What are things like currently at the Corporate Woods Bank Loan Center / Mortgage Loan Services Operations Center in Earth City, MO (St. Louis) after the 8/31/2018 qualified termination date?
Is it a disaster like I suspect?
I worked there for years before being laid off on 8/31/2018 and am curious as to the current environment there.
STL had great associates, but lacked leadership.
"It’s funny that none of the restructures actually required that the supervisors, managers, directors, and above actually learn the functions they lead."
This is a major problem with SF, all throughout the enterprise. They believe that leaders are leaders, without regard to any functional expertise. Until this changes, they will continue to wither on the vine.
The Bank adopted this philosophy as Stan O readied for retirement and the heir apparent was seen in MS. Just another reason the Bank entered its death spiral.
Thanks for your reply WjHI9dA-patx. I’m the original poster and this is exactly the type of boots on the ground report that I have wanted.
I find it hilarious that they didn’t want to consolidate the third and fourth floors of Corporate Woods because of the fourth floor mailroom.
When the BLC joined the MLS at Corporate Woods in 2009, the MLS and BLC, for reasons unknown, refused to share the same mailroom.
The MLS already had a mailroom on the third floor which shared space with the Imaging Department.
The BLC ended up with their own mailroom on the fourth floor.
For the next few years State Farm wasted and money and staff on two separate mailrooms for Corporate Woods even though the office only had about 400 employees.
Finally common sense prevailed and the MLS and BLC decided to eliminate the third floor mailroom and share the fourth floor mailroom.
I don’t understand why they couldn’t move the mailroom back to the third floor with the Imaging Team. The room is still there and it’s much larger than the fourth floor mailroom.
I’m also amused by the new, additional restructuring in mortgage. They seemed to restructure mortgage every year. They apparently feel that the mere act of restructuring is productive in and of itself.
It’s funny that none of the restructures actually required that the supervisors, managers, directors, and above actually learn the functions they lead. You can’t be a competent leader if you don’t understand what you’re leading.
I probably had about 30 supervisors over the course of an 11 year career due to the constant restructures. It’s nearly impossible for a short term boss to gain enough traction to be effective.
I also had about 100 cubicle moves due to the restructures, including ridiculous moves to only one cube away. Somehow endless seating changes where supposed to make us more effective.
I feel bad for the people left in St. Louis. It’s so stupid that State Farm would choose to lose so much great talent in St. Louis just so they can consolidate in their beloved Bloomington.
My understanding is the compliance issues were not that bad as they claimed and the bank did not almost get shut down. The stuff the bank settled on was fixed before 9/2017 acccording to the Consent - before new management and gold plated consultants took over.
The new management took the issues that did exist and blew them out of proportion as a smoke screen for what they really wanted to do which is to clean house and cut staff. They don’t know how to generate revenue so they blame compliance and cost. I am still here waiting for then to tell us how they plan to grow the bank and make money. They have no clue.
It will take awhile for people in Bloomington to gain the experience they need to replace STL. But State Farm does not seem to care about experience. I would guess they at least get out of the mortgage business since theyve never been able to get that part right and it just keeps getting worse.
I stayed after 8/31 and it was horrible. The overall morale was so sad, lots of empty space. They planned to move everyone to the 3rd floor, but couldn't because of the mailroom on the 4th floor.
They had yet another restructure to how things should be worked in Mortgage and it was so ridiculous on the approach, worse than EOM. No answers and lots of gaps. I don't foresee how the bank will remain open considering no one running it knows the regulations they are violating on a daily basis.
Some of the people who were not impacted by the layoffs are just awaiting the announcement they will be laid off next to get their severance package and go.
They had lots of hiring's in Bloomington to fill positions that they lost in St. Louis and other sites. I would assume that as soon as they feel Bloomington is strong enough they will pull the plug on St. Louis. They had hiring freezes in St. Louis and Tempe, only were filling positions in Bloomington. This was all as of 10/2018. I have since left the company and am so happy I did.
Someone from corporate with more recent bank knowledge will have to speak to the true status. We know bank is on life support. For years the employees - including leadership - at Corp Woods have been kept in the dark about everything. Most of them had no clue about the severity of the compliance and regulatory issues in the past few years that nearly shut down the bank. Shortly prior to QTD there were plenty of people who thought that location was untouchable. I wish them all well but would encourage the ones who did stay to prepare themselves for the job market.