Podcast S6E6 | Talent Management in Risk: Sarah Olthoff

TRANSCRIPT

Kimberley Cole 0:01
This is Risky Women Radio, a show that connects, celebrates and champions women in risk regulation and compliance. We’re here to share the insights on the biggest issues in our industry and hear inspiring journeys from our global members. Sign up to our newsletter at riskywomen.org. I’m Kimberley Cole, your Chief Risky Woman.

Tonya Hummers 0:24
So welcome. We’re here for the Risky Women podcast broadcasting live from Illinois. And I’m here today with Sarah Olthoff. She’s from Discover, and she is the chief business risk officer at Discover. So welcome, Sarah.

Sarah Olthoff 0:36
Thank you very happy to be here.

Tonya Hummers 0:38
Thanks for joining us. So I want to talk a little bit about Sarah at her career. I know that she had a long history at CapOne over 20 years of experience there, which is phenomenal. Lots of risk and compliance roles at CapOne, and then joined Discover, I think during the pandemic, if I’m not mistaken. Yeah. So, so big move over to Discover. And notice that you were promoted last year to a senior vice president role in December.

Sarah Olthoff 1:02
Yes I was!

Tonya Hummers 1:03
Can you tell us a little bit about your career path and journey? And what brought you over to Discover?

Sarah Olthoff 1:07
Yeah, sure. So as you mentioned, I was at Capital One for a little over 20 years and started there when it was a pretty small kind of startup organization, thought I’d be there for a couple years and learn some stuff, and then you know, go on to something else. And just ended up having a wonderful ride with a company that was growing and changing. And it felt like while I was at the same organization, I worked for a number of different companies through that, given how much they evolved as an organization over those years. And as you said, did a number of different roles a lot in the Risk and Compliance space. And kind of found myself at one point, feeling like it was time to try something else to give myself some additional challenges and to stretch muscles that hadn’t been stretched in a while. And so had a great opportunity to come over to Discover into the third line of defense into internal audit, which I had not done before.

Tonya Hummers 2:05
That’s great.

Sarah Olthoff 2:06
So it was a I had started my risk career in the first line had spent a lot of time in the second line, and then had a chance to come here and do some third line work, which was an amazing experience, and just really came to appreciate the value in the position that internal audit plays in an organization in a much deeper way than I had before. And then, late last year, had an opportunity to move kind of back into second line first line related work with this role, which is brand new. So it’s a brand new role. For me, it’s a brand new role for the company, to develop consistent frameworks for how we as a company manage risk in the first line. So our business risk offices, sometimes called the one point fives, the one point nines in the line defense framework. And we’ve had that framework for a while but just not kind of developed de novo in each organization. So had a chance to come over and bring those groups together in a more consistent and defined way. And it’s proving to be a very fun journey a couple of months in.

Tonya Hummers 3:11
Yeah, no, that’s great. And I’m sure now experience in all three lines, you have a preference you love the first line you wanted to get back to that space is that…

Sarah Olthoff 3:18
Yeah, I think I’m a problem solver by nature. And so being able to be a little bit closer to the action be kind of in the in the mix of actually solving the problems finding the solutions and implementing it.

Tonya Hummers 3:32
Finding the problem versus third line, right.

Sarah Olthoff 3:34
Yeah. Right, which is super valuable. Yes. But because of the nature of the independence, right, and third line, it limits the ability to be actually kind of on the ground, firefighting on issues. And so I kind of missed being being in the mix of stuff. And so it was a great opportunity to get a little bit closer back to the business.

Tonya Hummers 3:51
Understood. You know, in researching your history and your career, I noticed you’re also very passionate about DEI.

Sarah Olthoff 3:56
Yes!

Tonya Hummers 3:56
And you know, I’m just curious about the culture at Discover. And you know, what compels you like, What Are there aspects of the culture that really drew you here and that you really admire about the culture here?

