Photo courtesy of M&T Bank
Rob Drake
Senior Vice President/Regional Manager of Massachusetts Business Banking, M&T Bank
Industry experience: 22 years
M&T Bank’s SBA lending has become one of its highest-producing departments in Massachusetts. In fact, the U.S. Small Business Administration named M&T Bank the 2025 Lender of the Year for lending to women-owned businesses in Massachusetts. Rob Drake, the bank’s regional manager of business banking, says that’s down to the way M&T trains bankers, and the sheer size of its department.
As the bank grows, Drake says, his team makes efforts to stay present in the communities it serves. When evaluating loans or undertaking a credit review, Drake noted that it is easier to be confident in a business’s viability after getting to know the owner or owners.
Q: How important is it for the bank to support all businesses but also be able to uplift women-owned businesses?
A: We really have a theory and mindset here that it’s our job to engage within the community through our business bankers, through our branch partners and all of our colleagues in the retail bank, to make sure we’re engaged with all community members. Whether it be men, whether it be women – we don’t actively say we want to be the number-one woman business banker, but what we want to do is engage in our community, help as many community members, and helping them from a business perspective.
Q: How important is it guiding small business owners through the lending process during what can be some difficult times, especially for small businesses?
A: That’s something that’s extremely important and intentional. We’re training our folks, but the key is that we want to get to know our business owners. We ask them a lot of questions about them, their business, their challenges, their plans, and by doing that, we can really leverage programs like the SBA that we as a bank are heavily invested in to provide the capital when it may be challenging to do in a conventional way. The nice thing is that we have a huge team in our SBA department. They understand the SBA lending program. They understand how to do it effectively and efficiently. That gives our teams in the streets who are engaging with our customers the backbone to help support them through that.
Q: What do you think allowed the bank to continue to grow and be able to be a prominent small business lender?
A: I think it goes back to our mission to engage with all members of the community. It might sound boring, we’ve never really moved on from supporting small business owners and making sure that the team is educated on how to do so. That they’re encouraged to engage. Then, making sure that we have the back-office team, whether it be developing products, increasing efficiency, investing in the SBA program to understand it very well, to make sure that we’re equipped to really service all of our clients.
Q: As M&T continues to grow, how is it able to remain in tune with the needs of local small businesses?
A: That really comes from the top of the house down. The fact that every employee has 40 hours of volunteerism – paid volunteer hours – and we’re encouraged to do that. We feel truly that if we’re going to invest in a community and support a community, we have to be in the community and show up. There’s practical ways we do it, through the volunteerism, and then it’s really through the job requirements, whether you’re a branch manager [or a] business banker. The expectation is to be visible, be seen, show up, show interest in organizations in which you feel individually passionate about. That’s how we show up, and that’s where we’re meeting folks. We are a larger bank, but we try to be very local.
Q: How important is it to be out in the community at those events or stopping into these small businesses? With size and scale, sometimes it can just be reduced to a phone call?
A: It that’s down to the way M&T trains bankers, and the sheer size of its department.
It’s very important, if you were to be interviewing some of those on my team here, you know, they would know that it’s part of their weekly job activities to show up. We’re making a lot of loans. When there’s a judgment or a credit review, it’s nice to say, I’ve been to the place of business, I’ve shaken the hand of the business owner. We have that trust. So there’s some old-school-ness in terms of that, that we really value. We’re working with individual business owners most of the time and they may be very well versed in their industry. Banking and borrowing may be new to them or not as common so there’s a component of education that we really take pride in. Personal relationships make that much better. So, we are passionate about showing up in person.
Q: How important is it to have a solid team that you can bounce ideas off of to help each other continue to grow in your respective careers?
A: I think what may differentiate us at M&T is that all of our business bankers are well versed, trained and educated on SBA lending, because it’s one of the common loans that we make on a consistent basis throughout our entire footprint. When we look to hire folks, we’re looking for people who want to help businesses. Being such a proficient SBA lender allows us to help more businesses in other ways that others can’t. That’s just part of what it takes to be an M&T business bank and we’re certainly proud of that.
Drake’s Five Favorite Activities
- Eating at The James in Essex on a Friday night with family
- Walking on the Boston Common followed by dinner at LaPadrona with his wife
- Summer days at Crane Beach in Ipswich
- Going on a morning run
- Watching his kids play sports
