Growing up in Pikeville, Tennessee, Cara Roberson first learned about banking from her mom, who was a teller at First Bank of Rhea County in Dayton.
In January, after more than a decade in accounting and banking, Roberson became the first female president of the bank, which adopted The SimplyBank name at the same time the former First Bank of Tennessee acquired Community National Bank in Dayton.
“I’ve had a connection to this bank nearly my entire life, ” Roberson says during an interview at SimplyBank’s headquarters in downtown Dayton. “I’m proud of the historical success this bank has seen and of the prospect for even more growth.”
Staff Photo by Robin Rudd / Cara Roberson is the President of SimplyBank.Roberson worked at her family’s apple orchard in Bledsoe County as a young teen but, like her Mom, she says she was always interested in math and money. She pursued an accounting degree, which she earned in 2010 from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. While studying accounting, she also worked as a teller at First Bank under Sam Swafford, the longtime bank president and former Dayton mayor.
Roberson used her UTC degree to become a certified public accountant at the Chattanooga accounting firm Hazlett Lewis & Bieter where she began her career as an auditor for a number of community banks. By 2012, she decided to leave HLM and join the bank where she and her mother previously worked in Dayton.