Citi's Titi Cole on what's changed in banking: The Climb

After a 32-year climb to the highest peaks, Citi executive Titi Cole will soon exit the world of finance as she retires from banking to run a health care nonprofit.

Before she carved out a name for herself as one of the most prolific banking executives, Cole graduated from the University of Ibadan in Nigeria with an economics degree and was hired at her first banking job in Lagos, Nigeria, in 1992. Only a few years later she returned to the U.S., where she was born, to attend Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Business Administration and soon after became an engagement manager for management consulting firm McKinsey in their Chicago office.

Several years later, Cole took a position as a consumer lending product executive at BMO Harris, now known as BMO Bank, because she felt the Canadian bank would give her a concrete path to a C-suite job. "One of the biggest reasons I went to BMO Harris coming out of McKinsey in Chicago — which was a small bank back then, with still relatively small numbers — was because they were the only bank that let me go from McKinsey to actually running a P&L," she said.

But Cole knew very well where she intended to go: "I didn't want to do the detour to strategy because it could be a detour that never ends. Then you go from strategy, you go to marketing and maybe you go to HR. … You're never gonna get to running businesses."

Cole got an early glimpse of success among women in banking while attending her first American Banker Most Powerful Women in Banking event with Ellen Costello, former president and CEO of Harris Financial Group, a BMO subsidiary, who is now on Citi's board of directors. Many of the women she saw that night would go on to be in the cohort of executives in Cole's generation, which she cited as an inspiration. Cole would later be named to the Most Powerful Women in Banking list in 2022 and 2023.

Following her stint at BMO Harris, Cole held several executive positions in consumer banking at Bank of America for the next 5 years. In 2011, as product leader, her team was a part of the highly scrutinized effort to pilot a $5 monthly fee for any account with a balance lower than $200. Other banks had similar policies, Cole said, but Bank of America saw major public blowback — even becoming the subject of a Saturday Night Live sketch — before ultimately retracting the decision three weeks later.

Cole said the public's response was a valuable learning experience as the leader of the highly-criticized team pushing the effort forward.

"I learned a lot about myself as a leader, about moving things forward, listening to clients," Cole said. "A failure that I will never forget, but probably the biggest learning in my career as a leader all around."

At the end of 2015, Cole decided to move on to the bank known as the most consumer-friendly in the industry: Wells Fargo.

However, Cole's arrival came at an inopportune time for the banking giant. She was hired just as the bank's fake account scandal broke. The experience was one of the most difficult points of her career to navigate, she said: "You think, 'Do you go back to where you came from?' I said, 'No. You lean in and you become part of the you try your best to be part of the solution.'

"I was probably the only one, then, at that point, senior leader from outside who didn't have subpoenas or emails," she said. "It was tough the whole time I was there."

Despite the difficulties she faced in helping rebrand the company and maintaining order under a constantly changing executive regime, Cole said that the situation is what created the avenue for her to make a name at Citi.

"Prior to that, I would run teams of a couple hundred highly motivated P&L people, which is very different from running call centers or operations teams ... I got that opportunity at Wells and I will always be grateful." Cole added that this debacle gave her an avenue to switch out of P&L and gain valuable leadership experience over tens of thousands of employees, preparing her well for her position at Citi.

At Citi, Cole had the opportunity to lead consumer divestitures in 14 different countries in her final role as CEO of legacy franchises. As part of CEO Jane Fraser's corporate streamlining program, Cole was responsible for selling many of Citi's operations around the world, an assignment that came with unique difficulties, involving geopolitical conflicts, disputes and layoff or retirement processes. She will retire after four years with the company.

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Elevating women in a changing industry

The path Cole carved is not an easy one for many women to replicate, she said. She hopes that after her departure from the industry, more light is shone on the process that makes a highly sought executive position possible.

"What kind of roles are [women] in?" she asked. "Are they in roles where they're actually running P&Ls or holding high credit limits where they can actually be decision makers? Or are they in great roles, but roles that don't have a trajectory to C-suite roles?"

Another disadvantage that many women in banking face is making the choice and finding a balance between building a family during the most crucial time in a corporate career, Cole said. "For the women I mentor, the biggest thing I tell them is hang in there. Because as you know when the kids are young, that's when it's so hard to stay. ... You just gotta make it through."

But Cole also said she is beginning to see a tangible change in industry attitudes towards parental leave and care, especially because of widespread remote work, a development she believes was absolutely necessary.

"I remember when I started in banking, especially in North America, you were just there like you couldn't do work if you weren't at your desk," Cole said. "I really do think that technology during the pandemic has given us a lot more flexibility, which I know that men and women — especially working parents — tell us is really important."

But the industry does still need to improve in order to create an equal playing for both men and women, she added. "And if you look at our industry and we mirror in some places, we're a little better than corporate America demographics, but it's a lot of the same things (in banking)," she said. "How are we getting more women ready for that promotion … What are the biases in the process around how women show up in the workplace?"

In order to do this, Cole said, there need to be changes in education and a proper career trajectory that won't keep women stuck in roles that remain stagnant: "I think for us in industry, we have to think about pipelining; what are the development goals for our top talented women, and how do we make sure we're being intentional about exposing them to opportunities?"

Post-retirement plans

Cole will join a women and healthcare non-profit that assists in developing cures and treatments for sickle cell anemia as the executive director, a long-planned move into health care advocacy. She will also continue as a board member for CARE, a nonprofit that fights poverty and hunger in more than 100 countries.

"It's just really amazing work. I'm excited to be able to spend more time on things like that," she said.

Cole said both her successes and failures in the banking industry taught her invaluable lessons in listening, crisis management and decision-making that will translate into her advocacy work.

"The answer is no retreat, just put your head down, you're in it, you have to figure out how to learn from it and grow. I am a much better leader for having gone through those experiences," she said. "But when you actually have to do it and you also see others — who was great and who was not? — and you learn from that as well."