In this Ten Minute Talk, Brena Nath sits down with Ashley Yarabinec to discuss the role of young professionals in shaping the mortgage industry, and the power of advocacy, networking, and professional development. Discover how in-person events create momentum, why senior leadership recognition matters, and how MBA’s Impact program provides free resources for career growth.
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00:00I say to the Young Professionals Group all the time,
00:03you have to take initiative of your own path,
00:06your own journey, whatever that looks like for you,
00:08whatever you want that to be.
00:17Hi, everyone.
00:18I'm excited to be here.
00:19I'm with Ashley Yarbanek.
00:20She is the Director of Member Relations with the MBA,
00:24who also runs the residential side of their MPAC program.
00:28You are, I want to say, hot off the press,
00:30because that's the news term that we kind of say.
00:33But you are hot off of coming from the IMB conference.
00:36So first off, I hope you had a great trip and safe travels.
00:41Yeah, happy to be here.
00:43Landed very late last night, so happy to be home.
00:47But it was an awesome conference.
00:50Incredible takeaways.
00:51Always nice to see my industry friends and colleagues.
00:54So great, great time in Austin.
00:57Even though I think it's one of the last days of January
01:01when recording this, I feel like you've already
01:03been to at least a few, a couple conferences.
01:05You have a really good in-person sentiment
01:10on how the industry is feeling about 2025.
01:13Now that you've been to those events,
01:14I mean, specifically even looking at IMB,
01:16what have you been hearing?
01:17What is the feeling?
01:18What is the tone that you're getting from the industry
01:20right now?
01:21Really excited.
01:23I keep hearing the phrase thrive in 25,
01:26and so that's what I'm going to go with.
01:27I feel like a lot of the colleagues that I spoke to
01:31and industry professionals that I just
01:32saw in Austin for IMB are excited.
01:37They're a little definitely looking to us,
01:42especially with the new administration change.
01:44There's a lot of unknowns.
01:45But I think overall, there's hopefulness, excitement.
01:50There's growth.
01:52Hopefully, I want to say that people
01:56are really looking ahead, and I think
01:58it's going to be a really great, great year.
02:01That is what's personally, as the person who kind of oversees
02:04our events here at HousingWire, we have four of them.
02:06One of my favorite reasons to come together in person
02:09is you kind of leave with this air of,
02:13I don't even know if the word is hope,
02:15but coming together really just creates this new momentum
02:19of how you can conquer the year going forward.
02:20We're all in this together, and you notice that
02:23when you're at an event.
02:24Absolutely.
02:25I couldn't agree more.
02:26I feel like always being in person, it's this energy.
02:29It's this excitement.
02:30I keep saying I run off of caffeine and adrenaline
02:32when I'm at those events, and the adrenaline just
02:34keeps going.
02:35I feel like I haven't come down to earth yet.
02:38But that's the excitement part.
02:40That's exciting to come home and, like you said,
02:42continue that momentum and really build off of that energy.
02:45I really feel it this year.
02:47The amount of coffee you drink at a conference
02:49does not count in my book.
02:51You can have unlimited amount if you're traveling for work.
02:54That's good, because it's way too much.
02:57On that same note, I mean, you kind of touched on it well.
03:00We are at the turn of a chapter as far as even
03:02with a new mission to a new year.
03:04It's a new all at once.
03:07You specifically have a great pulse
03:09on what's going on with young professionals
03:11and how this industry is supporting young professionals,
03:13helping them move forward.
03:15I mean, looking at it through your lens of impact,
03:17how can young professionals make an impact right now
03:20in 2025 or January even?
03:23There's so many different opportunities
03:25for the young professionals to get involved.
03:28And so I want to kind of start this and preface it with
03:32MPACT is the Young Professionals Networking Group within MBA.
03:37It is for anybody in the industry who is 40 and under.
03:41You actually don't even have to be an MBA member
03:43to be a part of MPACT.
03:45So if your company for any reason isn't a member,
03:48send them to me first and I'll make them a member
03:50or hopefully make them a member.
03:52But you can join MPACT regardless.
03:55And there's so many different things
03:57that we're doing on this side.
03:59I do quarterly webinars focusing
04:01on professional development skills.