Sarah Olthoff 4:06
Yeah, for sure. You know, when, when I, when I thought about potentially leaving Capital One, I had a very few companies that I thought about leaving for and culture was a huge piece of me thinking about where I would go. And I had a chance to meet and talk with a number of people here at Discover, and just really felt like it was a great, great culture, very collaborative, very people oriented. There’s a there’s one of our core values, which is “we succeed together.” And by nature, I am a collaborator. I like to work with other people and solve problems together. And so was excited to find another organization where culture was important and openness and collaboration was at the core of how the company functions. And so that’s been that’s been great. I’m super glad I didn’t have to trade that off when looking for other opportunities. And I think, you know, culture has always been a big part of Discover’s history, and will be a big part of its future. people I think are really drawn to cultures that support openness and collaboration and engagement, and I think also have have have core values that they live and breathe by, and have investments in the DE&I work. So yeah, that proved to be very true for me here.

Tonya Hummers 5:31
Absolutely. I mean, I love the we succeed together. I always have, you know, similar thoughts for my team, one team one dream, you know, similar mindset.

Sarah Olthoff 5:38
Yes.

Tonya Hummers 5:39
And I’m just, you know, thinking about that culture, and how does that help you attract and retain, right? Because it’s both right, you’ve got to attract your talent. And today, our topic is talent management, for those of you that, that aren’t getting in on topic, but for, you know, how do you attract individuals? And then how do you keep them here? Is it that collaboration that, you know, we succeed together mindset that you think keeps people at Discover?

Sarah Olthoff 6:00
I think it’s a big part of it, I again, I think, even even more so today, I think there’s a big emphasis for people in the job market to think about, not just where they could work, but where do they want to work? What kind of environment do they want to work in. And, and while while there are those that thrive in different environments, I think, for me, and for a lot of people working in a space where you feel valued and make, you can speak your mind, and you can be open, you can be heard means a lot. And I think the opportunity for people to feel like they can explore different things at the company, right, have the opportunity to try different roles out there, the kind of idea of, of openness and collaboration creates space to see what else exists, right? And to give you a chance to say, Hey, this is something interesting, I wasn’t aware of, maybe I want to try this role out or try this area with the business out.

Tonya Hummers 6:59
So that brings us to a really interesting point. Right? So you’re a risk professional, and you’ve taken risks, I’m sure in your career, right. And you know, that safety zone, like you’re saying, at Discover it’s okay to make mistakes, it’s okay to be open. What’s one of the kind of biggest risks you’ve taken in your career? And, you know, did it pay off? That risk?

Sarah Olthoff 7:17
Yeah, I think I think one of the first ones was certainly joining Capital One when it was a very small kind of startup organization. And, and, and, you know, I don’t know that anybody at that point envisioned, you know, where that company would go. But taking a risk on a small kind of startup, I think is a brave thing for people to do. And I’m excited when people do it even, even if in the end, right, that startup doesn’t, doesn’t make it or doesn’t end up becoming everything they thought it would be, it’s just a great experience, you wear so many hats, and you get to try so many different things. Because it’s small, it’s you.

Tonya Hummers 7:55
Right?

Sarah Olthoff 7:55
Right. It’s there’s no other person to point to. But then I think this role that I’m in now to was was a risk in terms of, it’s brand new, building something new is hard. And you have to change the fabric of an organization, of how it operates, and its norms, and its, its, its kind of habits of how things happen, and insert this new thing in all these different places. And, and that can be hard, it can be hard to break some of those norms, while people are super open to change, it just might not be on the front of their mind, right, that this is something to do differently. And so…

Tonya Hummers 8:35
And we say people are open to change, I’ll tell you, you know, my one of my roles at Protiviti is business performance improvement leader and we have people and change in our practice, right? And just inherently I think, by nature, people don’t want to change, they don’t like change, you find out you go into a meeting room, everyone sits in the same seat they sat in the last, time right?

Sarah Olthoff 8:51
We’re creatures of habit.

Tonya Hummers 8:52
Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, that’s, it’s a very, you know, great thing that you’re trying to do in terms of influencing change. And, and interesting how you do that. Talking about that, like thinking about role models in your life, like who have you looked up to from a career perspective, or it can be anyone, right entertainment? What, who are your role models? And how have you kind of emulated those folks, as you’ve moved in your career?

