'Blown away'

Executive: Allen Brinkman. Chairman, president and CEO of SunTrust Bank's West Florida division, a market that stretches from Citrus County, north of Tampa, to Collier County. Brinkman has been in banking for more than 20 years and is active on many business and civic boards in the Tampa area. The market Brinkman oversees encompasses some $23 billion in assets, 155 branches and about 5,000 employees.

Diversion: Skydiving. Brinkman has jumped out of a plane 93 times since his first jump in 2001 in Georgia. He's jumped less as his four children (three teenagers, including 14-year-old twins) have grown. His last jump was in early 2016.

Guts and gusts: Brinkman sought something to motivate the team of bankers he supervised in summer 2001. His plan: If the team met certain goals on Gallup customer service reports, he would jump out of an airplane, he told them. But these were aim-high targets. “It was a very big goal,” says Brinkman. “I wanted them to get scores that would be better than anyone else in the industry.”