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Lisa Oliver
Lisa Oliver
Title: President and CEO, Cooperative Bank of Cape Cod
Age: 53
Experience: 29 years
From her office in Cleveland, Lisa Oliver always thought she might buy a place on Cape Cod when she was ready to retire. She’d vacationed there for years, after all, and loved the community. So when a recruiter called her with a community bank president job on the Cape, she initially thought it might be a joke. Now the bank’s fifth president in its 95 years and the first woman to achieve that role, Oliver sat down with Banker & Tradesman to talk about some of her priorities and her thoughts about mentoring the next generation of bankers.
Q: What are your current thoughts on the transition process?
A: For me, what’s important right now, since [former president and CEO Joel Crowell] was here for 47 years – 33 of those as CEO – our first order of priority is a very smooth transition from Joel to me. My goal right now is to be a listener and an observer because I’ve been in banking my whole career, but I haven’t been in the Cape. I’m new to this market and I’m learning the nuances of the community, so that means listening and observing and not necessarily changing management tactics.
Around the middle to end of summer, we’ll formulate a growth strategy likely focused on the commercial piece and technology, probably with a CRA component. That’s the way I’m thinking through the transition. Change is a challenge, but change can also be interspersed with growth, so getting people to think about change not just for change’s sake, but having a purposeful change that says “This is how we grow.” My goal is to have that become a driving force for acceptance in the group here.
Q: What are some areas where you might focus your attention once you’re ready to think about that growth strategy?
A: I have a focus on small business, commercial business and growing our penetration as a bank in that segment, but also working to support the businesses in the market and some of the challenges they’re having. How do we help with seasonal workers? Well, I can’t help with staffing, but I can brainstorm different types of things that we can do or help organizations think through the financing of projects to provide affordable housing.
One of the things we see in low- to moderate-income markets are people who are unbanked, and that’s a challenge. They might be people who have misused a checking account and now they’re on a Chex Systems watch list, so they’ve become the mattress economy, and they can’t avail themselves of a small savings account or the safety of a financial institution, so how do we help that group of people get back on their feet?
And when I think about some of the more commercial niches, I’m thinking about putting a focus on veterinary and dental practices. Not that there’s a connection between the two of them, but I think for a bank like the Coop, we can deliver credit, certainly depository services and relevant advice into that segment.
Q: You’re the Coop’s first female president and CEO; can you share with B&T’s readers some of your thoughts about women in banking?
A: Women, on a per headcount basis, occupy the most seats in banking, when you look at the industry overall. As you go up into the leadership ranks, there’s less and less and less as a percentage, and there are all different reasons for it. I don’t have any new insights about it. I do think as you have fewer role models, there’s less of a guidepost on how to navigate the political waters.
Without the confidence, without the role models, without the significant involvement of more senior women helping the more junior women – and I’d say the mantra really is carry as you climb, I feel a great responsibility to help women grow in their careers – I think it’s going to continue to be a challenge to see the evolution of women into those higher roles. That being said, there’s tremendous talent out there and women need to give themselves more credit.
Q: Does that mean you’ll focus on building a mentoring culture into the bank under your leadership?
A: Absolutely. I have seven senior executive direct reports: five of them are women, so we’ve got a good head start, but it’s absolutely about paying it forward. Mentoring is critically important, but there’s no one-size-fits-all. Very often we’ve tried to set up formal mentoring programs and what doesn’t work is trying to force someone to sit and talk to somebody else. That’s painful.
Now, should you do that for someone in a department who needs to learn the roles and responsibilities? Absolutely. There’s functional mentoring, but personal growth, leadership development, I think comes by … identifying people inside and outside the organization that they meet, that they respect, who maybe have something that you as an individual don’t, and say, “Hey, would you mind if you and I met maybe once a quarter?”
You’ve got to be willing to self-identify where you think your gaps are, ask questions of other people to identify that and then find your own little board of directors to help. That to me is the best mentoring structure.
The other thing about mentoring is, you start with a mentor; the next phase is advocacy, and then there’s sponsorship. Mentors talk to you, advocates talk with you and sponsors talk about you. That’s the continuum of mentorship. Having a mentor is just the first step. You have to be purposeful in asking people to assume those roles and be part of that chain for you, because if you’re just waiting for someone to come up to you and say, “Hey, I want to be your mentor,” that’s not going to happen. You’ll have a boss and that’ll be it. It must be a very personally driven process.
Oliver’s Top Five Fun & Unusual Opportunities Afforded By Her Career:
- Met and skied with Picabo Street at a bank client event in Park City, Utah.
- Served as a board member on the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
- Threw out the first pitch at a Cleveland Indians game – twice.
- Was emcee for a Guinness World Record for most snuggies worn by a group of people at the same time (at a Cavaliers game).
- Was a golf cart partner with Terry “Tito” Francona.