Sarah Olthoff 9:14
Yeah, I had, I had a really fortunate situation, during my career where the person I worked for, and I worked together for 10 years in a kind of manager, subordinate relationship. And it was it was one of these like yin and yang moments when we’re actually very different, but we complemented each other really well. So he knew my strengths, I knew his and we could really have some really good synergy. But it gave me really good perspective to watch as he navigated the organization and worked to leverage others right instead of having it all be something he felt like he had to drive. So I learned a ton from that. But I honestly I’m a huge observer of people and of dynamics. And I think that allows me to have almost everybody, in some ways be role models, right? I’m always looking for, what do I really like about how this person’s interacting or working or leading? Or what what don’t I like, right. But I can look for lots of folks who throughout my career point to and like, oh, I picked this up from that person, or I picked this up from that person. And I think sometimes we think there’s going to be the one iconic influencer, but I have certainly found throughout my career, that it’s, it’s, it’s a much broader pantheon of people and I kind of look across and go, I really gained something from almost everybody I’ve either worked for or worked with a lot.

Tonya Hummers 10:52
That’s great. Yeah, no, I think about that traits in people, right. So what is it you admire about lots of different individuals who work with, you know, one of the traits that I think is being stressed today in a lot of our education, with our younger people is resilience, right? So how do you, you know, fight and really have that character trait in what you’re trying to do? So just thinking about resiliency? You know, how is that affecting what the work that you do at discover? You know, do you find people are very resilient here? Do you have tips for building a resilient culture, you know, those that continue to fight and go for the good?

Sarah Olthoff 11:27
Yeah. You know, I think, challenge certainly builds resilience, right? So the more you’re challenged, the more you come through them, the more resilient you are, I think, for many organizations Discover being no different. The last couple years have have challenged us, right and have…

Tonya Hummers 11:45
the pandemic

Sarah Olthoff 11:46
…have really put that emphasis on how resilient are you and how resilient is your workforce, and I think Discover’s, done a lot to enable people to traverse the last couple of years with a lot of support and a lot of encouragement, and a lot of engagement. So they they feel like they can be resilient to those challenges. But that’s just one vector of challenge we face. Right. And certainly in financial services there’s constant pressures around the company evolving and regulatory expectations and where the industry is going. And so I think you almost you have no choice except to be resilient, if you want to be successful in these spaces. I think what really helps from a Discover perspective is a kind of going back to some of our core values and how the how the culture of the company supports that right? Having people feel like they don’t just have to suffer in silence, right? You can, you can bring your concerns to the table, you can be heard, there are tools and resources available that the company provides, if you are struggling with something, or if you do need help in a particular aspect that you can feel supported. And you don’t just have to find your way through it and muddle through it. So I do think that it’s different aspects of, of the company’s culture supports that resiliency. And again, the more challenges you go through, the more you kind of figure out how to be resilient.

Tonya Hummers 13:18
Yeah. And I think, you know, that has evolved, I don’t know I think you and I think started our careers similarly, at the same time, and just I know, when we started, that didn’t exist, right? There weren’t those support groups, it was just do your job. Right? It is a different culture! You know, the pandemic brought extreme challenges to all of us. And you know, I know companies are struggling today with the whole hybrid in office, how does that work? Right? And, you know, what is the culture like it Discover around that hybrid and office I’m here today at Discover there’s lots of folks here I was here yesterday, even more people at seeing but yeah, you know, what’s happening Discover with hybrid versus in office? And how do you manage that with your team?

Sarah Olthoff 13:55
Yeah, as you said, it’s a journey for all companies now coming out of the pandemic and figuring that out. Discover’s always been a place that emphasized flexibility, and providing opportunities for people to balance their personal needs with the company’s needs. And while that has evolved over the last couple of years, it’s not going away. Right. And so I think I always work with my team to go back to at our core, you know, we want to be flexible, and we want to provide the opportunity to meet personal needs and business needs and have that balance. So we do have a number of programs. So our customer care agents have the option to work 100% remote, our headquarters offices, we have flexibility to not work in the office for two days. But we also have programs that you can have flexible work arrangements, so condensed schedules or early starts or late starts, or, you know, variation in your scheduled days so that people can find that balance. I do think it’s it’s still we’re still early in my view of coming out of all of this, right, I think we’ve in some ways, are just on like step two of 20, probably of figuring out the new normal after the pandemic. And so it’s still going to be iterative and a journey, I think. But they Discover’s recognize that we need to retain that flexibility. We need to keep people’s perspectives and balance in check, but but also recognize that we’re not going to have all the answers on day one, right. So we need to remain open and continue to look for ways to evolve.

