After taking time off from a career in manufacturing, Lesa Vanotti responded to a help wanted ad for what she called a “nice bank job” at Torrington Savings Bank, where she planned to work for a few years before returning to manufacturing once her children were older. Instead, her job in the accounting department led to her becoming the bank’s controller and then chief financial officer.
Kiley Gosselin is passionate about promoting policies that support affordable housing, a central part of her role as executive director of the Partnership for Strong Communities.
Jarret Coleman can thank his childhood fascination with the weather for leading to his career as one of Connecticut’s top mortgage loan originators.
As he joins Colliers following a five-year stint at Cushman & Wakefield, Craig Ruoff is advising tenants and landlords on working through financial headwinds and rapidly changing corporate space requirements.
Sheryl O’Connor is three years into her latest move in her 30-year career as co-founder of WealthConductor, a retirement planning fintech that’s caught they eye of industry executives from Bank of New York Mellon, JPMorgan Chase, and others.
As facilities and vendor manager for Guilford Savings Bank, Victoria Magin would typically spend her time paying bills, working on budgets and taking care of the bank’s buildings, not managing the flow of Paycheck Protection Program loans.
Letting businesses and developers operate with more flexibility is a common theme of the Hartford planning and zoning commission’s approach to land-use planning during the tenure of Sara Bronin, a member since 2013 and its current chair.
Continuity offers cloud-based platforms that provide regulatory and risk-management support to financial services companies, and its chief regulatory officer Pam Perdue has been kept busy during the coronavirus crisis figuring out the dozens of regulatory directives issued so far.
A familiar face in state government circles for decades, Tim Phelan leads Connecticut’s largest industry association representing retailers as it confronts the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
While working at a software firm that helped community banks and credit unions manage Dodd-Frank requirements, Mike Kennedy heard from executives who were looking for niche market opportunities to grow deposits and remain competitive against larger banks and fintech providers.
With availability rates approaching nearly 24 percent in Fairfield County’s office market, it’s a good time to specialize in tenant representation work, as Colliers’ Jeffrey Williams has.
Middletown-based Liberty Bank is pushing to expand its commercial lending business from New Haven into northern Hartford County. And former KeyBank executive Jeff Hubbard is leading the way.
Seeing a photo of his favorite uncle and building contractor standing shoulder-to-shoulder with native American steelworkers atop a Manhattan skyscraper frame inspired Ross Spiegel, president of the Connecticut Green Building Council, to become an architect.
The Connecticut Bankers Association this month will honor its 2020 New Leaders in Banking, and Karin O’Brien, Newtown Savings Bank’s fraud and BSA officer, will be among the honorees.
West Hartford-based American Business Media LLC has acquired Mortgage News Network Inc., the Long Island-based publisher of National Mortgage Professional Magazine.
Kathleen Mylod is president-elect of CREW CT, the 100-member Connecticut chapter of Commercial Real Estate Women. In her day job, Mylod is a partner at Hartford-based Shipman & Goodwin LLP, where she advises clients including private equity and sovereign wealth funds, insurance companies and banks on debt and equity investments in commercial real estate.
As Glastonbury-based architect SLAM Collaborative has built a national platform with offices from Boston to Los Angeles, Managing Principal for Design Mark Rhoades has been in the thick of the action, designing facilities including Fairfield University’s Dolan School of Business, Sacred Heart University’s West campus and new residential quad and University of Hartford’s Barney School of Business.
A 33-year broker for CBRE based in its Stamford office, Jeff Dunne has closed over $30 billion in investment sales during his career. Dunne has represented owners of high-profile buildings this year in selling off such properties as the former GE Capital offices and current Vineyard Vines headquarters in Stamford.
Cynthia Merkle joined the Connecticut banking world only six and a half years ago, but she’s already had some notable accomplishments as Union Savings Bank’s first woman president and CEO. Last month, she became the first woman chair in the 120-year history of the Connecticut Bankers Association.
Thomas Collins is the new head of the New England region for Avison Young, a Toronto-based commercial real estate brokerage that opened its first Hartford office in 2015. He took the traditionally slow month of August to to assess the firm’s local brokerage strengths as he looks to build it up.
