Financial Analyst Lisa Weaver Just Keeps Rising

By Meg Hale Brunton

Ingles Financial Analyst Lisa Weaver has always had a predisposition towards both the arts, as well as more analytical skills. “Both sides of my brain fire equally, and they talk to each other,” she says about herself. “But I have the blessing to be able to tap into both of those [sides].” As a child growing up in Western North Carolina, she always hoped to become a writer and photographer. Although she is now a successful financial analyst, Lisa also managed to achieve her childhood wish.

In just three years, she earned her business degree from Western Carolina University in Computer Information Systems. “I’m an overachiever,” she admits. “I love to learn. If I could have been a full-time student, I would have found my calling.” After graduating, she got a job with a local software firm, where she says she earned much of her accounting ‘street cred.’ 

After getting married and having children, Lisa shifted her focus and started handling the accounting for her father’s business, Terry Brothers’ Construction. She eventually became the company’s Safety Director and Equal Opportunities Manager as well. “I wore a lot of hats,” she says of her versatility. “Whatever the need was, I helped fill it.”

Lisa eventually left her father’s business to start a utility construction business with her husband and served as the company’s office manager. After the couple divorced, she wasn’t sure what direction to take, so she decided to go back to school. She began taking programming courses at Asheville-Buncombe Technical College despite the fact that she already had a degree in what she was studying. “I needed a refresher because programming evolves,” Lisa explains.

After her first year in school, Lisa was offered a job as Business Manager for Tom Coleman of Coleman Development Group. Shortly after accepting the position, she was diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer and given a low chance of survival. During the twenty-four weeks of chemotherapy and the entire year of treatment, she still managed to work full-time and even worked weekends to make up for any days she missed. “I never missed a beat,” Lisa says, remembering. She was even included in a study for an experimental treatment, in which all the subjects showed a vast improvement… all the subjects, except her. “I hit one roadblock after another.” 

Lisa adds that so many people, although well-intentioned, can be somewhat flippant about a breast cancer diagnosis, because it so often treatable. “I don’t want people to become complacent, because it still is deadly” she says, referring to the importance of early cancer screenings. She also recalls the support she had from her loved ones and what a difference it made in her recovery. “The people that are fighting with you, that love you, struggle more than you know and their battle is as great as yours.”

Despite the bleak prognosis, Lisa made a full recovery and has now been cancer-free for over ten years. Although grateful, she says that cancer is never far from her mind. “When the fight is done and the battle is over, living as a survivor is powerful, wonderful and meant to be celebrated, but it’s a struggle because it never leaves you,” Lisa says of the experience. “It’s something that is always with you and you grow with it, you learn from it, you fight your battles based on that because you realize that there are so many things outside your control and you take control of what you can.”

After working with Coleman for eleven years, the owner decided to sell his business. Lisa took this as an opportunity to start her own photography business, Lisa Weaver Photography. She worked all the time, finding she had a particular propensity for portraiture. Her new career was put on hold to some extent, when Lisa reconnected with her best friend from high school and the two fell into a whirlwind romance and got married in Las Vegas. With her new husband working in the film industry, Lisa spent the next two years traveling with him from place to place to film on-location. All the while, she was doing portrait work with models to build up her portfolio.  

Photos by Brooke Parker Photography

Sadly, the couple had problems and the marriage ended after only two and a half years. Lisa returned to North Carolina at a particularly low point, feeling utterly disconnected from her previous life, both personally and professionally. “I couldn’t get my roots dug in photography,” she says after such a long absence. She applied for a job as a financial analyst for Ingles Markets, where she already knew a few of the employees in the corporate office. While she had concerns about her qualifications in a corporate environment, those who were familiar with her knew of her work ethic and her ability to quickly pick up new skills, and reassured her. “I’m stubborn,” Lisa admits of her dedication to work, “and it was in my wheelhouse.” Lisa got the job and took to it almost instantaneously.

“I love the job I have,” Lisa says of her job at Ingles. “If my younger self was thinking ahead, deep down this is really what I would have envisioned for myself. I just didn’t know that at the time.” She does admit that her job is not what most people think a financial analyst does. According to Lisa, she does a lot of tracking trends, analyzing expenses and debts, budgeting, and lots of reporting and documentation. “It’s different every day,” she says, adding that she counts Microsoft Excel as a friend. “I couldn’t ask for a better job, honestly.”

Working in a male-dominated field for much of her early career, Lisa encountered a great deal of chauvinism. She says she never dreamed that a company as big as Ingles could feel so welcoming and supportive. Lisa also feels incredibly lucky to be a member of Ingles’ female-heavy financial department, and loves being part of a team. “Coming to a place that honors, respects and celebrates women gives you a chance to grow and learn and support that,” she says of Ingles. “I just feel like I’m where I belong.”

Now, having been with Ingles for over three years, Lisa feels a true connection to her worklife. “I feel like I finally found my purpose,” she says, adding that she plans to stay in her current role as long as Ingles will have her. “This is what feeds my soul. To me, connection to people is where it’s at, and I work with incredible people.”

As with many things in life, when it rains it pours, and Lisa’s photography career took off at about the same time that her job at Ingles did. “I work all the time, but I like it,” Lisa says. “Balance is the word that I’m really looking toward in the new year.” Now a grandmother, she continues to struggle with maintaining a Work/Life balance, or rather a Work/Work/Life balance. 

After all her trials and tribulations, in the end, Lisa boils it all down to one key lesson. “When you get knocked down, you just keep rising,” she says. “My daddy taught me that, and he taught me well.”

For more information on Ingles Markets, go to: www.ingles-markets.com 

For more information on Lisa Weaver Photography, visit: www.lisaweaverphotography.com