Colony Bank and its CEO Heath Fountain were recently awarded the goBeyondProfit Champion Award for their commitment to a larger purpose beyond the bottom line. In our latest CEO interview with Colony Bank CEO, Heath Fountain, he clearly articulates not only the role that community banks play in improving lives but also offers practical ways to tie daily tasks and customer interactions back to the company purpose.
Founded in 1975, Colony Bank has grown to nearly 40 offices throughout Georgia, 500 team member, $3 billion in assets, and maintained their commitment as a community bank to those they serve.
More Than Just a Paycheck
I think you’ve seen people really wanting more out of life. What is this all about? The pandemic gave time for people to really do some soul-searching, and I think that’s another reason why it’s important for us to give back and to make sure we’re about something more than just profit and we’re about something more than the bottom line.
It’s an important selling point for us when we’re engaging with prospective team members; we’re telling them that their job is more than just a paycheck and more than just us achieving certain goals.
As a bank, we’re really important to people’s lives, we’re the grease that keeps the economy moving. We insert ourselves into the lives of our customers. And so we need to be sure we’re explaining to our team members how important that is and what our customers are able to achieve because we’re able to understand what their goals are and help fulfill a need they have for capital or payments, whatever it may be to achieve a goal.
As an industry we haven’t done a great job of helping connect people back to this larger purpose, It’s more important to the younger generation than my generation and generations before me. They want to be a part of something bigger, and we really offer that in community banking and here at Colony.
Understanding Leads to Meaningful Investment
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