Northwest Bank announced it is expanding its leadership team in Des Moines, as the community bank has increased assets in the Des Moines market to more than $450 million. Don Nickerson, who has been the Des Moines market president for Northwest Bank for nearly 17 years, has accepted the position of Des Moines regional CEO. Ed Arndorfer, most recently executive vice president and senior lender, is now regional senior lender for the Des Moines market. “We have experienced great success in Des Moines and have grown to the point where we need to add leadership capacity to our team,” said Joe Conover, president of Northwest Bank, which is based in Spencer. “As we implement our strategic plan, we recognize the size and scope of our banking activities require expanding our leadership team.” As part of the leadership expansion, the bank has named Travis Simpson as regional president of Northwest Bank in Des Moines. Simpson has worked for Northwest Bank for 14 years, and most recently was executive vice president leading the private banking, mortgage and retail banking divisions. Additionally, the bank is expanding Jill Thielen’s role as regional business banking manager. Thielen has been with Northwest Bank for 17 years and is an instrumental member of the Commercial Banking team. In her new role, she will manage all commercial and treasury management bankers in West Des Moines. A division of Northwest Financial Corp., Northwest Bank is a $2 billion community bank that offers business, agriculture, mortgage, consumer deposit and lending services as well as wealth management services.