BankThink

Women in Banking: #TheNew10; Heidi Miller's New Gig

#TheNew10: Which woman would KeyCorp's Beth Mooney or Citi's Suni Harford put on the new $10 bill? See the top picks from some of our favorite women in banking. The redesigned bill isn't expected to arrive until 2020, but the conversation about which woman should take the honor has been lively so far, with influencers offering their suggestions. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew says the public will get a chance to weigh in this summer as part of a design campaign.

Female Leadership: Banking vs. Other Sectors: A recent study of LinkedIn data offers more evidence that the financial services industry has a pronounced gender imbalance in leadership roles. The study shows that overall female representation in financial services and insurance combined (43%) falls right in the middle compared with other sectors (women make up 60% of the health care and pharmaceuticals industry and 27% of the oil and energy industry). The leadership gap is present across all industries in the study, but the gap in the financial services and insurance category is among the highest at 14.1 percentage points – almost on par with health care's 14.6 percentage points. See here for the breakdown.

The Rules Are There Are No Rules: Rep. Maxine Waters from California, the ranking Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee, accused regulators of providing "lip service" to diversity efforts. Dodd-Frank-mandated guidelines issued June 9 provide a framework by which financial institutions can self-assess their diversity practices. The standards are voluntary, it's not clear if or when companies even have to conduct tests on themselves and whether they decide to disclose their diversity data to their regulators is their choice. In a joint news release with Joyce Beatty, D-Ohio, Waters called the policy ambiguous, saying the rules "appear to do nothing to bring transparency to this industry, which has a long history of failing to promote diversity in its work force."

Lagarde on Greece: European Union leaders are getting closer to a Greek exit plan. Christine Lagarde, International Monetary Fund managing director, was frustrated and clearly unimpressed with the leaders in the room, whose sentiments ranged from blame games to silence. "The key emergency is to secure a dialogue with adults in the room," she said. "What we lack is a dialogue." They failed to end the standoff between Greece and its creditors and scheduled yet another emergency summit for Monday.

Yellen on CRA: Janet Yellen says the Fed is looking for ways to "improve" rules pertaining to the Community Reinvestment Act. The chair of the Federal Reserve said although it takes the CRA "very seriously", it is looking at possible changes to the rules implementing the 1977 anti-redlining law to address concerns that it is too lax.

Role Call

Former JPMorgan Chase executive Heidi Miller was added to the board at M&A services provider SRS Acquiom. Before she retired, Miller was a fixture in American Banker's Most Powerful Women rankings from 2003 to 2010 and topped the list from 2007 to 2009.

Wells Fargo's Hope Hardison was promoted from head of human resources to chief administrative officer.

Citizens Financial promoted Lisa Maass to president of its Connecticut market. She previously led Citizens' middle-market banking in the same state.

Pinnacle Financial in Nashville added Renda Burkhart, founder and president of the accounting firm Burkhart & Company, to its board and its audit and trust committees. She is the fourth woman to join the Pinnacle board.

In Case You Missed It

In a BankThink piece, Maxine Waters railed against the two-tiered American justice system handing out "sweetheart deals" to the wolves of Wall Street while hundreds of minority Americans, without megabanks to hide behind, effectively get life-ruining punishments for minor offenses. She called on Attorney General Loretta Lynch to put an end to this kind of inequality ahead of her tenure.

Citigroup's Heather Cox is our Digital Banker of the Year, in part because the company was among the first to allow outside developers access to its app programming interfaces. Cox is the chief client-experience, digital and marketing officer for the global consumer bank.

For reprint and licensing requests for this article, click here.
Women in Banking
MORE FROM AMERICAN BANKER