Connect with Bill on LinkedIn.
My father was an attorney in the Air Force and I grew up dreaming of attending the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and becoming a pilot. Unfortunately, this dream was crushed when I found out I didn’t have 20-20 vision my junior year of high school. And I didn’t return to Colorado for over 20 years, until CoBiz Financial, the parent company of Colorado Business Bank, moved me here from their affiliate bank in Arizona.
I graduated from Hillsdale College, a small school in south-central Michigan, with degrees in Chemistry and Finance. Knowing that I didn’t have the patience to pursue a PhD in Chemistry, I found a job in the banking industry to utilize my Finance degree.
I began my banking career with Comerica Bank in Detroit, MI, where I attended an 18-month formal credit training program and then accepted a job with their Middle Market Banking group. Middle Market was defined as companies with revenue of $15 million or more. After about three years as a commercial banker, Comerica moved me to Phoenix, AZ, in 2004 to help re-build their recently restructured Middle Market Banking team. I spent another six years with Comerica in Phoenix before moving to an Arizona-based bank, National Bank of Arizona. After four years with National Bank of Arizona, an opportunity for a player-coach position opened up with Arizona Business Bank, the Arizona operations of CoBiz Financial. After two and a half years at Arizona
Business Bank, an opportunity within the bank opened up in Littleton, affording me the opportunity to “finally” move to Colorado.
My tenure in Arizona afforded me the opportunity to serve several non-profit boards and advisory committees. I was a board member with the Phoenix Metropolitan YMCA, where I chaired their financial development committee and served on the executive committee. As the development committee chair, I chaired the annual golf tournament, which was held the last Friday of October. Five out of seven years, it was over 100 degrees the day of the tournament! I also served on the LISC-Phoenix local advisory committee. LISC, Local Initiatives Support Corporation, fostered public-private partnerships to create healthy, vibrant, diverse TOD communities along Phoenix’s new light-rail system.
While at Hillsdale College, I met my future wife and we married in 2002. We have three kids – an eight year-old son, a five year-old daughter, and a three year-old daughter – and 2 dogs. We’ve put 15,000 miles on our Tahoe since moving to the Denver area in July 2016. I like to think we’re getting to know the state but there is still so much left to see. I grew up skiing in the Midwest and East Coast, and after taking a 10-year hiatus in Arizona, my ski legs are slowly coming back.