04:03I put a lot of the MPACTers that come to conferences
04:08in front of opportunities for them to meet a mentor.
04:11So there's so many different ways to network
04:14and come together and really come with your peers.
04:18But the biggest thing that I would say,
04:20especially if you really want to make an impact
04:23and do something to create lasting change
04:27within the industry as a young professional
04:29is focusing on the advocacy piece.
04:33There was a webinar that we did previously
04:36just a couple of weeks ago
04:38on young professionals using their voices,
04:40both on the state association level
04:42and the federal association level.
04:44So MBA as a whole.
04:46And there is multiple different ways to start,
04:50whether you're able to come to conferences or not.
04:54The first one I would say is you can always start locally
04:57with your own state association, state chapters.
05:00They have different ways for young professionals
05:03to get engaged, whether that's on the state
05:07or Capitol Hill days that they have
05:09with their own advocacy efforts.
05:10You can always ask them to learn more
05:12about what bills they're looking at,
05:14what pieces of legislation their current state is looking at
05:18and why and how that impacts them
05:20and how that impacts the industry as a whole.
05:22Just another way to learn.
05:24But then if you are able to travel to a conference
05:27as a young professional, any conference,
05:29I would say as a young professional,
05:32hands down come to the NAC
05:34or the National Advocacy Conference.
05:36This year it is April 8th and 9th in Washington, D.C.
05:40And our legislative team does an absolutely incredible job
05:45the first day prepping you for everything
05:48that you're gonna see on the second day,
05:50which is the Capitol Hill day.
05:51And that's the most exciting piece to me.
05:53And especially as a young professional,
05:55being able to use my voice and see how my voice
05:59is actually impacting change
06:01and impacting the people that are on Capitol Hill.
06:04We always think of people on Capitol Hill
06:06like the congressmen and the senators
06:08and that's who we're meeting with,
06:09but we're also meeting with their staffers.
06:11And the staffers a lot of times are younger than me
06:14and I'm 32.
06:15And sometimes they are fresh out of college
06:17and they're 23, 24, 25
06:19and they know nothing about the industry.
06:21So you are the, I'll say the smartest one in the room
06:24when it comes to the mortgage industry at that moment.
06:27So it's our job to really educate them
06:29on why it's important.
06:30And as a young professional,
06:32being able to use your voice in that way
06:33can be a really powerful thing.
06:36And so if you go back and listen to that webinar,
06:38it really kind of takes the intimidation factor out of it
06:42because sometimes it can be really scary thinking,
06:44oh, I don't wanna go on Capitol Hill
06:47or oh, I don't wanna talk to,
06:49I don't think I'm well-versed enough
06:51to talk about some of these points.
06:53And our team does such an incredible job
06:56prepping you the first day
06:57that it should take all that intimidation out of it.
06:59That's such a great call-out
07:01because even when you and I first started this conversation,
07:05I was talking about the value in coming together
07:09and the momentum that sets going forward
07:11from even the fact that you had a webinar
07:12to bring everyone together,
07:13but then also saying,
07:14hey, here's what it looks like in action
07:17when we all come together and we get to see the change.
07:21And I think that even more than a conference
07:23is as a young professional helps them see,
07:25oh, this is the ways that I can make a difference,
07:27this is how the mortgage industry is making a difference.
07:30And I bet you that's a lot of kind of
07:33what people are walking away with,
07:34what are some of the attitudes when people are there,
07:37or when they're leaving,
07:38what is the feeling that people have?
07:42It's so like leaving, you mean the like meetings?
07:45After, yeah.
07:46So the biggest like piece that I always see
07:50is like a surprise on their face
07:53or like that hopefulness that we talked about
07:55because they're, and especially,
07:57I mean, I get this almost every time
07:59I leave the Capitol Hill day
08:02and kind of leave the conference debrief
08:04is so I'm always so surprised
08:07of how easy the conversations were with like the staffers
08:12or with the congressmen or the senators
08:15because they'll ask questions,
08:16but they know they're six inches deep and six feet wide.
08:22Like they know a little bit about a lot of things.
08:26And so it's our job to come in as industry professionals
08:29and really educate.
