The Latest from Women in Banking

Mooney is joining AT&T’s (NYSE:T) board of directors, the telecommunications company announced Friday. She will sit on the corporate development and finance committee.

Many if not all of the women on our ranking would tell you that their success at work has not taken place in a vacuum. It is one piece of their lives – lives that in some cases are filled with children, with aging parents needing assistance or any number of commitments that go along with being a well-rounded citizen.

To succeed today, financial firms need to encourage female employees to take the right kind of risks, such as trying new innovations to serve clients.

Meet some of the women who are taking bold steps to bring more female leaders to the fore.
• Centric Bank's Patti Husic: Taking the Initiative
• Wells Fargo's Caryl Athanasiu: Preparing for the Post
• RBC's Janice Fukakusa: Going All In
• Citigroup's Cece Stewart: Reclaiming Yourself
• PNC's Charlotte McLaughlin: Stepping Back to Get Ahead

We need to encourage women to disrupt the status quo and take jobs in uncharted territory, like those in risk management, social media, mobile banking and big data analytics.

Promotion to CEO roles will continue to be a challenge for women as the industry continues to consolidate.

Tracy Grooms, formerly of Bank of America, did not stay retired long. Queens University has hired her to teach undergraduates about banking at its business school, which is named after the most famous B of A exec of all.

Sandberg's book has highlighted the need for both men and women to sponsor high potential women and encourage them to take a seat at the table.

The year's Most Powerful Women in Banking special report contains good news and bad. On the positive side, women are making progress in the upper reaches of banking and finance. The trouble is that they still have a long way to go before achieving gender equality. The reasons are complex.

After 18 months running a Fifth Third affiliate bank in the upper Midwest, Mary Tuuk is back at the company's Cincinnati headquarters, where she worked as chief risk officer from 2007 to 2011.