LOAN OPERATIONS MANAGER

About this role

Since 1973, East West Bank has served as a pathway to success. With over 110 locations across the U.S. and Asia, we are the premier financial bridge between the East and West. Our teams of experienced, multi-cultural professionals help guide businesses and community members on both sides of the Pacific looking to explore new markets and create new opportunities, and our sustained growth and expertise in industries like real estate, entertainment and media, private equity and venture capital, and high-tech help build sustainable businesses and expand our associates’ potential for career advancement. 

Headquartered in California, East West Bank (Nasdaq: EWBC) is a top-performing commercial bank with a strong foundation, an enterprising spirit and a commitment to absolute integrity. East West Bank gives people the confidence to reach further.

The Loan Operations Manager provides day-to-day management and oversight of assigned commercial Loan Operations functions. The Manager’s primary responsibility is to maintain a strong post-onboarding quality-control and operating-control environment. The role leads people, quality, risk, service delivery, change, and continuous improvement while partnering closely with Business Unit Risk Liaisons (BURLs), Credit Supervision, Relationship Management, Enterprise Risk Management, Compliance, Legal, Technology, and other stakeholders. 

People Leadership & Team Management 

• Lead, coach, and develop a high-performing Loan Operations team through clear expectations, regular feedback, performance management, succession planning, and professional development. 

• Build operational depth and flexibility through structured cross-training, knowledge sharing, documented procedures, and effective back-up coverage. 

• Establish accountability for quality, responsiveness, productivity, risk awareness, sound judgment, and customer service. 

• Plan capacity, balance workloads, and align staffing and skills with production demand, transaction complexity, and organizational priorities. 

• Foster an inclusive, collaborative, and results-oriented culture focused on ownership, continuous learning, and operational excellence. 

Centralized Callback & Post-Onboarding Quality Control 

• Lead the continued centralization and development of commercial loan callback and post-onboarding quality-control activities to promote consistent standards, scalable coverage, and effective segregation of duties. 

• Cross-train the callback team to support commercial loans across bilateral, agent/lead, and non-agent/participant structures, including monetary and non-monetary transactions. 

• Develop and oversee risk-based callback, verification, sampling, maker/checker, and other quality-control routines. 

• Ensure post-onboarding reviews validate critical loan data, transaction accuracy, approval evidence, documentation completeness, and adherence to established procedures and controls. 

• Monitor data and transaction exceptions, analyze recurring issues and trends, identify root causes, assign remediation, track corrective actions, and escalate material or systemic concerns. 

• Develop standardized quality criteria, review protocols, escalation thresholds, and reporting to improve consistency across Loan Operations functions. 

Performance Management & Operational Excellence 

• Establish, monitor, and improve service-level agreements (SLAs), quality standards, turnaround expectations, productivity measures, and operating routines for assigned functions. 

• Monitor queues, aging, exceptions, capacity, service performance, and control execution to identify emerging backlogs or delivery risks. 

• Hold teams accountable for timely exception resolution, sustainable corrective action, and achievement of service and quality expectations. 

• Promote scalable and standardized operating practices while retaining flexibility to support different commercial loan products, structures, and business needs. 

• Monitor employee performance, cross-training progress, engagement, development, and retention. 

Change Management & Process Improvement 

• Lead effective change management for new processes, systems, products, controls, regulatory requirements, and organizational changes. 

• Identify, prioritize, partner with Technology and business stakeholders to evaluate and execute process improvements that strengthen controls, reduce manual work and rework, improve scalability, and enhance thecustomer and employee experience. 

• Develop implementation plans, stakeholder communications, procedures, training, readiness assessments, and post-implementation monitoring to support sustained adoption. 

Data Analytics & Management Reporting 

• Assess and monitor key performance indicators (KPIs), key risk indicators (KRIs), SLAs, quality measures, exception aging, error rates, recurrence, productivity, and remediation effectiveness. 

• Analyze operational data and trends to identify root causes, emerging risks, capacity constraints, control weaknesses, and opportunities for optimization. 

• Prepare management reporting and dashboards that provide actionable insight into quality, service delivery, workload, risk exposure, and improvement progress. 

• Use reporting and business-intelligence tools to strengthen fact-based decisions, resource planning, and preventive risk management. 

Risk Management, Audit & Controls 

• Maintain a strong first-line control environment supporting transaction accuracy, data integrity, policy compliance, regulatory requirements, and operational risk mitigation. 

• Ensure callback, verification, approval, segregation-of-duties, documentation, and quality-control requirements are consistently performed and evidenced. 

• Support risk and control self-assessments, internal audits, compliance reviews, regulatory examinations, and control testing; lead timely and sustainable remediation of findings. 

• Perform timely reviews and updates of procedures and controls to ensure they remain current, effective, and aligned with operational, regulatory, and business requirements, and draft proposed revisions for senior management review and approval. 

• Strong audit and examination outcomes with timely closure and no repeat findings. 

Stakeholder Partnership & Communication 

• Work closely with BURLs and business and functional partners to understand priorities, address service or quality concerns, and support commercial lending objectives. 

• Partner with Credit, Enterprise Risk Management, Compliance, Legal, and other stakeholders to resolve complex operational matters and implement change. 

• Communicate operational risks, exceptions, capacity constraints, dependencies, and remediation status clearly and proactively to management and stakeholders. 

• Balance customer service, production needs, operational risk, and control requirements when evaluating priorities and solutions. 

• Bachelor's degree in Business, Finance, Accounting, Economics, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and relevant experience. 

• Strong commercial loan operations experience, including demonstrated leadership responsibility in a control-focused operating environment. 

• Minimum five years of managerial experience leading commercial loan operations or a comparable banking operations function, including responsibility for people leadership, performance management, operational controls, and service delivery 

• Strong knowledge of commercial loan operations, including but not limited to post-onboarding quality control, callback and verification practices, monetary and non-monetary transactions, data integrity, and exception management. 

• Demonstrated ability to lead people, manage performance, develop talent, build cross-functional capabilities, and establish accountability. 

• Proven experience establishing and improving KPIs, KRIs, SLAs, quality measures, productivity standards, and management reporting. 

• Proven ability to lead change, execute process improvements, strengthen operating controls, and manage multiple priorities in a complex environment. 

• Strong analytical, problem-solving, communication, stakeholder-management, and decision-making skills. 

• Experience with commercial loan platforms, such as Metavante, Power BI, workflow tools, Microsoft Office, and business-intelligence or reporting tools preferred. 

East West Bank is an equal opportunity employer.

Applicants must have legal authorization to work in the United States.  We do not offer visa sponsorship at this time.  

The base pay range for this position is USD $100,000.00/Yr. - USD $140,000.00/Yr. Exact offers will be determined based on job-related knowledge, skills, experience, and location.