Carlos Renteria, Director de Seguridad de la Información de Southside Bank, a la izquierda, y Russell Estrada, Vicepresidente Senior de Seguridad para la Prevención del Fraude de Southside Bank, a la derecha, conversan durante un pasado taller para hispanohablantes. (Foto contribuida)

Southside Bank will host its third annual Small Business Workshop for Spanish Speakers from 5 to 7 p.m. Thursday at 1201 S Beckham Ave.

Southside Bank started doing this workshop at its Gentry location in Tyler to give back to the community surrounding the bank.

Employees who work closely with the Hispanic community know it’s important to offer the workshop in Spanish. Russell Estrada, Southside Bank Senior VP Fraud Prevention Security Officer, often met clients who owned businesses but had many questions.

“There’s a need for learning the right way to do things, like how to get credit,” Estrada said. “I’ve seen customers that started from needing that education to now them having their own commercial business to where they’re now getting commercial loans, or they’re growing. Their business is growing.”

Carlos Renteria, Southside Bank Chief Information Security Officer, often hears from customers who want to be aware of fraud threats. Customer Care Manager Alma Dear receives questions on services and loans. At the workshop, they hope to answer questions like this.

“We try to make it approachable, make it very humble … to the customers, so that they feel comfortable reaching out and doing that,” Renteria said.

The event will have food trucks and vendors including Bryan’s Cheesecakes. The event is family-friendly. The activities start at 5 p.m. and the workshop, starting at 6 p.m., to cover various topics including cybersecurity, technology, fraud prevention, commercial lending, and mortgage lending.

For Renteria, answering people’s questions is his favorite part. He enjoys providing reliable information.

“You get a podium to get that answer that everybody wants, they just never had the opportunity to ask and get directly from the source,” Renteria said. “It’s usually secondhand, third-hand, and you don’t really have the confidence of knowing if it’s accurate. Hearing it from the professionals makes you get that sense of doing that they are getting the right information from the source of it.”

In addition to learning about technology, lending and other topics, the workshop is an opportunity for people to network. Southside Bank will bring their community partners like Tyler Hispanic Business Alliance and Hispanic Professionals Association of Tyler.

“We’re bringing in more partners to help us with the growth and to reach maybe some community members that we never met before or don’t know anything about Southside bank,” Dear said.

HBA President and CEO Nancy A. Rangel will be the moderator and David Carrasco, president of the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professional (NAHREP), will be a panelist. In addition, they will have the Latino Entrepreneur Association and NAHREP present.

The workshop will be conducted entirely in Spanish.

EN ESPAÑOL

EN ESPAÑOL: El tercer taller anual para hispanohablantes pretende ayudar a los empresarios hispanos, tylerpaper.com/espanol