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Patrick Fairchild
Career Intern Examiner, Level 1
Bloomington, Minnesota

“FCA is my first job out of Iowa State University, where I earned a B.S. in finance. Growing up in Iowa, I worked in my family’s shop repairing large farm equipment and also worked for local farmers in the summers and at harvest time. I knew I wanted to go into banking, so when I attended a career fair at Iowa State and talked to two FCA examiners from the Bloomington office, I felt that FCA was a good fit for me. I started right after graduation in May 2006.

“All new hires are on the Staff Development Team, where we learn examining in a mix of classroom and on-the-job training. I am responsible for overseeing one association, although I am not restricted to that one. I get to go to other associations to gain other types of experience and even go on contract exams at SBA [the Small Business Administration] and other agencies. While I’m on site, more experienced examiners will give me certain sections to work on, such as capital, assets, information technology, or YBS [young, beginning, and small farmers and ranchers]. They’ll help me gather information and tell me who I should talk to.

“On a typical day on site, I work from 8 to 5. I review loans the first couple of days; typically, we pull a sample of loans to review and divide them among different examiners. I find the diversity of loans in Farm Credit System institutions very interesting—dairy, vegetables, ethanol. Before, I was familiar only with row-crop operations, like corn and soybeans. We talk to loan officers about any concerns we have about certain loans. We classify the loans according to their quality and determine whether our rating agrees with the association’s. We also need to reach conclusions about the adequacy of each program or section and make sure they are in compliance with regulations.

“On a typical day in the office, I start by firing up my computer and checking for e-mails from my contacts at my association. I review board minutes, audits, and quarterly oversight of financial trends and business plan variances, looking at actual versus projected numbers. I get this data from the association’s funding bank’s database or from e-data on the FCA Web site, where I can log in to a secure network. I document every action I take in FCA’s institution files database.

“I’ve always considered myself a detail person, but this job has really honed my attention to detail. I’ve improved my writing—you do a lot of writing—and my communication skills have definitely improved. I am always talking about issues with association staff and my coworkers.

“Before I accepted the job, I thought the travel aspect would be challenging. However, it hasn’t been an issue for me. It’s been pretty easy to deal with. I enjoy the traveling and like seeing different areas around the country and meeting association personnel. Some months you don’t travel at all; other months you travel quite a bit. Whatever it is, your travel is scheduled; you always know when you’re going on site. I estimate that 30 to 40 percent of my time so far has been traveling to trainings or to exams.

“The benefits at FCA made it one of my top picks for employment. FCA is very competitive in that regard. Work schedules are really nice. I’m on 5-4-9 [working nine-hour days for nine days in two weeks]. I like it that there are lots of staff who are always available to answer my questions. That makes the job easier, to be around people who are willing to help.

“The Agency really wants to see you succeed. I can see sticking with this job for quite some time because I really enjoy what I do.”

Patrick was recently promoted to level 2.

• Patrick Fairchild, career intern examiner, level 1, Bloomington
• Jennifer Nelson, career intern examiner, level 1, Dallas
• Benjamin McMahan, associate examiner, level 3, Denver
• Kevin McAdoo, associate examiner, level 3, McLean
• Sarah Kreger, certified IT specialist, McLean
• Michael Anderson, program manager, IT/Operations Examination, Denver
• Robert Coleman, Director, Office of Secondary Market Oversight, McLean
• Eric Howard, senior policy analyst, Office of Regulatory Policy, McLean