2016 Dynamic Dozen No. 4: OakStar Bank

SBJ: What are your top issues when it comes to managing growth?
Randy Johnson: This is a relationship business, and when you grow, you have to grow with your customers’ best interests at heart. Part of balancing that growth, and managing it, is our team members set our goals. There’s not some big holding company in Kansas City or St. Louis saying here’s how you’re going to perform this year. It’s just the opposite. Every person in this bank is part of a team that puts together a bottom-up budget. That budget is ultimately approved by our board of directors, but it’s not a top-down budget. They don’t hand it to us and say, “Now, make this happen.” I think that helps us manage our growth.

SBJ: Is your fast growth sustainable?
Johnson: I believe it is. And I also believe it is absolutely necessary in the industry we’re in. There have been a lot of changes to the industry. Regulatory burden is very real. A lot of those regulations require additional people. And to afford those folks, you have to be bigger.
But the reason I believe our growth is sustainable gets back to our strategic objective to retain our independence. We don’t want to be one of those banks that’s gobbled up by some large holding company and another community bank goes by the wayside. We don’t want people who are engaged and know their customers to all of a sudden have their decisions made in some metropolitan area where they don’t know the customers, they don’t know the relationships. Everything we’re trying to do would strengthen our core and make us the community bank that will be here in years to come. So, not only do I think it’s sustainable, I think it has to be to maintain our strategic objectives.

SBJ: Have your goals changed as business has taken off?
Johnson: Our annual financial goals have changed. The easiest way for me to tell you they’ve changed is we have had a record year, on top of a record year, on top of a record year, on top of a record year, on top of a record year. And our team sets those goals – sometimes to the point where our board has said, “Really? You guys are planning a 20 percent increase in net income?” Every year without exception, we have exceeded our goals. And every year without exception the goals have been loftier than the previous year. Yes, our goals have changed, but they’ve been people-driven, and the strategy behind the goals has been constant.

SBJ: Where do you see the company headed in the next five years?
Johnson: I see the company as continuing on the path to being one of the dominant community banks in Springfield. I see us acquiring institutions that, for whatever reason, come to that point in time when it makes sense to hand the baton to a new owner. When it comes to regulation, there is not a lot of margin for error to be successful in the future. We have to be an early adopter and perfecter of regulatory changes. Also, we are chartered for a full-service bank in Kansas City, and I think we’ll be in a position to take advantage of some of those opportunities.