It was no shock when John Ciulla was named Webster Bank CEO in 2017.
The board and management of the Waterbury-based bank and its parent Webster Financial had been grooming the longtime executive for the top spot for years, part of a leadership succession plan for when Jim Smith ultimately retired from his CEO and chairman roles, which happened in early 2018 and early 2020, respectively.
Now, Ciulla is just the third CEO at the 84-year-old publicly traded regional lender, which he first joined in 2004, climbing the ranks to president in 2015.
While Ciulla commutes to Waterbury from his home in Westchester County, he’s well connected in Hartford’s business and political power circles. He chaired the board of the Connecticut Business & Industry Association in 2017, and in early 2019, a newly inaugurated Gov. Ned Lamont turned to Ciulla for help packaging interest-free loans for furloughed government employees during a federal shutdown that ultimately lasted more than a month.
The stakes were much higher when Lamont called on Ciulla and his fellow bankers about 14 months later, as the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic effectively shuttered the state economy, creating a need for mortgage and loan forbearance arrangements for those facing financial hardships.