CTO?

I had an opportunity Wednesday to attend a meeting of the Triad Job Search Network. This is a weekly meeting of those seeking to be re-employed, after losing past employment, mostly through no fault of their own. During the two hour meeting, there is peer encouragement, success stories, training, coaching, possible opportunity sharing, and moral support. The other attendees were actively looking for 40 hour a week jobs in their old career field or were considering a change to a new field. I was there more in the roll of a spectator and because my friend, Lori Carter, is one of the moderators. I don’t really want to work 40 hours a week. I’m more or less retired and just want a little something to bring in some “rainy day” money. I could hardly have picked a better day to be there. We had a guest speaker. In my career, I have run across my share of CEOs, COOs, CFOs, and more than my share of CIOs. Wednesday was the first time I ever met a CTO. Okay, you’re saying to yourself, “I know what a CEO, a COO, a CFO, and a CIO all are (if you don’t know, ask me later.) What in this world is a CTO?” Ah ha! That is the exact same question I asked myself when I read the name and title of our guest speaker as it appeared on the meeting room white board. Lisa Snowden’s business card lists her as a Senior Vice President and (pay attention, here it comes) Chief Talent Officer. Her job is to identify and hire the very best talent available for her company. She was at the meeting to share her experience with those hoping to soon be employed. I think she did a bang-up job of that. She shared her top 10 list and discussed it carefully. She used anecdotes to bring the lessons to life and answered questions until there were no more to answer. Since I’m not looking for a fulltime, career type job, I didn’t pay as much attention to what she said as I did other things about her. I knew I was going to like her as soon as she walked into the room. Her field of business is not known for being on the cutting edge of haute couture. On the other hand, since you are going to be talking to a group who is trying to put a good spin to being unemployed, why dress like you are attending a wake? Lisa came in wearing a pink pants suit. It may not have occurred to her when she put it on, but it looked like spring and like joy and like she was there to deliver good news. We sat in chairs arranged in a circle and she sat down in one too. I would have had to have had a podium to cling to and to hide my knocking knees, but she relaxed and treated us like people she might like to get to know. What I liked the very best though was her body language as she spoke. Her hands were in constant motion and so were her eyes. She leaned forward when she was really trying to drive a point home and relaxed in her seat when there was group conversation. I could have listened and talked to her all day and felt at the end that I hadn’t been interviewed so much as begun a friendship. As I walked her out to her car, I kidded her telling her that I thought I could have listened to her talk about rectal cancer in raccoons and found myself to be equally as interested. Her skills in presentation of herself and her subject were lessons for us all, whether or not we wanted a job. What company would have a CTO in their upper management? My first guess would have been one of the cutting-edge, techno industries. My last guess would have been a bank. Lisa is a member of the management team of Piedmont Federal Savings Bank. Growing up in Winston-Salem, I was familiar with Piedmont Federal Savings & Loan Association. I never considered the reputation of one bank more than another, but had I been asked, I would have described Piedmont Federal as a true example of a hometown financial institution; not one that just pretended to know their customers better, but actually worked at it and did. I don’t know whether or not Lisa is the first CTO at Piedmont, but I hope that she will be there a long time and won’t be the last one. I salute the management leadership that puts so much emphasis on its people that they are willing to invest in a Lisa Snowden. I salute Lisa Snowden that she is willing to invest in spending time trying to bring out the very best in job seekers. Just her presence sells Piedmont Federal to me. I happen to be in the market for a new banking partner. I’m not all that wild about the huge size and economic vulnerability of my current bank. I don’t know that I’ll end up being a customer of Piedmont Federal, but I do know that I’ll now stop by and hear what they have to say.