Bernard Hampton
speaker
129 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard May 2025
last heard May 2025
Bernard Hampton’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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Appearances
And ultimately, I'm glad I didn't because ultimately what sparked my interest was how the company thought about its clients, the responsibility to them individually for companies of all sizes and to the community, the importance of good financial advice and the responsibility the organization took to be able to provide that to positively impact families, companies, the economy.
But honestly, the biggest thing that made my decision in the factor to join the bank came down to the greatest asset in the company, and that's our people. And so through the process of interviews over the course of four months, I had an opportunity to engage with some 40 plus people outside the interview process, people that were- Wow.
Friends had introduced me to, and it was those people that love what they did as they talked about the organization, how open they were about the culture, that the values were more than words on the wall, and that they intended to spend their careers here. Well, that's when I knew. So that's ultimately what made my decision to say, this was the place for me to be.
And here we are almost 21 years later. Only thing I wish is I'd have made the decision sooner or that I had an opportunity sooner.
100%. What mattered then is the same thing that matters today is certainly magnified in moments like the financial crisis or whether it was the years during COVID, communication and listening and your ability to do that on steroids during moments of uncertainty. Because at the end of the day, nobody wants to follow the leader that says, oh, boy, are we in trouble and I don't know what to do.
Right. That would be a problem for those people. And it's in those moments where if you were communicating twice a week that maybe it needs to become four or five times a week.
And it's the opportunity to listen, pick up the phone, whether it's a roundtable or a call, understand what you're taking anecdotally from people and bring those learnings into a broader conversation to say, if five or six people are feeling this way, that's probably 50, 60 or 100 that are feeling that way.
And your ability to outthink or what would come across as really being in touch with people is ultimately what it is. People want a sense of clarity, want to know what's happening. What do we expect to have happen? If something changes, is there a level of steadiness and trust from a leadership perspective that they can follow? And for us, that happens at all levels of the organization.
I love that question. And the first one, from my perspective, is that you always treat people like adults. And so regardless of what someone does, regardless at what level or role that they have, we all largely want the same thing in life. We may or may not have a family that we're responsible for. We'd like a decent place to live and a safe community.
You'd love to be able to advance or achieve career goals. Maybe you're in your dream job already, but at the end of the day, you have bills to pay. You may have a mortgage or rent. There's some commonalities and themes that regardless at what level someone may be at in the organization,
the way the organization runs, their understanding of it, their ability to recognize whether their voice matters or not is integral to all of those things. I tend to think almost anything, unless it's confidential information, that I can have, whether somebody is four levels removed from me, if they're a level above me or they're beside me, all need the same information.
You may change the tone or tenor of it a little bit, but ultimately information is powerful. And having a habit of doing that usually creates the opportunity where people will trust you, that they know you'll always shoot straight with them, particularly when something's not good news. And I think that's okay.
I think about three things. One, I think about my own personal purpose, which is about helping people change their lives by reaching their potential. achieving peace with their own decisions, right? So everybody's at different places.
And I think to a great extent, that peace with your own decisions can impact negatively or positively where someone positions themselves, the way they think about the company, their role, their experience. So I'll give you an example on that one before I give the other two.
I remember I used to tell a story to teams and different organizations, depending on what was going on, sometimes individual conversations about at one point in my life, depending on family circumstances, I'd made decisions. I was not mobile. And I knew that that meant that that would cause me to miss several opportunities along the way.
but I had to personally be okay with that because that's not something the company did to me. That was the decision I made. That level of piece meant I would have to make sure that I was continually learning, preparing, because at the moment that changed, I didn't say I would never be able to move, but I said, for now. What did that mean I should be or could be doing at the same time?
Well, that story related to a lot of people on the way in some cases, maybe saying, well, as the company spotted missing these opportunities, but not thinking about their own self-imposed limitations and having a sense of peace and confidence in that.
I appreciate that. You expanded that very well. The second one really comes down to what is it that somebody wants? And think about working through things systematically. And I always encourage people, be willing to declare it, but then work backwards. And then you have a decision point. You have to decide, are you willing to do what it takes then to be able to achieve it?
So you may declare the goal and that may very easily change where they were headed along the way. And then the final one is a momism. And so my mom's always had this saying growing up for the three of us that was, you're no better than anyone else, but no one else is better than you. I think I landed on the three of us in different ways.
But as I've gone through life and careers and managed careers, that's probably some of the most powerful advice I've ever gotten. Because what she meant by that is there will always be a skill level or a difference. But she also admit at the same time that those are all differences that you can control.
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