When Maria Hackley started recruiting talent at Georgetown University early in her career at Citigroup, impressing her managers was an accidental result. 

“Part of one’s success is the incremental things that one does outside of their day job that help senior leaders meet their goals,” Hackley explained. 

It was the early 1990s and Hackley was a coverage banker at Citi. In her free time, she flew from New York City to Washington, D.C. seeking new talent among the women, Latinos and members of the LGBTQ community at her alma mater. 

When doing a lot of public speaking, a background in theater comes in handy.

Samara Epstein Cohen, Blackrock’s first chief investment officer of ETFs and index investments, holds a bachelor’s in theater arts from the University of Pennsylvania. In the last year, she’s spoken at more industry events and has been a guest on panels, podcasts, and news outlets like CNBC and Bloomberg. 

As Citigroup undergoes a massive restructuring, Ida Liu, head of Citi Private Bank, is focused on the engagement and morale of a 3,000-employee team spread across 52 offices in 20 countries.

Liu’s methods include traditional efforts such as frequent communication through emails and town halls and less conventional techniques that include inviting a nutritionist to advise on eating and a doctor to discuss sleep. She organized a competitive bake sale at the London branch and once invited a Buddhist monk to discuss guided meditation.

Over the past year, financial markets have been driven by higher rates and a potential shift toward deglobalization. In response, Hanneke Smits, global head of investment management at BNY, has aligned the bank’s portfolio strategies to meet evolving client needs.

This includes launching Pinpoint, a data-driven portfolio consultation service that has led to new client opportunities in Switzerland; debuting Pershing X Wove, a wealth-management platform for North American clients; and expanding a partnership with alternative credit specialist CIFC Asset Management, which allows clients around the world to access private credit exposure.

In 2020, less than one year into becoming Wells Fargo CEO, Charles Scharf tapped Ellen Patterson to lead the bank’s legal department. The job promised to be a challenge: Well Fargo faced a mountain of federal investigations plus class action lawsuits and overall concern it could not manage risk.

Four years after coming over from TD Bank, Patterson said, “I feel really good about the progress we’ve made putting a number of historical matters behind us.”

Moving Comerica’s back-office employees into new digs in Farmington Hills, Michigan, was about more than just a change of scenery — it was a concrete manifestation of a recently adopted core value of making “the bigger possible.”

That’s the view of Megan Crespi, Comerica’s chief operating officer. The new office has more natural light, sit-stand desks and 32-inch curved computer monitors, all designed with employee input.

One of the biggest challenges Jennifer Smith has faced this year at Zions has been the Salt Lake City-based bank’s decision to require most employees to return to the office five days a week.  

“This directive reflected in a headline can sound so simple, yet there are often immediate favorable and unfavorable reactions,” Smith said.  

Particularly as it relates to IT employees, regional banks have hired people from all over the country to source the best talent, she said. “There are cases where we cannot find some talent locally in our markets,” she explained.

As chief information officer at KeyBank, Amy Brady guided the bank to high talent retention rates within the company’s technology, operations and services (KTOS) organization. In a highly competitive market for technical talent, this stability is a significant strategic advantage.

The division, which includes 4,524 employees, had a voluntary annualized attrition rate of 6.8% in 2024. Technology employees had attrition as low as 3.78%. These figures, which are below industry averages according to the bank, reflect a culture that minimizes disruption, preserves institutional knowledge and reduces the high costs associated with recruitment.

This success in workforce stability is a direct reflection of Brady’s focus on employee engagement and professional growth. She advocates for empowering her employees to be the “CEOs of their careers,” a philosophy supported by internal development programs that she said goes beyond typical training, fostering critical skills like adaptability, digital fluency and complex decision-making.

“Chief experience officer” is the kind of job title that seems open to interpretation.

Beth Johnson took on the role of vice chair and chief experience officer at Citizens three years ago. For her, the job title means that she’s responsible for building the Providence, Rhode Island, bank’s capabilities so it can deliver excellent customer experiences in a rapidly changing banking environment. That includes digital design, data and analytics, marketing and communications and enterprise payments strategy and infrastructure.

Deborah Guild, the head of enterprise technology and security at PNC, has served in a number of tech leadership roles at the bank over the last 12 years. This year, however, her challenges look a little different, given  the acceleration of AI, global cybersecurity threats, and an alarming increase in consumer fraud perpetrated by bad actors. 

Additionally, deepfake technology and sophisticated cyberattacks have made traditional identity verification more challenging than ever.