Tonya Hummers 15:35
And I think it’s great. It’s not a one size fits all. Everybody must be here Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, right? It seems like there’s lots of flexibility with the workforce, which is fantastic. It’s a hot job market still. Right, which is surprising. And we all thought that may change with all of the rate hikes and everything that’s been going on with the Fed, but it seems the job market is persisting, which is probably why we’ve got the extra hike. But you know, as you look at hiring, right, and I’m sure you guys are always out there looking for new talent, what types of skills are you looking for, for your organization? Right, and what types of people do you hire? What do people need to come to Discover with if they want to be part of your, your organization?

Sarah Olthoff 16:13
Yeah, I think first and foremost, the the ability to be adaptable, I think, is a huge piece. And, and, and that’s, it is probably true for many jobs. But I think particularly when you’re in any risk or compliance related role, the world is always changing, right. And there are new influences and new inputs all the time, kind of reprioritizing our day. And so having the ability to be adaptable, to be agile, to recognize, and lead through change is just critical to be successful in these spaces. The other one I really look for is what I call integrated thinking, or sometimes some people might say, is connecting the dots, right, seeing kind of disparate pieces of information and saying, Hey, I actually think there’s some connection across these, or there’s something related to these pieces of data that I’m seeing across different, you know, vectors of things, and being able to draw kind of more connected conclusions. Because risk can be elusive, right, you know, there’s stuff that’s very clear, but then some stuff, there’s, it’s really elusive. And we’re in the risk space, we don’t like surprises. But they happen. And so I think, you know, the best talent I have seen in the risk space, are those who have an innate ability to connect dots and to think in this integrated way of starting to see, right, that fuzzy thing on the horizon of like, hey, you know, I smell smoke somewhere, right, and starting to dig it out and come up with insights that can actually help the company to make different decisions.

Tonya Hummers 17:56
Yeah. So that brings me to an interesting question about kind of working in teams versus working as individuals. So are you looking for individuals that connect dots? Or are you putting together kind of diverse teams that collectively connect those dots? Because I know, in my line of work and consulting, obviously, you know, we’re always going for diverse teams, because I’m one type of a person, right? There’s so many different types of people that bring so many different perspectives that when you’re looking at solving client challenges, you know, we leverage all of those different perspectives to to bring the right solution. How about a Discover? Do you find the same?

Sarah Olthoff 18:26
I think it’s both. I think it is both, you know, folks who can can innately look for some of that as well as through a team. A number of years ago, I was introduced to a term called shared consciousness, which I just love. And to me, it’s this idea of how teams develop this shared understanding of what’s going on. And different people play different roles in that and brings different insights to the table. But if you can, if you can have that team develop this kind of shared consciousness of what’s going on, then they become that hub right? Of the dot connecting. And it’s, it’s, it’s tough to do, you have to be very intentional to make that happen. Because we all get, we all get on our priority list. And we all get going down our path. And we’re all kind of running against our stuff. But I think if you spend some time to create space for people to share, even if they don’t think it’s impacting to other people, right, just to here’s what’s going on, or here’s something I saw, or here’s something I observed, that plants, the seeds, that I think teams over time can like pull on and harvest. So I think it’s both

Tonya Hummers 19:35
Yeah, no, absolutely. So just thinking again, around kind of what you’re looking for, likewise, in your career, thinking about career advice you’ve received or, you know, I’ve heard this phrase as your younger self. If you could give advice to your younger self, what would that be? So a what’s the best career advice you’ve received? And then what career advice would you give to others or to your younger self?

Sarah Olthoff 19:57
Yeah, I think one of the best pieces of career advice I got was, careers are not decisions of right and wrong. They’re just decisions. And I think sometimes when we’re thinking about where we want to go in our careers, we spend a lot of time toiling over the decision.

Tonya Hummers 20:16
You never want to make a mistake!

Sarah Olthoff 20:19
Am I making a mistake? And someone said, it’s not a matter of right and wrong, it’s just a decision. And either way you go, you’re going to learn something. And that doesn’t mean they’re all going to turn out great, but you’re always going to be learning, you’re always going to be growing. And if you approach it through that growth mindset and for the chance to learn from whatever experiences come your way, you’ll never regret a move. Even if it’s not exactly what she thought it was gonna be. And so that that’s always really helped me throughout my career. Luckily, I got that early on in my career.

