Patsy Johnson talks about her life with a nonchalance that belies her résumé.
A North Carolina native, Johnson moved to Cary in 1986 as a novice in the banking industry. Today she’s the president of TowneBank Cary, nearing 50 years of marriage to her high-school sweetheart, and still hits the slopes at her family’s annual ski vacation.
“I’ve had a really fortunate life,” Johnson said. “I have a good husband. I have a good son. I have a profession that has allowed me to grow. And it has also allowed me to develop many, many, many relationships over the years — and do it in one place.”
Johnson had what she describes as a “typical rural upbringing back in the ’50s and ’60s,” growing up on a farm in Wilson County with her mother. Her father passed away when she was young, so “family life was basically me and her as I grew,” she said.
Her mother leased the land to other farmers, who primarily took care of the day-to-day operations, but Johnson was no stranger to farm chores. “I barned tobacco. I picked cotton. We picked vegetables,” she recalled.
“I grew up dedicated to hard work and focused on the quality of my life,” Johnson said. She describes her mother as a “strong, independent woman” who “had a very strong focus on making sure I had a good education and that I understood the value of education.”
Acting on that advice, Johnson picked up a bachelor’s degree from UNC-Chapel Hill and a master’s degree from NC State before working in government for a few years. Along the way, she married Howard Johnson and had their son, Patrick.
When Howard was hired to run the Cary Chamber of Commerce, their young family moved to Cary, which had around 30,000 residents at the time.
“We both received good positions that we enjoyed, and we were committed, and we just continued to grow as the town grew,” she said of living in Cary as it ballooned to more than 175,000 people. “Once we got to Cary, it became home.”
The Johnsons aren’t ones to draw a thick line between work life and personal life. “Howard running the Chamber meant that our life revolved around a lot of involvement in Cary,” Johnson said. Their respective careers were demanding, but they still found time to regularly attend their son’s sporting and social events.
What’s the key to growing two careers, building a lasting marriage, raising a son, and being active in the community? “I just do what I need to do,” Johnson said. “It works.”
That attitude is reflected in her daily routine at TowneBank. She’s been at the head of Cary operations since Paragon Bank entered the local market in 2014, through its acquisition by TowneBank in 2018. But her tenure at the top hasn’t distanced her from the nitty-gritty of banking operations.
On any given day, “I may be trying to get a loan closed for someone, or trying to get an account set up, or trying to get somebody referred for another product that we o er, or I’m out in the community representing the bank at other functions, other events,” said Johnson. “So it’s full time. And then, of course, you have to be responsible for making sure the operation here is successful and being profitable for the bank.”
No sweat.
“Our competition is very stiff in the area,” Johnson said, but TowneBank has been able to expand thanks in part to the number of people moving to the area. “Cary does a really good job of selling itself,” she added.
Working her way from novice to notable in a male-dominated field in the ’80s and ’90s, you might expect Johnson to have encountered glass ceilings and prejudice, but her experience has been quite the opposite. “I feel like I’ve been very fortunate that in my career, I was always evaluated based on my performance, not that I was a woman,” Johnson said.
That individual-centered approach is reflected in TowneBank’s business practices. “TowneBank is about relationships,” Johnson said. “It’s not about transactions. The clients that we deal with are those individuals that do indeed value relationships.”
A key element to building those relationships, Johnson believes, is compassion — with a side of business acumen, of course. “I don’t do compassion for just compassion’s sake, and I don’t do strategy just for strategy’s sake,” she revealed. “You can combine the two.”
Her marriage is another relationship she’s nurtured over the years.
“When you’ve been married 50 years, you have a lot of chances to do things,” Johnson said, citing travels to Africa, New York, Canada, Europe, and their annual ski trip. And through it all, “When we come back, we usually are still speaking to each other,” she laughed.
Locally, they enjoy sports, playing golf, and spending time with the “tons of friends” they’ve built during their time in Cary. And after 48 years of marriage, “We’re still friends after all these years,” Johnson said of her husband.
She credits their ongoing happiness to both of them being “compatible and accepting.” But it hasn’t been all roses, she clarified: “Marriage is not easy. You have to work at it.”
In fact, that’s Johnson’s overall outlook.
“You need to figure out what it is in life that provides you focus, provides you a sense of accomplishment,” she advised. “In any situation, I think you have to be very accommodating, patient, forgiving, because life … it’s something you have to work at.”
- Garden Adventurer: Beyond Purple: The Other Beautyberries
- Liquid Assets: Unicycle Pale Ale
- Liquid Assets: Easy Peasy, Lemon Squeezy
- Restaurant Profile: La Victoria Mexican Food
- Small Business Spotlight: Crumb & Cream
- On Trend: Hair Extensions
- Erica Chats: Finally Feeling Fall
- Less is More
- Nonprofit Spotlight: Shield North Carolina
- Women of Western Wake: Tamani Anderson Powell
- Meet Cary Magazine’s 2023 Women of Western Wake
- Women of Western Wake: Dr. Rebecca Kitzmiller
- Women of Western Wake: Patsy Johnson
- Women of Western Wake: Sheri Erhart
- Women of Western Wake: Leslie Covington
- Things to Do: September 2023
