Karen Camblin
This guest was born on the South side of Chicago but grew up amongst a chain of lakes in a small town in Northern Illinois, where she became a competitive water skier. A chance meeting on Valentine's Day in 1995 led her to her husband, Dave, and another chance interaction changed her path from stay at home mom to a successful career in the mortgage industry where she is a top producer for Guild Mortgage and now a mentor to others in the field. Welcome a wonderful professional and great friend, Karen Camblin.
Episode Transcription
Guiding Growth. Conversations with Community Leaders. In this podcast we'll explore the human journey of leaders, their stories of humility, triumph, roadblocks and lessons learned. Come join us as we journey together and uncover the questions you've always wanted to know. This podcast is brought to you by the Gilbert Chamber of Commerce providing resources, connections and belonging for business professionals and modern moments. An event and meeting venue in the heart of Gilbert today's episode. We have somebody but who is that? So we actually have a legend in our she's a state champion, she is.
We'll have to get her autograph before she leaves this guest tattoo on your arm. Maybe this guest was born on the south side of Chicago but grew up amongst a chain of lakes in a small town in northern Illinois where she became a competitive water skier. A chance meeting on valentine's day in 28 led her to her husband Dave and another chance interaction changed her path from stay at home mom to a successful career in the mortgage industry where she is a top producer for guild mortgage and now a mentor to others in the field.
Welcome, a wonderful professional and a great friend, Karen Campbell in. Thank you. Welcome. Welcome Karen, thank you. Glad to be here. We're excited to have you hear today we're going to start with what we call rapid fire. All right, here we go. Would you rather sing in public or dance in public? Dance in public, but you've done both right, of course, being in water skiing, I imagine you have plenty of these, but what's one of your nicknames lips? My name was lipinski. Okay, that makes more sense.
Would your 25 year old self think you are cool today? Of course, yeah, I think so. Confidence. How about this one? Have you ever won a contest? Yes, favorite movie of all time. Oh, that's tough. I just gotta go christmas story off the top of my head. Okay, that's a good one this time here. How do you overcome failures? Think through it and know that everything is figure out a ball. Okay, fill in the blank. Joy is family. Are you more of an introvert or an extrovert or a combination of both?
A combination of both, but more of an extrovert. Do you have a favorite book? I have a lot of favorite books. One that I recommend everybody is Rhinoceros success. Oh yes, that is a good book. I like that one. And what is one thing you're grateful for life? An opportunity and Dave and Dave also confident, Do you ever feel like your business is stuck? It's time to get traction and move it forward. Call Chris, spear your business coach and certified us implementer will help you use the entrepreneurial operating system to get traction and achieve your vision.
Call Chris today at (703) 270 270, that's 225. Okay, let's go back to Illinois. Let's go back. Alright, well competitive water skier years. I can't wait to get into that. Let's let's go a little bit earlier. Okay. Talk us through it. What's it look like? Born on the south side of Chicago. My mom and dad, we moved up north. My dad had grown up up north um on the chain of lakes and it's right on the Wisconsin border, we'd walk through the woods and you'd be in Wisconsin. We had two family cottage is up there, which is what the draw to northern Illinois was.
So we moved up there and I just loved it. I loved growing up on there. We could go to church to friends, houses, to family by boat, uh jet ski or snowmobile. Hence why I'm now in Arizona. Like that snow part um huge family um irish polish uh 19, 1st cousins on one side, six on the other. And it was amazing. And siblings. I have two siblings, a brother and sister. I am the oldest. Yeah. Alright. So school, what was it like there? And what kind of environment was that for you when you were growing up school was to me it was very tiny.
Um I graduated with 264 people. Um good friends, a lot of people stayed in that area and I broke the mold and came to Arizona uh went to eastern Illinois University and as I referred to it, chuck town, Illinois, but it was charleston Illinois. The town of charleston was 11,000 people and 10,703 of it was the campus. So very small town, but super fun. Kind of expanded when school's in session. And then, yes, there was no one in the summer down there. All right. So take us into your water skiing years.