Tonya Hummers 20:51
Couldn’t agree with you more. When I was a little girl, I used to love to read the Choose Your Own Adventure book. Oh, yeah, that’s like, okay, read this. And if you want to do this, pick page 11 If you want to do this page 54. And I would go back and say, Well, what if I’d done 54? What if I’d done 11 – you know careers are somewhat like that? Where you say, Okay, what if I go from step one to discover is that the right move? And there’s no right or wrong? And there’s just different outcomes? Yeah, learn all along. So that’s absolutely true. So.

Sarah Olthoff 21:17
And I think the other thing, I would go back and tell myself, I think I kind of realized that midway through my career was, don’t define yourself by a job title, or like, by role, yeah. Define yourself by what your skills are, what you’re good at, and what you enjoy doing. So if you enjoy, you know, data analysts, and analytics, and or really strategic thinking or problem solving, you know, define yourself by yourself by those things because then you’ll you’ll open up a much wider vector to what you could do than if you just think, Oh, I’m a compliance advisor. That’s what I do. But if you if you take it down to what are the skills that I’m good at within that, what do I really enjoy doing that I could get better at? I think it really opens up more opportunities.

Tonya Hummers 22:12
I love that I, I’m sure you mentor a lot of younger women and men in the workforce. And I always tell people do what you love. Because you’re going to spend most of your waking hours in that job. And if you’re not doing what you love, and you’re not passionate about it, you know, where did where do you find your happiness?

Sarah Olthoff 22:30
Yeah, absolutely.

Kimberley Cole 22:34
This episode is brought to you by Protiviti. Protiviti is a global consulting firm with deep expertise in transformation, risk management, and compliance, partner with Protiviti and face the future with confidence.

Tonya Hummers 22:51
So I’m going to take a different turn now in terms of our annual risk survey. So one of the things we want to talk about is kind of Protiviti does this annual Top Risk Survey and for 2023, the second highest risk was that I’m going to read this so I get it right: Adoption of digital technologies requiring new skills that are in short supply, you know, would potentially say I’ve got to upskill my current workforce, and how do I do that? Right? And what are the challenges associated with upskilling? Have you found that in your space, and you know, are digital technologies making a big difference? AI is all over the radio? Yeah. How are we going to leverage AI? Yeah, audits thinking about that all of the different organizations are thinking about that. So how do you address that? And how do you upskill your employees? Or what are the challenges that you might face doing that?

Sarah Olthoff 23:35
Yeah. I think like many things, it’s it’s a blend of things, right? It’s not there’s not one silver bullet solution right, that gives you the answer to that. You know, the digital revolution has certainly changed things, So many dimensions. And, and again, I think I think we’re probably at the early end of that, right? I agree about where AI is going you think about things that are going to be on a horizon that we can’t even conceptualize now, but are actually probably going to be here in 10 15 years,

Tonya Hummers 24:03
I couldn’t conceptualize this iPhone. I didn’t have a mobile phone in college and now the kids can’t live without them.

Sarah Olthoff 24:13
Yeah! So I think I think it’s a blend of things. You know, at Discover, we have what we call Discover Technology Academy or the Discover technology, experience, and there’s great opportunities within that for training and learning focused on some of these emerging technologies are emerging areas of, of the industry. So a lot of investment to create that for existing employees. There’s also a program we started with kind of new out of college, folks in the data space through what we call our ARC program where they are able to come in and spend some time rotating through different areas of the company, through the lens of data and how they’re Thinking about data in those areas, and really explore how to think about them differently. They bring really interesting perspective. But then they also get a chance to learn different areas of the company and understand, you know, other areas they might be interested in after they come out of rotation and spending some time.

Tonya Hummers 25:15
Yeah, that’s those are great programs. And, you know, it’s, you either have to hire new skills, or you’re gonna take your current and maybe a combination, both your current employees and upskill them. So that’s great that Discover has those programs they can offer. Yeah, folks to kind of I know myself, I’ve changed kind of direction of career path, as you have first line, second line, third line, and, you know, taking a big risk and jumping over. So that’s always great. Yeah, you know, as I think about the talent market, and how has it changed over time? Right. So, you know, from your perspective, as you think about, obviously, we’re upskilling. But the talent market today and the new hiring, what’s that, like, from your side? Like, how has it changed from 20 years ago, 10 years ago? Do you see differences?

