differentiate yourself at science?

Chai
Most certainly I go out and talk to prospects clients around the country. And one other company that we brought on as a client, they were spending $47,000 in annual fees and a vendor that was completely unresponsive and was not executing a couple of transactions to be agreed upon. And and our fees were half that and we were able to take over 20 30% off a workload from that private equity groups manager and so so there is a tangible, there is monetary value we add. And there are days where CFOs just feel comfortable doing business with us because we’re we’re a large financial institution from Salt Lake City, we have expertise, they can come to us seek guidance and advice and in this complex topic area where how do I do this with my employee who has options? Or how do I track what it before fit. And we have experts in house that can walk them through that process there. Their main job is to run company efficiently from the financial statements and tracking options and talking to and communicating with investors and employees is not their core competence. So we help them outsource that. That part with very limited cost.

Alan
I mean, I’m gonna kind of throw a curveball at you here. But you know, in the we talked about stock options and in tracking stock registers in the in the valley here we have the restricted stock unit that a lot of companies have moved towards it. Are you involved with those? Also, or?

Chai
Yeah, we with restricted stock units, we would track them. We want to accounting for them. So we have a capabilities in our system to appropriately attract them. But we can communicate with employees. We just don’t have those capabilities. And if we have more than one approaches per quarter, I suspect that we can add that enhancement to our process. But that capability at at the moment we don’t have is there.

Alan
Do you use your firm mouse So get it out of the bank also get into the valuation of the stock, or do you work with independent advisor?

Chai
Yeah, so we work with independent advisors, CPA firms and client valuations with private companies are very subjective. So it’s not like you can go and get a new valuation form overnight. So we work very simultaneously or in a very harmonious way with their existing firms. And we resource that information from that firm. And then we were able to store it and make sense of it. And then we’ve turned that information back to CFOs for do their so they can do their K ones and other filings for.

Alan
We live in a definitely an age of electronics and trying to automate things is is more important for firms ever, ever more. Right. Right. Most certainly. And so are you realizing a lot of growth in your in science in the stock, you know, area of providing the stock stock service?

Chai
Tremendous growth. We started brainstorming this business line two years ago, we fully launched the business line in January. And since then, we have added a handful clients. We have exceeded our goals for the goals we’ve set to, to add new clients so we’re, I feel confident we’re doing good. And in our in the speed that we add clients in last two months have increased. So I’m getting very comfortable with what we’ve done.

Alan
Amazing here today with Chai Patel. She’s the senior vice president at Zions Bank check, I need to take a quick break. And we’ll be right back after these messages.

Alan
Welcome back, I’m here today visiting with Chai Patel. Chai is the Senior Vice President at Zions Bank and is also leading the bank strategic partnerships. Were more specifically focused on working with private companies and managing their stock registers oversight. Try. I want to I want to kind of switch gears for for a minute here. And I want to get more back into your life story. coming in into the US as a Navy national at age 17 had to present some challenges or Justice back to your life but But what was it like transitioning from coming into another country into this country and then pursuing a career?

Chai
Yeah, so. So if you really want to know how it’s like on a day one, in India, we sit in the one classroom and the teachers come and go. And my first day at my high school, I sat in one class because that’s what I thought I was supposed to do. And and, and in the students who move around me and teachers would move around me and and I could not figure out what was going on. Until three weeks later, I was told that I was not following my own schedule, and my teachers were looking for me. So that’s how it’s like, day one, when you were fully grew up somewhere else. And you showed up in completely brand new country and you have to follow their flow of things. So starting from their language was a barrier, of course, it was a big issue. I was part of the ESL program at the high school. Getting through that having to go through community college, I needed to take all of the math and science and other topics in English. So it’s been a long road, but I think I feel like at this age, I’ve made it up by running very, very fast. So I knew that I could catch up to my contemporaries by running faster. And I think not only have I caught up my contemporaries that I think I’ve moved beyond my contemporaries, so, you know, speed equates to a lot of hard work and in you know, so yeah, it’s been tremendous, so far.

Alan
You come across as a person with a lot of ambition and determination and you’re you’re one that also forecasts in the future and sets your mark for career career goals. What what do you what do you anticipate or strive think that you’ll be within a three to five year window?

Chai
Three to five years? If I have to, if I could be completely candid, I would love to go into a social businesses with a social responsibility factor attached to it. Maybe hybrid business that’s part nonprofit prop part business, even politics that is attached to business, something has to I have a great intentions to do good for people through social, social work, or purely political work. But I have this great sense of business that I, I think I should capitalize on. So could I be a chief operating officer for, you know, social company? Perhaps, you know, I could I hold the position within government, I could, I don’t know, it’s been, it’s been a blessing. And it’s been tremendous success. And I don’t know where I’m going.

Alan
Well, if you look at working with entrepreneurs and business owners on a day to day basis isn’t natural to you that just the relationships are defined that there’s some challenges, as you adjusted?

Chai
Very natural I can relate to, I can relate to my maid at my hotel room, I can relate to my taxi driver, and I had 45 minute conversation with my cab driver coming here today, and how he’s from Honduras. And you know, we were talking about homelessness in San Francisco and what I saw in Vancouver last week, and, you know, so I can relate myself to that. And I was at White House last month, and I talked to Rand Paul, and I could talk to you know, so I feel like I have been blessed with the ability to relate and connect with people of all walks of life.

Alan
In a way you You remind me of Nikki Haley, she’s East Indian, though you’re on the other side of the country, but But coming here is Indian national and venturing into politics. She’s done a remarkable job she has, what’s your thoughts on that?

Chai
You know, if I regret it now that I feel like I should have gone into politics, I envy her position. She works very hard for her position. She’s very good at it. I see a lot of future for her at National Space. But she’s a beautiful model for sure. For someone like me. And but but she did something I could not. So she’s a great role model for for young Indian Americans to see that you know what they could do?

Alan
So try going back into where you are today with the business strategy. What are some of the challenges that you see companies facing today?

Chai
I think the challenges companies face today is I was in Vancouver, and I had an opportunity to chat with director of marketing of Lululemon. And, and she struggles with the same challenges are such, how do you, you know, grow a company to certain level and still continue to keep your niche, or your uniqueness? Or that agile company that you were once she is a mammoth of a company now Lululemon? And the way they talk back to their customers, and the way they respond to certain complaints, it’s all cued, and, you know, off off beat, and how do you continue to do that when you are a multibillion dollar mainstream company? Right. So I think the the biggest challenge companies have is how do they retain their uniqueness? While keeping the growth in mind?

Alan
It also isn’t today’s business even though we have technology advancing the importance of having a good team, still critical.

Chai
Yeah, you know, when CEO of Yahoo came out and said, I need everybody in the offices, she got a lot of flack for it. But I think there’s a value to face to face. The reason why I run around the country and meet folks like this folks like you is there’s there’s that unique spark you get with face to face, that you don’t get over the phone or you don’t get over the email. And those relationships, I think are lasting. So if anyone’s in the business of building relationships with customers or partners or community, there is no better value than face to face.

Alan
And visiting here with, Chai Patel, She’s the senior vice president at Zions Bank, head of business development and also CTF partnership Chai if a person wants to get in touch with you. How would they do so?

Chai
So I am available? I’m on social media. I’m on LinkedIn. My name is Chaitali Patel. My my contacts are right there. I’m on Facebook. Find me I’m on Twitter Chai Patel find me. And of course they can come to freedoms. American freedom website on Facebook and find me.

Alan
Chai thank you for being on today’s show.

Chai
Thank you for having me.

Alan
We’ll be right back after these messages.