08:30And that's that education piece
08:31that we think sometimes we're not well-versed
08:34to speak about or speak on.
08:37And I will say too, in those settings,
08:39like in that conference setting and in those meetings,
08:42you're not like one-on-one with those congressmen.
08:45Like you're in a group delegation with your state.
08:49And so there could be 20 people in the room.
08:51There could be five people in the room
08:53and maybe other industry professionals
08:55are able to speak a little bit more
08:57and you can just watch and learn.
08:59That's what I did my first year
09:00as a young professional going into NAC
09:02for the very first time.
09:04So you can take a passive approach.
09:06You can take an active approach
09:07and really use that voice if you feel comfortable.
09:09But surprise is I feel like the biggest takeaway
09:13that I've seen.
09:14Like, oh my gosh, that was way easier to talk about
09:16than I thought.
09:16Or, oh, the meetings, the legislative team
09:21prepped me with all of these talking points.
09:22And I was able to actually speak on this
09:25in a much better way than I anticipated
09:28with the staffers in the room
09:29writing all of these notes and questions down
09:33to be able to take back to their constituents.
09:36So definitely surprised at how easy,
09:40much easier it is than people realize.
09:42Yeah.
09:43I can feel the energy and passion
09:45just even as you talk about it,
09:47which I think leads really well
09:48into this kind of like final question
09:50that really sums up what I think
09:52this industry constantly needs to point back to
09:53is like, okay, what do we do now?
09:55Like we see this is how young professionals
09:57are getting into this space.
09:59These are how they're able to make an impact,
10:02help create change.
10:03But what about the companies
10:05surrounding the young professionals?
10:07How can they step in and support
10:09the next generation of workforce or the workforce?
10:13I think it's really just recognition.
10:16It is recognizing the people that you have,
10:19the people that are actively raising their hand.
10:23I say to the young professionals group all the time,
10:26you have to take initiative of your own path,
10:29your own journey, whatever that looks like for you,
10:31whatever you want that to be.
10:32And part of that initiative is raising your hand.
10:36It's speaking up and being that squeaky wheel
10:38and saying, hey, I want to learn more.
10:40I want to do more.
10:41I want to have more responsibility.
10:43But as senior leadership
10:45and the executive leaderships,
10:46they need to be able to recognize
10:48when people are doing that.
10:50And when the young professionals
10:51in their current organizations are doing that
10:53and say, oh, hey, she's come to me twice now
10:56and wants more responsibility or wants to learn more
11:00or wants to cross train in a different department
11:02to be able to be more well-rounded
11:04in the current role that she's at.
11:06Let's get her the opportunities to do so.
11:09The MBA has opportunities for that to happen.
11:13Your own organization can implement
11:15what that succession planning looks like for you.
11:18There's so many different ways,
11:19but it's really just that recognition piece
11:21of the executives looking at their own staff
11:24and saying, hey, I have a handful of people
11:28that have expressed interest
11:29in learning more about advocacy
11:31or learning more about their position
11:33or the industry as a whole.
11:35What can we do about that
11:37to really help them grow in their career?
11:39Impact is free.
11:41There's so many resources that we can create
11:44that will provide those professional development skills
11:48so that when those executive leaders do want to retire
11:51because nobody wants to work for the rest of their lives,
11:53the people that they have under them
11:55are poised and ready to be able
11:57to take over those positions
11:59or step into those roles
12:01when people want to start retiring or moving up
12:04or there's a shift in your organization.
12:06So really just having that recognition
12:08and I think it's really just owning your own journey
12:13and taking that initiative.
12:15Yeah, that's so true as far as owning your path.
12:19And what stood out to me
12:21as you talked throughout kind of our conversation
12:24was you guys have made Impact so accessible,
12:27whether that's free
12:28or there's not a barrier to join, stuff like that.
12:30And I think that's so important
12:32that it's a great resource that people should step into.
12:34So all of that to say, Ashley,
12:36I appreciate you kind of diving into this.
12:38It's personally, as someone who is also growing her career,
12:41it's always great to see how this industry
12:43is helping take the next generation forward.
12:46So thanks for your time.
12:47Yeah, absolutely.
12:48Thank you so much for having me.
12:49It's been a pleasure.