Kevin Harbour

Managing Director - Head of Healthcare Originations, Wells Fargo Capital Finance

40 Under 40 Category: Business Development

Biography:

Kevin Harbour currently serves as the head of Healthcare Originations for Wells Fargo Capital Finance’s Healthcare Finance Group. In this role, Kevin leads a team of business development professionals focused on originating and executing senior secured-asset-based, real estate, and cash flow financings to middle-market healthcare companies throughout the United States, operating across a variety of sectors, including acute care and specialty hospitals, post-acute care, behavioral health, hospice, medical device, pharmaceutical and others.

Kevin has over 14 years of experience with Wells Fargo Capital Finance. In his previous role as national underwriting manager of the Healthcare Finance Group, Harbour was responsible for overseeing the structuring, underwriting and execution of all healthcare transactions. Prior to this, he held various roles in the areas of originations, underwriting, and portfolio management, where his experience included working out of distressed loans, identifying and structuring new credit opportunities, and leading due diligence efforts on potential transactions.

Kevin holds a B.S. in finance from the University of Arizona and an M.B.A. from the Anderson School of Business at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Is there a piece of professional advice that you would give yourself if you could go back in time?

Flexibility will be as critical to your success as hard work and technical skill. Throughout your career, one constant theme will be change. Whether it’s a change in the economic environment, a change in job function, a change in management, a change in business initiatives or a change in institutional priorities, change is both constant and unavoidable.  How you deal with this change can have a profound impact on your career and your overall happiness.

Throughout my career at Wells Fargo Capital Finance, I’ve experienced change on multiple levels. While these changes initially resulted in feelings of discomfort and uncertainty, I’ve since learned to recalibrate my thinking. By viewing change as an opportunity to improve your business as opposed to a threat, you can better diagnose the situation and make the adjustments necessary to adapt to your new reality. The faster you recognize and embrace this mentality, the faster you can use it to your advantage.

What is the best professional advice you have been given and how have you implemented it?

Two pieces of advice come to mind. The first of these was more impactful early in my career, but I still use it today: When stepping into a new situation, make sure to treat every task, no matter how innocuous or mundane, as an opportunity to excel. As a new team member, it can be difficult to differentiate yourself and earn the trust of your colleagues and managers. If handled timely and well executed, everyday tasks such as scheduling a meeting, responding to an e-mail, or preparing a basic memo are all opportunities to demonstrate your competency and earn trust in the process. Once you’ve established that trust and others know they can count on you to execute, you will earn the opportunity to take on more prominent assignments. 

The second great piece of advice I received is: if you don’t take responsibility for your career development, no one will be there to do it for you. While it’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day activities of your job, it’s critical to think longer term about your career path and to identify growth opportunities and stretch assignments that can assist in your development. However, identification isn’t enough. Once identified, you need to verbalize your development goals and plan of action to your managers so they are aware of your longer-term career objectives. Throughout my career at Wells Fargo Capital Finance, I’ve been extremely fortunate to have managers and mentors who supported my development and worked with me to help me achieve my career goals. Yet, it was incumbent on me to take the first step and establish a dialogue around my development in order to make that possible.  

What do you know now that you wish you knew when you first started your career?

Always keep a balanced mindset. Throughout my career, I’ve encountered a variety of high points and low points. It’s important to celebrate high points briefly and analyze what led to that success, but know that nothing is permanent. When faced with a low point, learn from the situation and move on with the confidence that the knowledge you gained will help you achieve your desired outcome when the next opportunity arises.  Complacency and negativity can both be equally damaging to long-term career goals. In order to continually achieve success, it’s critical to treat both wins and losses as learning opportunities that you can draw from as you embark on future endeavors, while continually recognizing that you are not far removed from either outcome.