Four Decades Of Service

Four Decades Of Service

Kathy Underwood Shows Leadership For Banking And The Community

BY KEN LIEBESKIND, SPECIAL TO BANKING NEW ENGLAND

Kathy Underwood was toiling away in a Maine grocery story while a college student. One of her accounting professors approached her and told her to seek more lucrative employment. He made an introduction to a banker friend not knowing he had laid the foundation for a 43-year career.

While completing her economics degree, Underwood worked part-time as a Portland Savings Bank teller. Then she transferred to Key Bank where she would stay for 25 years.

She’s now president/CEO of Ledyard National Bank, a community bank based in Hanover, New Hampshire with six branches in the granite state and one in Vermont. It’s a position Underwood has held since 2005.

In spite of her professor’s advice to seek more money, Underwood’s career has not been one built just seeking renumeration. It’s a collection of service to her profession and to the greater community. It’s why she has been named the 2020 recipient of the Sandra J. Pattie Distinguished Leadership Award. She joins a number of prominent New England women bankers who have received the accolade.

The award is given to prominent New England women bankers in tribute to Sandra J. Pattie, the first female CEO of BankNewport in Rhode Island. Previous winners include Michelle Roberts, president and community affairs officer of Bristol County Savings Bank in Massachusetts in 2017; Ellen Ford, CEO of the People’s Credit Union in Rhode Island in 2018; and Cynthia Merkle, president/CEO of the Union Savings Bank in Connecticut, and Guilda Nogueira, CEO, East Cambridge Bank in Massachusetts, in 2019.

“It’s a great honor to be recognized as being helpful to my industry. It’s been a great career, it’s never the same and it’s very rewarding to help our clients in our communities,” said Underwood.

A GREAT CAREER

After college, Underwood started her career with Key Bank. Her employment path would take her to president of the bank’s operations in Maine. “I started as a loan collateral clerk processing loan documents and ran the private banking department before becoming president of the bank in 2000 and maintained that position until 2005,” she recalled in a telephone interview.

She was hired as president of Ledyard National Bank in 2005 by Dennis Logue, the chairman of the board at the time who said, “It was a difficultnegotiation but we stuck to it and she has been remarkable over the years.”

Logue cited three characteristics that generate success – mastery of the tongue, enthusiasm and belief in a higher power. “She has all three of these,” he said. “She is quite articulate speaking clearly in front of an audience and she’s done a good job leading the bank. We faced challenges in 2008 but we continued to pay dividends. She did a good job of preparing us for what’s coming and has done a great job of managing our financial advisors and leading the activities of a growth phase.”

Underwood oversees a bank that is currently achieving superlative numbers with record quarterly earnings for the second quarter of 2020 and year to date. Total revenue for the quarter was $8,149,150, an 11.6% increase over 2019 with total revenue for the first six months of $15,453,775, an 8.3% increase.

“We’ve achieved record earnings for a number of years and we’re one of the top 200 community banks in the nation in the under $2 billion category,” Underwood said. “We have a strong wealth management department and commercial lending group and we’re hitting on all cylinders.”

The bank is operating efficiently during the coronavirus. “We’re refinancing mortgages and giving two to three times as many loans as we’ve ever done with low rates and the commercial department is focused on PPP loans. We did over 300 in April, which is more commercial loans than we did all of last year and we just started a process of forgiving those loans. We’re advising and hand holding our clients and want to be responsive and helpful.”

Logue said two of Underwood’s finest moves were providing company stocks for employees and invigorating the trust department. “Providing dividends to employees was a great morale builder and she brought in Dennis Mitchell, a colleague of hers, to build the trust department, which helped us develop private banking.”

“She is the fourth bank president I’ve worked with and far and away the best,” he noted.

Ledyard National is a community bank that serves the Upper Valley, Lake Sunapee and Concord region of New Hampshire, as well as a slice of Vermont. It’s a region Underwood is proud to serve. “As a community bank we’re tightly connected to the people and businesses in the community,” she said. “Our employees live here and are decision makers. We lend money to businesses in the community and donate

to non-profits so we’re dedicated to the health of the community, which is critical to all of us.”

Underwood and Ledyard National Bank have receive accolades for their volunteer work.

SERVING THE INDUSTRY

While President/CEO of Ledyard National, Underwood also served as a board member of the Boston Federal Reserve Bank, one of the central banks in the U.S. that conducts research and participates in monetary policy-making to promote sound growth and financial stability in New England.

In March, Underwood was appointed to the Boston Fed’s First District Community Depository Institutions Advisory Council after serving two terms on the Boston Fed’s nine-member board and was chairman of the Fed Board’s Audit Committee. She acted as a liaison between New England’s regional banks and the central bank. As a Reserve Bank board member for two previous terms she said she shared management news and best practices of Ledyard bank as she participated in national meetings.

Underwood also served on the national level. For two years, from 2014 to 2016, she was a member of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Community Bank Advisory Council. “I was there to insure that no harm was done and no unintended consequences could occur on rules that were put in place to protect the consumer,” she said.

Honoring employees is an important hallmark of Underwood’s leadership style.

IN THE COMMUNITY

Underwood is also renowned for the work she has done to support the American Heart Association. “My husband John was diagnosed with heart disease and needed a transplant and I joined the association in Portland because I’m interested in their mission. I chaired the first Go Red for Women event, which was very successful and it’s grown since then,” she said.

Go Red for Women is a comprehensive platform that increases women’s heart health awareness and serves as a catalyst to improve the lives of women.

She has incorporated the heart association’s mission at Ledyard National. “We have blood pressure checks for employees and put a defibrillator in the office. We also offer healthy snacks for clients and provide educational materials.”

Ledyard National Bank was awarded the heart association’s Fit- Friendly Worksite Gold Achievement award in 2015 and invites other organizations to join them in the Ledyard Live Well Walking Challenge every fall.

The bank has also accelerated its charitable donations during the pandemic. “We’ve donated to non-profits and sponsor events like food pantries,” Underwood said. “We support local hospitals and organizations that need us during these hard times.”

Kathy Underwood will be honored at the New England Women in Banking conference at the Wyndham Newport Hotel in Middletown, Rhode Island on Oct. 16. The event is presented by Banking New England. Go to nebankwomen.com to information and to register.