Enabled a Large REIT to Focus on its Business Plan by Creating a Talent Administration Solutions

A large commercial mortgage real estate investment trust (REIT) experienced explosive growth after the financial crisis as traditional lenders retreated from the market.

The REIT provided mortgage loans and debt investments for a range of sectors, including hotel, multifamily, retail and office properties. To maintain flexibility in executing its business plan, the company had added independent contractors to its team as it grew, until the team totaled nearly a dozen professionals, some with their own analysts. But the model became cumbersome and difficult to manage over time, as each professional had negotiated an individualized employment agreement, entailing unique policies, procedures and demands. The REIT needed a solution to create a uniform and consistent personnel structure, and a thoughtful change management strategy to avoid turnover among its seasoned professionals.

Solution & Outcome

A talent platform with a uniform set of policies and procedures aligned with the client’s guidelines and culture.

The REIT turned to SitusAMC, which developed a bespoke talent platform for the client, driven by consistent policies, processes, titles and compliance guardrails that mirrored the REIT’s guidelines for internal employees, including uniform regulatory compliance monitoring and performance reviews.

Once established, SitusAMC worked to “lift and shift” the 11 Client contractors to the SitusAMC platform. SitusAMC renegotiated and restructured each covenant, highlighting the advantages of joining the platform, from health insurance to more timely expense reimbursement to the ability to jettison the costly and time-consuming payroll operations required for analysts on their teams. Ultimately, SitusAMC successfully transitioned ten of the eleven professionals to its platform.