**Exhibit 10.15**
**Short Term Incentive Program for Bank Offices**
**Overview:**The short term incentive program for bank offices has several key objectives. First andforemost to push accountability for the future of the bank all the way down within theorganization. This program aligns personal rewards with quality production, aids in the retentionof performers, supports localness by providing discretion for all managers, supports teamwork,encourages individual excellence and creates clarity around goals, performance and rewards. Abonus pool will be generated at the regional level and then allocated to eligible employees.
Defined terms are contained in the Summary of Sterling Bank Short Term Incentive Programs overviewdocument.
**Eligibility:**All officers and non-officers of Sterling Bank who are assigned to work in a bankoffice. Officers include regional CEOs (RCEO), Office CEOs (OCEO), Lenders and Office Managers.
**How will the incentive bonus pool be generated and allocated?:**In general, each of the BankOffices will generate a bonus pool based on the bank’s excess return on average allocated equity(ROAAE) over the hurdle rate (for instance 12.0%). The size of the pool will be determined byapplying some percentage factor (for instance 27%) to the excess ROAAE. Ninety percent of allpools will be awarded to bank officers and 10% of all pools will be awarded to non-officeremployees.
A portion of each bank officer pool will be allocated to the RCEO based on the RCEO’s scorecard(result must be 3 3) as assessed by the President/CEO. The RCEO will then allocate theremaining pool to the individual bank offices. This allocation to the bank offices will be basedon individual bank offices’ performance against predetermined and stated measures that are weightedto reflect importance. These weighted measures are:     Loan Growth Target  30%Deposit GrowthTarget  20%Net Income  20%Asset Quality Points  10%Employee Fulfillment Survey Results  3.33%Customer Service Shopping Results  3.33%Cooperation Index Results  3.34%Collateral Exceptions  10%
Once the pool per office has been determined, the RCEO will determine how much of each individualofficer pool will be allocated to the OCEO based upon the OCEO’s scorecard (result must be 33) and subject to one-up review. The allocation of the remainder of the pool to the individualofficers will be determined by the OCEO based on individual scorecards (result must be 3 3)and to the non-officers based upon individual scorecards (result must be 3 3) and input fromthe Office Manager. All officer allocations will be subject to one-up review.
**How often is the bonus paid?:**Quarterly. Bonuses will be paid 60 days following the end of eachcalendar quarter. To receive a bonus, the employee must be employed by Sterling Bank on the datethe bonuses are **paid.**
**Who administers the incentive program?:**The bonus pool calculations will be performed by theFinance staff and approved by the CFO. The allocation of the bonus pool to individual

 

employees will be performed by the CEO, RCEOs, and OCEOs, subject to one-up review for allallocations below the CEO level. The HR department will make the payroll entries to pay theapproved bonus.
**Will the participants in this incentive program participate in other incentive programs?:**AsShared Services members, the RCEOs will also participate in the bonus incentive program for SharedServices. However, their participation will be divided between these two programs on a weightedbasis. Except for a few isolated instances where officers have undertaken new initiatives, it isthe intention that officers and all other employees will not participate in any other bonusincentive program. They will, however, continue to participate in the various “master” programsand referral fee programs, such as Master Lender, Master Office, lease incentive, etc.