Rachel Bryant, Regions Bank | Most Powerful Women: Next

Enjoy complimentary access to top ideas and insights — selected by our editors.

Head of market, liquidity, capital and strategic risk management

Rachel Bryant specializes in risk management, and she applies that framework not only to her job duties, but also to her career path.

"I continually look to the future, which has led me to take calculated risks to move my career forward," she said. "I was willing to move for the jobs I wanted."

It's hard to argue with what Bryant has accomplished by age 32. A graduate of Georgia Tech, she was in her mid-20s when she was hired as an examiner by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta. She later moved to Charlotte, N.C., for a role as a team leader for the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond.

In September 2015, Bryant joined Regions Bank, where she is now the head of market, liquidity, capital and strategic risk management.

For her work in this role, she has been selected as one of the 15 women on our inaugural Next list. (An extension of our Most Powerful Women in Banking program, the list is meant to highlight high-achieving women in the leadership pipeline who are age 40 and under.)

• See the full Next list for 2019

At Regions, Bryant is a key player on the regulatory front, overseeing compliance with the Volcker Rule and the resolution planning process. She also has been overseeing the transition at the Birmingham, Ala. company away from the use of the London Interbank Offered Rate, or Libor, as a benchmark.

In addition, Bryant led a yearlong effort to improve the efficiency of Regions’ process for making stress-test submissions to the Federal Reserve.

“It is a lot,” Bryant acknowledged during a recent interview.

From mid-2017 through last year, Regions overhauled its market and liquidity risk division, with Bryant managing the project. Besides providing better control of expenses, the project has allowed for keeping Regions’ C-suite and board of directors better informed about developing risks.

"There was real opportunity there to improve our messaging and impact," Bryant said.

She noted that the issues her team works on involve almost every department at Regions. “It means that there has to be very good relationship management,” she said.

Nominating executive: Martha Raber, head of financial risk

What she says: Regions has much deeper insights into its capital and funding requirements and a stronger risk framework because of predictive measures put in place in a bankwide project where Bryant played a critical leadership role, Raber wrote in nominating Bryant for the Next list. “This framework would have been invaluable if in place during the Great Recession, as it would have identified warning signals to executive leadership,” Raber said. "Rachel’s efforts have resulted in significantly strengthening and improving Regions’ ability to chart a prudent, sustainable and profitable course."