2009 Rising Stars in Banking: Barbara Finney

Barb Finney has been a crucial contributor to two major mergers in the last three years, and has distinguished herself as an influential senior officer at the $1.5 billion MidWestOne Bank, Iowa City, Iowa..Finney is a senior vice president based in Oskaloosa and market president of the bank's second-largest market. She led the merger of four banks held by what was then the Mahaska Investment Company. One of the banks, Pella State Bank, a de novo at the time, hired Finney to help the bank get up and running. In 2006 Finney, moved to Oskaloosa and became the operations officer for the holding company. In an effort to improve consistency and efficiency among the four banks, she led the consolidation into MidWestOne Bank..Last year, MidWestOne and Iowa State Bank & Trust executed a merger of equals, which Finney described as a partnership between two holding companies "that really fit into each other's footprints very well and had a lot of commonalities as far as our banking philosophy, systems, vendors and core systems. It just made sense.".Finney chaired the product standardization portions of the merger, which made MidWestOne Iowa's fifth-largest bank, with 25 locations in 20 Iowa markets..As a result of that experience Finney now chairs the company's product development committee.."It has representation from each area of the bank, retail, commercial, mortgage and so on. We all come together to say this is what is new in the market, or this is what our competition is thinking about, this is what's available from vendors," Finney said. "By bringing the information together we can identify and prioritize what we need to be looking at or doing… [and] what is needed from marketing, training, the whole gamut to successfully develop products.".The committee is working on mobile banking now and has led rollouts of rewards checking and remote deposit capture in the last 12 months..Finney started her career as an examiner in the Sioux City, Iowa, office of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.."Being a regulator was a great way to learn banking. You get that big-picture understanding of all facets of the bank, and then you also get a chance to hone in on [specifics]," Finney said. "You see a large variety of different approaches. You see the good and the bad. It stuck with me throughout my career.".Finney has a degree from the University of Iowa—"I'm a Hawkeye," she said—and also graduated with highest honors from the Graduate School of Banking at Colorado, Boulder..Charlie Funk, president and CEO of MidWestOne, said "we had a huge hole to fill in Oskaloosa with the retirement of John Pothoven, a 34-year employee. Barb has stepped into her new role and has quickly become one of our key senior officers.".He added that Finney has "outstanding, not just good, communication skills," and that she is getting to be both well-known and well-respected in the bank and outside it.."She has stepped up her community leadership as would be expected for any market president," Funk said..Finney works with the Mahaska Community Development Group, an organization that works closely with the Oskaloosa Area Chamber and Development Group on local job creation, infrastructure and business development initiatives. She also serves on the area soccer club board..Finney, her husband and two children like to attend sporting events, and the children themselves are very active. Finney is also a dedicated runner.."I had a lifelong dream of running a marathon, and I did that in 2007," she said. "I ran Grandma's Marathon in Duluth, Minn. It was great fun."Other 2009 Rising Stars in Banking include:David Wittenberg, United Prairie Bank, Mankato, Minn.Brad Koehn, F&M Bank, West Point, Neb.Amy Thiede, Prairie Community Bank, Marengo, Ill.Mike Stratton, Better Banks, Bartonville, Ill.Greg Vetter, American Bank Center, Bismarck, N.D.Lisa Artz, Choice Financial Group, West Fargo, N.D.Anthony Gambaiani, Jackson County Bank, Seymour, Ind.