This first installment in a three-part series challenges one of the most repeated narratives in mortgage today—that the industry is “broken.” Drawing on decades of perspective, David Lykken reframes today’s pressures not as failure, but as the natural result of an operating model that has been pushed beyond its original design. While the legacy model was built for volume, headcount, and manual control, today’s environment demands intelligence, leverage, and speed. This episode is not about technology—it’s about structure. Why have years of tech investment failed to materially improve outcomes? What’s the difference between modernizing versus rebuilding? And how can leaders tell if they’re solving surface issues or addressing something deeper? This conversation establishes a critical lens for understanding the transformation already underway—and why the future of mortgage will not be built through incremental fixes, but through fundamental redesign.