After years as a career soldier’s son living in Fort Benning, Korea and Germany, SunTrust market president Gene Perkins and his family finally settled in Columbus in 1982. Perkins attended Mercer University before being commissioned as an officer in the Army Reserves. This position took him to Fort Benjamin in Indianapolis where Perkins started his banking career, but when a position opened up with SunTrust in Macon, he jumped at the chance to be closer to family and warmer weather.

The moving around paid off as Perkins was named president and CEO of the West Georgia region in 2012, after serving as the managing director for the Wealth and Investment Management teams in Columbus. “It’s been a great two years. I love helping people, which is why I accepted the role. Clients, community at large or teammates—I get to help people every day. I’ve always felt compelled to give back to the community, so volunteerism is important to me. I love studying numbers, but what I’ve enjoyed most at SunTrust is the community involvement aspect,” Perkins said. 

This community focus resulted in Perkins team accumulating 600 hours of volunteer time in 2013, with him personally serving on a variety of boards, including SunTrust’s Financial Wellness Program in partnership with Columbus State University. “Given that we are a financial institution, financial education is very important to us. We’ve helped fund the programs and provided seminars to more than 600 students and faculty about topics like budgeting and identity theft. It’s been a great partnership.”

One of his proudest community-minded accomplishments to date was being asked by the Columbus Museum to chair corporate sponsorships for the ‘Let There Be Art’ sale and show in 2014. “That was very rewarding for me. Through the week long art show and sale, we were able to raise $100,000 in corporate sponsorships.”

The ability to raise that level of sponsorship speaks to the optimism identified in SunTrust’s recent business survey. “Through the business survey we found that clients are confident about their own businesses right now and are looking to invest and expand. This mirrors what we have been seeing locally. We are actively engaged with our clients and understand their financial priorities. We spend time with them to understand their needs so that we can offer advice-based solutions and options. As much as possible, we want to be a resource for the capital they need to help grow their business.  Our capabilities align very well with their goals.”

Through his role, Perkins hopes to keep the positive momentum of Columbus’ economy moving in the right direction. “There are a lot of good things happening in Columbus as a whole through local leadership, our chamber and the initiatives developed to secure and retain new and existing businesses,” says Perkins.

He indicates that the industries showing the most growth in Columbus, aside from the military, are hospitality/tourism and medical. As a result, SunTrust even has a client advisor that only works with medical professionals. Perkins also shares, “Of course, BRAC is a hot topic, but I think the right people are in place to focus on that for our community. “ 

This positive outlook is even sweeter considering the tough period the banking industry and others survived. “Despite the challenges, as a group and as a team, we made sure we were in front of clients and prospects. Getting over that hump and regaining people’s confidence wasn’t an easy task, but we’ve done a great job.  We want to make Columbus an even better place to live than it already,” he says.