Former Westpac commercial banker Shubham Bhaskar speaks to The Adviser about his move to become a broker, the importance of setting targets, and what Sheel Capital means to him.
How long have you been a broker and why did you get into broking?
I’ve been a broker since April 2021. I come from a banking background and I used to work for Westpac in commercial banking for close to nine years.
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The reason why I became a broker was to be able to provide more solutions for my clients. Westpac was a great training ground for me as they provided me with a lot of support around learning the banking products and learning about lending. But one thing that always stood out to me was that whenever a client would come to us and we weren’t able to provide them with a solution in one policy, we just had to go back to the client and say: ‘Hey, we can’t help you’.
But as a broker, we have a suite of banks and banking products that we can relate to and provide solutions to the clients through those banks. So, that was something that really appealed to me and that was something that I really was excited about; to be able to provide for my clients and that was the reason why I should be going broker.
How did you decide on your aggregator?
When I was leaving Westpac my knowledge of the broking industry was very limited. A few of the bankers that had left Westpac before me recommended that I talk to Tim Schneider at Choice. Tim and I met for a quick breakfast and a coffee and I think a week after, I decided that we would just go ahead with Choice!
Fast forward two years we came to a point where we grew very quickly…. We thought about how we could scale our business and moved to the BYOB (Bring Your Own Brand) model by Loan Market Group.
How quickly did you grow?
I set myself a yearly target and it was getting daunting because my first year’s targets were $60 million. Those targets really helped me in grounding myself and figuring out the number of applications I would have to do on a weekly basis, monthly basis and the number of settlements that I want to see happen in a month.
How did you decide on the name Sheel Capital?
Firstly, it is a nice, flowy name. That’s what we really liked about it. But Sheel in Sanskrit means ‘good deed’, so it's close to my heart. I’m quite spiritual outside of work and we wanted to have a name that’s close to our hearts and remind us of what’s right in our lives and what we’re actually driven by. So, if you do good by people good will come back to you.
What advice would you give to a new broker?
There are no shortcuts to hard work and if you’re looking for shortcuts you’re not going to survive in this industry for a very long time. I feel like new brokers should really invest in relationships with the bank, whether that’s with the retail BDM, whether that’s with commercial BDM, whether that’s with the banker or anyone, get as much industry knowledge as you can because the more industry knowledge you’ll get the more it’s in the forefront of your mind and you’ll be able to seek opportunities better.
Also setting yourself targets, a yearly target, is what I did when I first started.
To find out more about Shubham Bhaskar, tune in to the podcast episode New Broker: from banking to broking.
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