MARY ANN SCULLY DISCUSSES WORK, LIFE AND GIVING BACK
Mary Ann Scully, president and CEO of Howard Bank, has worked in the banking industry for more than 35 years. She’s also devoted to giving back to the community, not just as a founder of a local bank, but with past and present positions with such organizations as Howard County General Hospital, Catholic Charities and the Columbia Foundation, serving on the boards of the United Way of Central Maryland, the Baltimore Opera Company and the Horizon Foundation. Myriad awards and recognition include the Business Women’s Network Woman of Distinction award and the Daily Record’s Most Admired CEO in 2012. We talked with her about work and life balance – and giving back.
Q There’s been a revival lately in the discussion about whether women can have it all. What’s your take on this? Having it all means different things to different people. If you want to have a family, a career, children, it’s very doable. But if your definition of career is to be President of the United States, achieving the other parts will 
be more difficult. I always wanted to have children and think my son is my greatest accomplishment, bar none. But my aspiration about motherhood never included making hand-decorated cookies at Christmas. I have a child whose definition of Christmas cookies is Pillsbury slice-and-bake.
Q So you can have it all, as long as your expectations aren’t too extreme? Maybe that’s my definition of balance: managing expectations.
Women who want every day of their lives to be balanced are being unrealistic. I find it immensely disturbing when I sit across the desk from an entrepreneur and ask why she started her business, and she tells me she wanted balance in her life, wanted to see her children, go to their plays. Of course, there’s nothing wrong with that – but you are likely to be less successful in business if that’s your reason. You won’t be working as hard and won’t be as passionate. Entrepreneurs are unbalanced people for much of their careers. You have to be that way.
Many women don’t define balance as “it will all work out at the end of the day.” Instead, they look at it as: “I’ll work for 6 hours, come home and make dinner, and sit down and help my child with homework.” This approach doesn’t alleviate stress, it exacerbates it. There are nights when you want to bang your head against the wall. It doesn’t mean you’re a bad mother, it just means you’re living in reality.
I worry about this expectation that younger people have, that life will make accommodations for them, so everything will be smooth sailing.
Q Do you fault so-called “helicopter” parents who may have raised a generation with high expectations? We’re an aspirational country. There’s a deep-seated belief that each generation can be better. Every generation wants a little bit more. When I started in business, women of my generation just wanted a seat at the table. The glass ceiling talk started later. In my 20s, we just wanted to be able to have the same kind of job a man had. The good news is, it was a possibility, the bad news is it wasn’t a probability. These days it’s normal for women to assume they can have the same kind of job a man has and also want to spend more time with family.
Q Do you consider yourself unbalanced? I have a high-powered career and a family. I don’t pretend that those parts are in balance at any given time. I know there are times when I give more to work and come home late. When I left the large bank and had to decide what to do next, I wanted something more community oriented. I knew that in a community bank there was a better chance that my work would have a positive impact on my family than if I was a national consultant traveling all over the country.
Q Is it also important to manage your child’s expectations? The greatest gifts you can give a child are confidence and knowing they’re loved. That has nothing to do with whether their clothes are hand embroidered. I like to think children see that it’s a good thing when their parents have a life that is connected to the family but doesn’t revolve around it every moment. It prepares them for life, to be more self sufficient. I think all of us, as parents, don’t do enough explaining to our children why we’re doing what we’re doing. I talk to my son about why I work as hard as I do – what the trade-offs are.
Q What do you tell him? If you care about people, you have to give it your all. I have responsibilities, and I have to accept them. Like many parents, I don’t spend as much time with my son as I would like to. I know he’s safe – and healthy. My husband picks up the slack. He’s a professional golfer and is busy on weekends. So my son and I spend the weekends together.
Q What do you do? We do what all unbalanced people do on weekends, the things normal people do during the week: We go to the dry cleaners and the grocery store.
Q And when you have more time? I love to travel. We don’t do as much as we’d like. A couple of years ago, we started putting more exotic trips on the calendar. I realized when my son was 12, he’d never used his passport. We went to Italy, and we’re trying to decide if our next trip will be to England or Paris.
Q As CEO of Howard Bank, you’ve established a culture of giving back. How did it all start? A group of us who had been bankers pulled together community leaders to invest in the bank. We wanted to have all the sophistication the big banks had, but wanted to have more of a human face, with a staff that can recognize that everyone is different and everyone is part of the community.
The bank opened in 2004 and now has five branches and about 62 employees.
Not everything we do is for the bottom line. In the long term, doing community work is good for shareholders, even if in the short term it feels like a sacrifice. We encourage employees to get involved, to take leadership positions in the community. And that’s a good thing, something you can pass on to your children.
Q You have served, and currently serve, on a wide range of boards and organization. Do you have an area of particular interest in your charitable work? It’s all over the board. I’ve asked myself why there isn’t more of a focus, wondered if there should be. I have passion around education and believe that’s the way forward. I love the arts because that appeals to me. I’ve also done health care stints, have been involved with general human services. The breadth of the Columbia Foundation’s work appeals to me. I guess the focus has less to do with specific cause and more with what I can bring something to the table. If you want to start something, grow something, change something or fix something, I’m the right person. I can look at it and see that I made a difference.