So I loved the water and I loved water skiing and I happened to have some amazing friends who introduced me to their cousin and he was into three event water skiing. And so I water skied every day, twice a day, six days a week, um, with two neighbors who became very, very good friends. And We, they took me out, taught me everything I knew and who knew that at 13 years old, my parents would let me randomly travel and camp with two men. One of them was married um, around the state of Illinois.
The competitive water ski. I met a lot of good, good friends and then you became an instructor. I did coach water skiing. There were two locations on our lake. And do you still water ski? I tried to water ski once a year. That's awesome. I love that. So I got to know because I've done a bit of this. Are you barefoot skier? I've done barefoot skiing and it hurts, it hurts. So mostly slalom and trick was my big one. Okay, So it was fun and your girls water ski, they both know how to water ski, proud moment in my life.
Um, when Dave and I got a boat, we argued fish, fish boat, yeah, bass fishing boat or water ski boat and I wanted a master craft and nope, no, no, we have a fish ski boat, which is fine. It works. I'm curious because out here Minnesota guy, where do you go, where is a good place? The best place to go here for water skiing in that little area. Um, Saguaro sometimes pleasant, depends on what the day is. Mix it up with fishing and water skiing tomorrow. Okay, great.
So okay, this water skiing thing took a bit um, of your life. I should say. What, what kind of influences does that have on you today? When you look back on that. Like, okay, I learned this and I met people through this. Is there parallels, yes. Um, independence learn to take care of myself and be with people I didn't really know when I started traveling with them. Um, success, friendship. Um, I don't know a lot of lot of life lessons mentioned, Your parents kind of just let you do this thing.
So um, what kind of relationship there? I mean, obviously they had a trusting relationship in you, but yes, amazing relationship with my parents um, with Dave's schedule right now. They, he works nights and so I make it a point to go over once a week, play cards with them, have dinner, hang out. Um, super close. I was the oldest, so I had to take into consideration that they had to be there for my brother and sister. And water skiing was not an arena to, unless you were a family doing it together.
It wasn't an arena to have Spectators and do that kind of thing. But I learned water ski from my dad because he grew up water skiing, so huge influence. Okay, so in school then where'd you excel? What was the thing? Um, I would say social life that counts for sure. Well that would explain Valentine's day, 1995, um marketing, I had a marketing degree. Um I loved doing group projects and presentations, testing was not my thing. Okay more on the creative side storytelling and yes and I am not a school person I graduated, I was done, I never wanted to go back, you are still learning always write great books.
So I know that's about it. Okay, cool. When you think back on those school careers then, especially in college probably is there anybody in there that influenced you that you can remember that can help you on this path. My dad was principal. Oh my gosh, so you know my dad was a principal, my sister is a teacher, my sister in law is a teacher. Everybody was you know that was the career that was kind of expected and I could not go that path. It just was not in my arena you find though that even though you aren't doing that, you still do it.
I do do it. I am a coach with guild mortgage and I am coached, I am coached and I coached so and I love it. There's nothing more rewarding to me than mentoring or coaching somebody and watching their success. So what I find interesting is in the stories that you've shared, you follow your instinct often and you act on hunches. Um where does that come from? I mean that that's that trust in yourself. Is that developed over time? Is that somebody who, who told you to listen to your instinct?
What does that look like developed over time and probably from just a huge, strong rooted family. Um it's super interesting in our family um With as many cousins and aunts and uncles and my mom and dad, there is very little divorce. Um my parents will be married 52 years next year. Um Dave and I are 26 years. My sister and brother have both 20 plus years of marriage. So I, I think it's um, I don't know, it's always pushing to commitment and things like that are very important. And so what brings you, did you meet Dave in Arizona?
Okay. So what brought you to Arizona? Um my aunt and uncle had moved here when I was a sophomore in high school and we flew out and I loved it. I'm a sun person. So I went back graduated from Eastern, I had done my internship out here with America classifications, um, in their marketing department. So my girlfriend and I lived out here for the summer and had a blast, went back, finished my senior year, graduated and told my parents there were no jobs available in Chicago Illinois.
