For Marc Womack, TD Auto Finance’s new chief executive, improving customer service, strengthening the partnership with TD Bank and championing diversity are top priorities in 2021.
Womack was promoted in November after serving as chief operating officer of TD Auto for three years, a role in which he spearheaded customer strategies in commercial lending, consumer underwriting, distribution and dealer operations.
TD Auto Finance was the 17th-largest auto finance company in the nation at the end of last year, with $24.1 billion of auto outstandings, according to Big Wheels Auto Finance Data.
Womack is responsible for expanding TD Auto’s U.S. auto lending business and improving its retail and commercial lending profitability. He will also “drive integration between TD Auto Finance and TD Bank’s consumer business,” according to a company statement.
TD Bank and TD Auto focus on customer experience, both for dealers and consumers, Womack told Auto Finance News. “We’re not trying to be everything to everybody, we keep focused on that delivery of great service to our customers,” he said. “As we’ve looked at the macroeconomic factors during the pandemic and how that’s really driven customer expectations … it’s made us think about how we define what service is, given these changes.”
Womack said the subsidiary’s partnership with the bank will continue to strengthen next year, especially given pandemic-spurred transitions. “As you as you start to look at the digitization of auto sales and auto finance processes, our linkage with the consumer bank is a natural fit,” he said. “We’ve always had a partnership with the broader organization, but I think now it’s going to help us evolve faster.”
Womack has more than 27 years of consumer and commercial banking experience in auto, personal loan, commercial real estate, credit card and insurance. He held leadership roles at JPMorgan Chase and Hyundai Capital America before spending the last seven years at TD.
Working with a variety of leaders, Womack said, set the stage for the professional he is today. “I always believe that everything that you experience is a lesson that you learn, whether it’s positive, negative or neutral,” he said. “All the leaders that I’ve ever worked with have a little bit of a spice in the gumbo pot that is my leadership style.”
Womack also is a member of the board of directors for the American Financial Services Association (AFSA) and the digital lending platform RouteOne, which TD Auto helped create in 2002. Both groups, Womack said, have provided him with various perspectives on auto industry issues and where executives’ focus should lie. “There’s a lot of common issues that are all affecting us, and that’s one way for us to amalgamate our voices relative to those things,” he said.
Womack also contributes to advancing the roles and contributions of African-American executives as a member of the Executive Leadership Council, a national organization with more than 800 members.
In recent years, Womack has championed diversity and inclusion initiatives for Capital One Auto Finance, Hyundai Capital America, JPMorgan Chase and TD Bank. Womack’s advice for professionals and mentees has also been featured on Diversity Inc., which provides U.S. company diversity rankings.
Diversity and inclusion must be part of businesses’ strategies, as companies with greater levels of diversity — ethnic, gender, racial and thought — perform better, Womack said, adding that diversity is a continued focus for TD Auto going into 2021.
“Anytime that you don’t have that [diversity] lens of what you’re doing strategically, you’re leaving money on the table,” Womack said. “I think as a member of the diverse community, it’s important to me to be able to share with [all] my colleagues the lessons that I’ve learned.”
This article originally appeared in the December issue of Auto Finance News, available here.
