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How to Lend Money to Strangers

A global career in collections, with Chris Somervell

How to Lend Money to Strangers

Brendan le Grange

Business, Careers, Fintech, Management, Lending, Credit, Banking

4.943 Ratings

🗓️ 27 January 2022

⏱️ 37 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

New Zealand might be forgotten from world maps so often that it’s become a meme, but that didn’t stop today’s guest from taking his career truly global. Chris Somervell’s has worked in eight countries while away from home, predominantly managing collections operations.

And that’s what we discuss: lessons learned as technology developed and cultures changed alongside him, and a fundamental reimagining of what it could mean to work in collections.

You can find Chris on his LinkedIn page (or out sailing)

You can learn more about myself, Brendan le Grange, on my LinkedIn page (and while you're there, send me a connection request)

If you have any feedback, questions, or if you would like to participate in the show, please feel free to reach out to me at brendan@howtolendmoneytostrangers.show

A full written transcript with timestamps can be found on HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.Show

You can also find my pulpy action-adventure novels in all their formats on Amazon


Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

When you hear or see the word collections or collections department,

0:04.3

what does it trigger in your mind?

0:06.4

And I don't think that's necessarily positive.

0:09.2

And if the person on the end of the phone is actually designated as a collector,

0:13.5

what is their mindset?

0:15.0

And you know, whilst training will take care of some of that,

0:18.4

shouldn't we be trying to change that perception in the first place?

0:21.5

So no, why call it collections?

0:30.2

Hong Kong, London, Mexico City, Hong Kong,

0:32.8

Kuala Lumpur, Singapore.

0:35.0

That's just the second half of Chris Humvelle's

0:37.4

Globe Trotting career.

0:39.0

One will be mining for insights today.

0:41.6

That is here, spending an hour of his own time talking to me,

0:45.2

rather than enjoying a New Zealand summer,

0:47.6

is his own fault.

0:49.1

Is C.I. wants to live at an industry webinar that was supposed to be closed

0:52.9

out with 10 minutes from our collections expert?

0:56.0

But as often happens, a mix of misunderstandings and overlapping obligations meant that it wasn't possible.

1:02.5

Anitis cramble to come up with a slide or two to fulfill the promises of the agenda.

1:07.9

After that session, I got an email from Chris.

1:10.8

He congratulated me overall, but also a little cheekily, I thought,

...

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