So I tempt with Motorola and beat feet and got out here and they, they support everything. I mean if it's our dream, they are supportive and even today they look back and because I have an entrepreneurial type job and nobody in our family does, um, they're, they're kind of amazed by me and I, that's very hard to say. Um, but it's cool. They're super proud. So the mortgage industry, how does that kind of evolve and get into that space? And that seems like a tangent from the marketing but not, but not.
Um, So I was at home with a, let's see Samantha Grace. So we have two daughters. Um Samantha was 2.5. Grace was turning one and I was refinancing our house and the loan officer said you should be a loan officer and I laughed. I said, uh, I'm a stay at home mom. She said, yeah, it's a great job for stay at home. Mom, flexible hours. All that said, um, have a marketing degree. No, nothing about mortgages. Yeah, marketing degree is what you need. So I hung up the phone started thinking about it called a couple of girlfriends in the industry and I was like, okay, so I went down to the school of real estate, which you did not have to do at the time, this is pre licensing, this is pre any rules, regulations, as far as being a loan officer were involved, went down to school of real estate, realized it's a big puzzle and I love puzzles and so I walked into a company that my girlfriend was at and they said, okay, go get loans said, well I have no idea what I'm doing, yeah, we'll walk you through it.
Um that branch manager left very quickly and I got a new branch manager who she passed away about two years ago was probably the biggest benefit of my career and I worked for her for eight years. Um and she was amazing. She taught me everything I needed to know about mortgage, introduced me to referral, networking and I just built my business from there and my one loan a month that I wanted to do to make a minivan payment went away and here I am. Crazy. So over the years, obviously you've seen some ups and downs in the industry and um what are some of the greatest lessons you think you've learned from this career path?
Oh boy um push forward. Don't give up. Um And I think I said it best a few years ago, I used to take every mortgage I did personally, I take it personally from a relationship standpoint, but when there's things that are out of your control starting to recognize that they're out of your control and letting that sit, well, not going in the corner and crying it out and, you know, taking it all on myself. Well, that's probably less than we could just exercise in everyday life, right?
Um, yeah, it's been a huge learning curve, huge learning curve, but um, 2008. Never thought we'd make it through that. And what was my alternative? And dave would always say, I said constantly, I need to go find a job like that pays a W two, I need to go, he said, so you're gonna be gone 8 to 5, miss everything that the girls have going on. He said, we will make it through this. So I don't think it, I know that if it was not for his support, I'd be behind a desk somewhere.
And what do you, if you look back at those, you know, those early years in the industry, what would you go back and tell yourself? I probably would have encouraged myself sooner than later in my career. I really, but I think time means everything to, I did not build a big career in the beginning because I was with the girls and I wanted to be there. Um and I always had my priorities and my clients knew it. I would say I'm, you know, I've got two daughters, but I'm happy to meet you, they'll be with me or do you mind swinging by my house and I'll get those documents.
So, um, I, it was, it was an amazing, it's been an amazing career and now that the girls as they've grown and are on their own or out of the house more, I'd really, really dove in. Yeah, well, and I love the example that you said that you can have both, you can be a hands on mom and have an amazing career and now you're beautiful girls are grown. They are, yeah, Yeah. It's weird. Often on the show, we dig into those that mentored you and, but I'm curious because you have such an interesting career now talk about how you mentor others a bit and some of the things you could give some advice on how to help others in that situation, like kind of, some of the leadership things you do. Okay.
So, um, I've always had a knack for helping other people. Um, maybe that's why I didn't become a teacher in the classroom. Um, I love watching people succeed in business. So a lot of people have business coaches, life coaches, all of that. So I started dabbling with a couple of people in the Gilbert chamber on mastermind groups and getting some coaching And in 2019 Guild mortgage decided they wanted the best coached loan officers across the country. So they created this um, elevate coaching program through guild and it was higher up guild loan officers, coaching, lower level producing loan officers.
So I was sitting at leadership summit in SAN Diego and they rolled it out and I kept thinking I should apply, but Grace is going to be a junior and I'm so busy and I just kept making all the excuses and I finally decided, okay, no more excuses. They're only taking 70 people. If I'm one of those, it was meant to be, if I'm not, it wasn't meant to be, I was one of the 70 that they took. So as we're on our way to the airport, I ran down, did my video my interview, the whole nine thing, the whole nine yards and I was accepted.
