Ingrams September 2023

Mike Valentine PRESIDENT/CEO, NETSMART

Nicole Van Denabeele PRESIDENT, BANK MIDWEST

Just over a decade ago, Mike Valentine pulled up stakes, trading in the COO’s hat at Cerner for the CEO’s duties at a New York company called Netsmart Technologies. He was a man with a plan, quickly relocating the headquarters to KC and putting the health-care IT firm on a growth arc, making it the country’s largest human services and integrated care technology provider. Its various platforms help providers deliver services and care to more than 25 million people nationwide.

Nicole Van Denabeele has leveraged her training as an accountant and CPA into a banking leadership role, directing Bank Midwest’s regional operations that make it ninth-largest in this market. NBH Bank, the parent company, has more than $8.3 billion in customer deposits, and Van Denabeele’s team is overseeing nearly $1.9 billion of that.

COLLEGE: B.S., Industrial Engineering, Kansas State University 2022 REVENUES: $584.74 million MASSIVE AUDIENCE: Operating in every U.S. state, Netsmart lists more than 24,000 corporate and non-profit clients with a combined user total of more than 500,000. JOB GENERATOR: Last year, the Overland Park-based company surpassed 10,000 employees for the first time; roughly one-fourth of those are in the Kansas City area. COLLEGE TIES: Netsmart has a solid track record of hiring engineering graduates from Valentine’s alma mater, one reason why the company was K-State’s Company of the Year in 2018. THE FULL SUITE: From behavioral health to autism, from addiction therapy to developmental dis abilities, Netsmart offers tech products that help providers improve care outcomes, and it has built a solid line of business in population health and analytics.

COLLEGE: B.A., Accounting and Business Administration, M.A., Accounting and Information Systems, University of Kansas MULTIPLE HATS: In addition to being the organization’s president, Van Denabeele is also chief ac counting officer for the parent corporation. FROM LAW TO FINANCE: The former controller for this market’s biggest law firm, Polsinelli, PC, Van Denabeele is a seasoned executive in public company accounting and financial reporting. She previously was assistant controller for UMB Financial Corp. and spent six years in public accounting with Deloitte. OFF THE CLOCK: Her board service commitments have benefitted the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce and the finance committee for Ronald McDonald House Charities of Kansas City. Before those roles, she had served as a board member for the Jo Bryant Memorial Foundation and Mighty to Serve, which promotes family participation in community service.

Randy Vance PRESIDENT/COO, SUNDERLAND FOUNDATION

Julia Vander Weele OFFICE MANAGING PARTNER, SPENCER FANE

Randy Vance and the Sunderland Foundation have been behind some big philanthropic moves in the relatively short span as the region’s third-largest foundation, but they rewrote the book this year with a $100 million lead gift to help The University of Kansas Cancer Center build a new, state-of-the-art destination cancer center. It was both the largest gift ever given by the foundation and the largest ever received by the health system and university.

Julia Vander Weele, who oversees the Kansas City office for the Spen cer Fane law firm, is a leadership team member who is also instrumen tal as a specialist in employee-benefits law. Among her accomplish ments in that role: Helping employers and other benefit-plan sponsors create and maintain competitive benefits packages that attract and retain talent to help their businesses thrive. A highlight of the past year, she says, was “continued growth without sacrificing our culture.”

COLLEGE: B.A., Business Administration, MBA, Finance, UMKC FIRST-HAND EXPERIENCE: With a mission to support the construction-related needs of other non-profits, the foundation has the right guy in place to sign off on its philanthropy: Vance was the last CEO of Ash Grove, one of the region’s biggest private companies before the sale to CRH. MAJOR PLAYER: The foundation itself has been around since 1945 (thanks to the visionary lead ership of Lester Sunderland) and is funded through the family’s ownership of Ash Grove Cement Co. When the company sold in 2017 to an Irish construction conglomerate for $3.5 billion, the philanthropic floodgates opened. OTHER IMPACTS: Among other significant donations of late, the foundation has granted $5 million to Union Station, $2.5 million to the Liberty Memorial Association, $2 million each to the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, the Folly Theater and Omaha’s Joslyn Art Museum, $1 million to build the new visitor center at the Overland Park arboretum. Those are just a few from a very long list.

COLLEGE: B.A., J.D., University of Iowa RECESSION ODDS: “I think it’s 50/50, but still hopeful for a ‘soft landing.’”

NEXT BIG THING: “The debate about the next site of the Royals stadium seems to be dominating the news. I am eager for the decision to be made so that we can move forward with the next stages of development.” ON THE NEW KCI: “I love it!” SALUTING A MENTOR: “My mother has always been my inspiration. She taught me resilience and tenacity.” MORNING READ: “Not sure if this counts as reading, but I do the daily Wordle every morning first thing, just to get my brain going.” CHARITY MISSION: “I’ve always been partial to children’s charities, so likely early childhood education.” LEADERSHIP HIRE PRIORITY: “Humility.” STAFFING PLANS: “We anticipate continued, measured growth.”

Tom Wagers PRESIDENT/CEO, NORTH AMERICAN SAVINGS BANK North American Savings Bank charged into its second century this year, and Tom Wagers is the man leading the celebration for this Grandview-based bank, which is also one of the bigger investor-owned companies in the Kansas City region. He’s a CPA by training, and has been with the bank for a decade. NASB is No. 11 among all banks, local or national, in deposit market share, at $1.6 billion.

Marc Warrington SVP, SUN LIFE

From India to Ireland and back to Indonesia, Sun Life is a global mon ster in financial services—it has more than $1.3 trillion—yes, with a “t”—in assets under management, and the team is 50,000-strong. Leading up the squad in the Kansas City market is Marc Warrington, a career professional in the insurance and benefits space, who was retained in a leadership role after the 2016 acquisition of Assurant Employee Benefits.

COLLEGE: B.A., Accounting, East Tennessee State University ON THE JOB: Wagers oversees mortgage and banking products and customer service, with the ex ecutive and senior leadership team. He’s overseeing a work force of more than 500 for an institution with nearly $2.5 billion in assets. MANY HAPPY RETURNS: For most banks, a 1 percent return on assets is considered a sign of healthy financial performance; NASB exceeds that threshold by half again, according to FDIC data. BEFORE NASB: Wagers worked in banking leadership roles at Atlantic Coast Bank in Jacksonville, Fla., including nine years as CFO and a stint as interim CEO. LENDING POWER: NASB offers traditional banking and mortgage products, including conventional, FHA, and VA loans, plus non-recourse and bank-statement loans for self-employed borrowers.

COLLEGE: B.A., Business/Managerial Economics, Cornell University ABOUT SUN LIFE: One of the largest public companies based in Canada, this financial-ser vices giant focuses on helping clients with fiscal and physical health, the former by targeting financial security, the latter through living healthier lives. MONETARY MIGHT: The Kansas City office is primarily engaged with the benefits side of the company’s insurance products, but the parent is also a wealth-management monolith. DOWNTOWN FIXTURE: The sign above may have changed following the Assurant acquisition, but Sun Life is a significant Downtown employer, with 440 people attached to that office.

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September 2023

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