Mary Beth Brooks*

Mary Beth Brooks, 43, was the late John Lewis’ hand-picked successor as president and CEO of the Bank of Fayetteville, by far the largest Arkansas bank to be headed by a woman. The numbers suggest Lewis knew what he was doing: Net income has tripled in the three years since Brooks left Arvest Bank to run BOF. That’s one of the reasons she was No. 13 on U.S. Banker magazine’s list of “Women to Watch” last year.

For 2007, BOF will report an admirable return on assets of about 1.3 percent, despite being in the middle of a particularly difficult economic downturn in northwest Arkansas “I think we’re all going to take some hits in 2008, and we all took some hits in 2007,” Brooks said. “I had the advantage of not being a brand-new bank.”

Originally an engineering student, Brooks baffled her parents by switching her major to finance. She started her banking career in 1986 as an examiner for the Arkansas State Bank Department. After a stop at BancorpSouth Bank, she joined National Commerce Bank of Memphis, which became a national model for in-store banking.

As a consultant for an NBC subsidiary, she set up about 50 Arvest branches in Wal-Mart stores. She eventually hired on with Arvest, first as director of in-store branches, then as vice president of commercial loans and finally as executive vice president and sales manager for the Rogers market. At Arvest she worked for the CEO she most admires, Jim Walton.

Brooks said being a woman has not been an issue at the bank, but she shares the same problem as working mothers in any industry: balancing family life and work. About 75 percent of bank employees are women, but few rise to the top executive office, Brooks said, because they shy away from commercial lending, the breeding ground for bank presidents.

So is she encouraging women at BOF to get experience on both the retail and commercial lending sides? “You bet your sweet life I am.”