The Most Powerful Women in Finance: No.7, Donna Milrod, State Street

Last November, after State Street announced it was not moving forward with its acquisition of Brown Brothers Harriman investor services business, Donna Milrod, who had been the lead integration executive, took on a new role: chief product officer. 

Milrod now oversees a team of more than 500 professionals who provide a diverse range of services and products to institutional investors around the globe.

As the orchestrator of State Street's Investment Servicing (IS) businesses and the guiding force behind State Street Digital — the business division launched in 2021 to help institutional investors prepare for and thrive in the digital financing future — Milrod stands at the forefront of propelling the company's growth and innovation. Her direct influence extends over approximately 70% of State Street's operations, a daunting task considering the firm earned $12 billion in revenue in fiscal year 2022. 

In 2022, Milrod's team worked closely with leading technology and cloud service providers to realize State Street's digital infrastructure modernization goals. Central to advancing this vision was the evolution and growth of State Street's Alpha, the company's comprehensive open-architecture platform that lets clients manage the entire lifecycle of their private equity, real estate, infrastructure, private debt and fund-of-funds investments.

Lately, Milrod's team has taken up the cause of Web3 and blockchain technology. In a recent LinkedIn blog post, she explained her hybrid approach to information management — meaning, balancing private tech infrastructure with public cloud platforms. "We can envision a future in which public and private architecture will increasingly converge, and ultimately, the industry will realize the promise of the next generation technology stack built on distributed ledgers and smart contracts," Milrod wrote. "And we look forward to being part of that future."

Under her leadership, State Street Digital has been sharply focused on enhancing the digitalization of State Street's business units. This has meant integrating State Street Digital into the broader investment services product lineup to maximize synergies in governance, technology and customer investment opportunities. 

As institutional investors continue to recognize the benefits of tokenization and the utilization of blockchain technology, State Street Digital has focused on the tokenization of diverse asset classes. In a noteworthy achievement, her team's State Street Digital Digest, a quarterly compendium of digital transformation thought leadership, garnered the prestigious Crypto AM's Campaign of the Year Award.

"We believe in the future of digital finance," asserted Mildrod. "As digital asset structures continue to evolve, our role is to help make these structures better, more progressive, and more transparent." Emphasizing the need for rigorous customer protections, she elaborated, "We support healthy regulation in the space to prevent disasters like FTX in the future, and believe that rigorous compliance, governance, and risk practices will provide a competitive advantage in the digital space."

State Street's innovations extend beyond core custody and include modernized fund accounting and fund administration, and evolving servicing capabilities for the fast-growing private markets segment. "Since my appointment last year as State Street's chief product officer, I've thought deeply about the vital importance of back-office servicing and how not all such offerings are created equal," Milrod said. "Though State Street is well-recognized as a leading provider of investment services, clients may not always fully appreciate how they benefit from the investments we make in modernization, technology and products, nor how our core custody capabilities serve as enablers and accelerators for their own strategic growth ambitions. A holistic offering can bring to clients benefits of strength, stability and scale."

Upon assuming her role as executive vice president at State Street in 2019, Milrod has been dedicated to fostering diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI). Under her guidance, over 38,000 of State Street's global workforce completed unconscious bias and inclusive leadership training by year-end 2021. She is also a leading force behind State Street's 10 Actions Against Racism and Inequality, established in 2020, and  serves as workstream sponsor for Action #8: Representation Across the Industry, leveraging industry partnerships and educational networks to advance representation and career opportunities for Black and Latinx talent and attract diverse talent to the financial services industry. 

An active member of State Street's professional women's network, Milrod has contributed to fostering women's professional growth through networking, coaching and career development opportunities. She's a mentor in "Leading Women," a group of top female executives at the company who sponsor senior women across the organization and provide mentorship support to more junior peers. In addition, she serves as an executive sponsor of State Street's PRIDE network, where she champions LGBTQ+ support and advocacy within the organization. 

Mildrod's commitment to diverse and inclusive leadership extends beyond State Street's walls. She was included on Empower's Top 50 Advocates list for 2023, which acknowledges "inspirational business leaders'' who are increasing representation and driving inclusion for people of color within the workplace.

She is a board member of the Partnership Fund For New York City, the investment arm of the Partnership of New York City, which works to spark innovation and expand job opportunities in the five boroughs. 

She is also a board member of New York Women's Forum, the Committee of 200, the National Association of Corporate Directors, the Council on Foreign Relations and the Economic Club of New York .

This is her third time on American Banker's Most Powerful Women in Finance list, and in 2022, she earned a spot on the HERoes list of "Top 100 Women Executives," which honors women in business who are driving change for gender diversity in the workplace.