This time for Laura Boison, it is she who is making the move instead of the company that employs her. Boison will join the Lexington investment firm E.S. Barr & Company, leaving her position at Chase Bank, the former Bank One, which was First Security National Bank when she signed on as a teller in 1974.
"I've always been in the same building," noted Boison. "I've been with First Security, Bank One and Chase. Thirty years! When I say that I think, 'Oh my gosh, that's my parents, not me!'" Since '74, Boison has managed a credit department, a commercial loan division and business banking before being named city executive/senior vice president at Chase.
In the process, she has collected quite a loyal fan base, including many local professionals whose careers parallel Boison's.
"When Laura called me and informed me that she was resigning and moving on, we took that moment to reflect and talk about when we first met and the fact that it was her first week in the bank, I was her first customer and that she had no idea what she was doing and neither did I," said Rick Ekhoff, a founding partner of EOP, recalling the 1981 launch of the Lexington architecture firm. "Through the years, as her career blossomed and our firm grew, she kept being put in these loftier positions, but she still kept us as her only client. People would ask me what bank we used, and I would always say, 'The Bank of Laura Boison!'"
For premium†audio†speaker manu-facturer Kathy Gornik, the relationship began by mere chance. "We started THIEL Loudspeakers back in the late seventies, and one of the more fortunate events was a cold call Laura made at our new little company when she was at First Security. We had been turned down by several other local banks for a loan to buy some used manufacturing equipment at auction and were quite frustrated at our inability to take advantage of an opportunity to grow our production. I still scratch my head remembering that day when Laura, who had just met us, said, 'Well, I'll need some paperwork, but I'm quite sure I can get you what you need, and is that all? Is there anything more?' Not only did she secure the loan, which we paid back on time, but she has been at our side every since, through thick and thin, enabling our business to grow and prosper."
Echoing Ekhoff,†Gornik added, "I like to tell people that I don't do business with Chase, I do business with Laura Boison. If Laura had left for another bank, we would have followed her there. Small businesses need relationships like the one Laura gave us all these years. We consider her to be a critical factor in our success and will sorely miss her! That she is such an outstanding individual on a personal level makes our relationship with her even more special and a real rarity. We feel a sense of gratitude and good fortune for having her as part of our business and our lives."
Boison has packed into three-plus decades not only her own growth in a banking career, but also the devotion of a mother of five who still has managed to find time for active roles in Lexington civic life.†
"One of the things that's important to me," she said, "is my involvement in the community. I have kids, and I want to make sure that they understand that role. Ed Barr is completely supportive."
"You want to have as strong a team as possible. Laura is known to us, John Maddox and myself," Ed Barr said of his new employee. "She has a record of accomplishment, and she will add to our human and intellectual capital. We're delighted that she will be joining us, primarily because I think that her addition will prove to the benefit of our clients."
Boison serves Hospice of the Bluegrass as a member of its executive board, treasurer and chair of the organization's audit and finance committee. She is a past chair and board member of Women Leading Kentucky, a member of the LexArts board as well as the board of Junior Achievement. And she chaired the board of the YMCA of Central Kentucky Family Care Center for five years.
Taken together, said Boison, an accomplished career coupled with consistent civic engagement can bear rewards. "After 30 years, you start to develop a franchise value because of a lot of different things: 30 years of building a client base, 30 years of community involvement, 30 years of building good relationships."
Differences in corporate cultures, primarily between that of a giant such as Chase and the more intimate setting of E.S. Barr eventually prompted Boison to consider a change in her own direction. "Chase had evolved a bit more†into†implement than create. It will be more create than implement," (at E.S. Barr), she explained.
In the end, Lexington's a big small town in what really can be a small world. "Ironically," Boison noted, "Ed and I started out together at First Security. Our offices were two offices apart on the same floor."