So I've been in since its inception, it was based off the book Rhinoceros success and they came to me at the end of last year, beginning of this year and this is so weird. Um said we've noticed your leadership and we feel like you would be a great coach and I was incredibly humbled, um excited and so I've been coaching now I'm just finishing up my first semester and what I have found is and I always tell people, I feel like I could grow your business better than I can grow my own because you're looking at it from the outside.
So I started coaching with guild and I started putting together some little events and seminars to help people have a better work life balance, live life on purpose, um take care of yourself because if you don't take care of yourself, you can't take care of other people and last or the week of thanksgiving, I got a card in the mail from one of my students and my coaching group and it said thank you so much for helping me and being there for me this semester. I've grown by leaps and bounds and it's so rewarding to see people that you have mentored be successful and so I just, I enjoy it and oftentimes as a mentor, it actually sharpens your own tool.
Exactly, you learn a lot from your students or even from people you're mentoring. I have found the Gilbert chamber has brought that to me a lot. Um getting together with, you know, great minds and just bouncing ideas off each other I think has led a lot of me towards this coaching. What are some of the biggest challenges you hear from your students in the coaching that maybe you can share with others here, um you hear it from anybody, whether it's in my coaching group or outside work life balance, um and getting over and we can talk about the mortgage industry as far as you know, where we're at right now, it's a struggle, so they have that struggle, but I feel every industry goes through their own struggles and recognizing how to pivot and do things differently to make it through what you're going through at that time.
So, and thinking and thinking outside the box. So, so this is all fairly new change for you then. So congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. I'm loving it. Yeah. Well, I appreciate that you, you take those same skill sets and you put it back into the membership at the chamber as well and your great leader with, with other businesses, especially those who are just trying to figure out where they want to go, who they are. Yes, I love that. So it's maybe too early to ask. But what do you see on the horizon now that you've just started this new phase, you see some more.
Um, so I actually just let them know that I'm willing to take on another coaching group. So I'm hoping to have two through guild, um, continue my mortgage career. I have an amazing assistant who I hired about a year and a half ago and you know, it allows me the opportunity to go out and do some income producing stuff and coach and be involved in the community and you have a wedding to plan and we have a wedding to plan? Yes. Yes. We're earning an amazing son in law.
So that's fantastic. Well, so then as far as the next chapters go with that then, do you see beyond that, like you guys staying Gilbert forever. Is this, this is forever home for you guys or you know? Yes. Oh, maybe Dave will I believe Arizona will be where we're at, um, hopefully a second home somewhere on the water, whether that's south Carolina or who knows where that will be. Um, but yes, we'll stay here. Um, Dave is headed towards retirement, hopefully in the next five years. Um, and then I will probably just continue to work forever and ever and ever with the flexibility.
I don't know that I could ever truly give it up. Yeah. Well, and you know, we didn't really touch on that, but you have to keep some things late because, you know, Dave has a pretty serious and intense career and I'm sure that that's a role that you have to play in your home life too. It is. Um, so yes, my husband's a city of phoenix police officer, um, 25 years on the street and it's had its ups and downs as everybody can imagine. And so to get him to retire and for me to maintain a career is kind of what we're looking at because we do have to keep it light.
It's, we're going to be done with this world as soon as we're done with it. So yeah, well, you, to make an incredible team. I'm honored to be able to work with you. I appreciate you and what you bring to our organization and just to my life. Well, thank you, I attribute a ton of my success to the relationships and what I put into and what I get out of the chamber. Thanks So thanks Karen, this has been a great story. I loved learning about your journey and thank you amazing things that I want to go water skiing with you sometime.
Well, let's do it. I want to watch. Oh no, Sarah will teach you. It's like walking on pillows. My dad used to say, well if that's the case, I would definitely want to see her try this. Well, thank you for joining us and thank you, goes out there today. Hopefully you enjoyed this conversation. We certainly did. And if you want more of this, please subscribe to our tribe and you can give them right in your inbox. Appreciate you listening. Thank you, guiding growth conversations with community leaders.
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