Executive Q&A: Lisa Barksdale, Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Get to know key business people in the Valley through our "Executive Q&A" feature. This month, learn more about Lisa Barksdale, GPCC board member and senior vice president for Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Q. What was your first job and the most important lesson you learned from it?
A. My first job was at age 14 working Saturdays and Sundays manning the concession stand at a flea market owned by a neighbor in St. Petersburg, Florida. All the neighborhood kids worked there and it’s where we all learned working outside in Florida during the summer was not much fun. But, perhaps more importantly, I learned about paying taxes, saving, and spending hard earned money. This experience definitely gave me a foundation for handling money responsibly.
 
Q. What's the most unusual job or duty you've ever handled?
A. At the flea market one of my jobs was to make cotton candy. It might sound like fun, but it is such a sugary, sticky mess that gets all over you, I have not eaten cotton candy since.
 
Q. What do you like most about your job?
A. What I like most about my job is the opportunity to learn how a wide variety of businesses and industries operate, and to interact with the people who make businesses successful. Just a few of the businesses I have worked with are: catfish farm and processor; producer of genetically engineered cotton seed and soybean seed; heavy equipment dealers – including a ride aboard a huge dump truck on a surface coal mine; hospitals; kitchen appliance manufacturer; micro-brewery; air medical emergency transport; hard wood flooring manufacturer – from timber to finished product; horse racetrack; barge operators on Mississippi River and air flight school.
 
Q. What's a typical workday like for you?
A. Every day is full of challenges and opportunities as our team works to be client-focused, deliver innovative financial solutions and drive high client satisfaction and loyalty. Standing routines to manage the team and our business are integral to achieving our goals. A typical day might also include participating in key professional community activities and attending community organization board meetings. Being actively engaged in the community is important not only from a business standpoint, but for me personally as I strongly believe in giving back to the community I live in. I spend time in all of our market states: Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado.
 
Q. What's a common misperception people have about your industry or job?
A. The famous, “Banker’s Hours.”
 
Q. What's the best advice you've ever received?
A. The advice I try to follow every day is to not take myself so seriously because our success as a team is not about me. It is all about my associates and how hard they work. If I’m doing my job – removing road blocks, knowing when to get out of their way and let them run, being positive and energetic, communicating critical information, building a sustainable trust with and among teams – then they will be successful as individuals and as teams. And, then it is all about celebrating!
 
Q. How do you like to spend your free time?
A. I spend my free time with my two girls (ages 14 and 12) at the barn riding our horses. We ride English Hunter-Jumper and have done this together since my oldest was about 5 years old. Both of my girls compete and we enjoy traveling to horse shows with our barn mates throughout the year. My husband is the chief photographer. There is nothing like the feeling of flying through the air on the back of a horse over jumps. Just being at the barn around horses is a major stress reliever.
 
Q. Anything about you that would surprise people?
A. I played competitive tennis as a kid and wanted to be a professional tennis player when I grew up.
 
Q. If you won the lottery (a super big one) how would you spend your money?
A. If I won a super big lottery, I would buy a ranch with sprawling, green pastures and hills, and fill it with horses.

This interview, conducted by Christina Estes, is part of the Chamber's monthly Businesswise for Women email. To sign up for any or all of the GPCC's email communications, click here.