Bill Cox

I bet it’s not hard to believe that our favorite banker, Bill, dreamed about being a teacher in high school. He took a DECA class, and the teacher of that class, Mr. Sam Riddle,  inspired him so much, that he wanted to be just like him and teach that same class.  Because that was a very specific major and the University that he was to attend did not offer it, he instead settled on business management.  Through this pathway, he found his second love, retail management.  Again this will come as no surprise to any of us, but Bill found that he loved working with people and solving their issues and making their days a little brighter.  So when he realized retail management was no longer the best fit for his health he easily shifted his focus to banking.  Realizing that if he stayed in Virginia he only had two options, to be a tobacco farmer or working in a factory, Bill and three of his friends packed up and Moved to Atlanta.  (This was June 23, 1988) I love this, once a year he goes to the beach to spend a week with one of these friends.  In closing, I asked Bill something that has made a profound impact on him or his life and he shared the following.  In church, on the first Sunday of January he was asked to pick a star out of a bowl.  On this star was a word, a word that he had to use for the entire year.  His word was authenticity.  At first confusion overwhelmed him and with much prayer and thought he realized that he needed to be true to who he is; He needs to be the Bill Cox he wants to be, not the bill cox that others want him to be.  He did confess that this is very much a work in progress and as a talisman he keeps the word posted to his desk to remind him to be the Bill he has set out to be.