Sarah Olthoff 25:55
Yeah, I do think there’s, there is a lot of emphasis on technology. And it’s both from the lens of what people in the talent market bring, as well as what they expect in terms of the organization’s commitment to it, and with the technology they want to have available to them as they’re here. And I think there’s a lot of investment Discover’s doing in, in helping to make sure that we have an environment and a workplace where people get to experience some of these new technologies. A lot of discussion lately as you sit around like generative AI. So we have a council that’s established to help think through where in the organization, would this be a valuable tool? And if people have ideas, they can come talk with the council and explore it? So I think it creates that space for some of these new things to be available.

Tonya Hummers 26:45
And you don’t have to be a technologist anymore.

Sarah Olthoff 26:47
No!

Tonya Hummers 26:47
I had an undergraduate degree in systems, but I learned to program in COBOL. Today, you don’t have to be a COBOL programmer to kind of take advantage of the technology.

Sarah Olthoff 26:56
That’s right. That’s right. Yeah, I think the other thing that’s a pretty significant shift in the talent market, if I think about kind of when I was younger, in my career is I think there is an expectation for companies to be values based and to have an emphasis on their communities and their DE&I programs. And, and I think the younger generations expect that more than we did kind of when I was coming out of college school. And I think again, it’s it’s been a strength for Discover I think, continues to be a strength of being a very values based company, having a real commitment to our communities, being very demonstrable about that, right, and making sure people understand that that is core to who we are. And I think that helps us in the market, because people want to work in an organization that they can feel proud of.

Tonya Hummers 27:46
I agree. And I mean, I think the younger generation seems to be more founded on giving back. Right? And they’re involved in the community and their passions and kind of what they like. So that’s fantastic Discover has that. I want to try to think about our less serious question for today, which is around kind of retention and succession. So, you know, a lot of companies are struggling with the market, because we’ve got people that are retiring, the markets hot, you know, how do you develop these succession plans? And, you know, plan for that? How do you retain the employees you want to retain? So just your view on kind of the overall retention and succession, at Discover and what do you do to try to manage that?

Sarah Olthoff 28:24
Yeah, I do think it is a challenge. And, you know, I think it’s important for people to explore in life, right. And that, that sometimes means exploring outside of your current organization, I don’t see turnover per se as a bad thing. Because it also means we have the opportunity to bring in other great talent from other organizations, right. So I do think that movement in the market can bring a lot of freshness and a lot of goodness. But it is hard sometimes, right? Especially if there’s a really, really great talent that is, you know, potentially leaving or leaves. I think that commitment to just continuing to create space for people to grow and develop is super important. I have a lot of open conversations with the folks on my team. What’s important to you, what do you what are you looking for in your next opportunity? Is it I want to learn something totally different, or I want to play to my strengths in this space, or I’m feeling unchallenged and I need something that’s really going to break me out of my mold? And I think it’s a place where that open if you can, if you can get people to that openness, right where they really share, here’s what I really am either worried about or want to do, or, or feel like is important. Then you can become an advocate and champion for them, whatever that may be. And hopefully it’s, Hey, I’m gonna find you this next opportunity.

Tonya Hummers 29:49
Within Discover!

Sarah Olthoff 29:52
That what we’d like to happen right? But it doesn’t always and I think you know, I’m sure this is true for you, right like a pretty I’d network across different organizations and different communities. And so, you know, I never want to say, we can’t have people leave because that means I can’t pick people from other organizations who, who I’d really love to have here. So, yeah, that’s how I think about it.

Tonya Hummers 30:14
Yeah, that’s fantastic. All right, we’re gonna go for the quick speed round. The fun part of this podcast. So we’ve got four quick questions. So in one word, what do you see as your top priority for the year ahead?

Sarah Olthoff 30:26
Oh, continuing the build. This is a year of build so it’s, it’s it’s getting the foundational pieces for my for my new function and new role in place and just continuing the build.

Tonya Hummers 30:37
Okay. What did you want to be when you when you grew up?

Sarah Olthoff 30:41
So originally, I really thought I was gonna be a Broadway star. I thought I was like, going to be onstage singing and dancing.

Tonya Hummers 30:47
Me too!

Sarah Olthoff 30:49
I did a lot of theater. I loved it. But I realized I wasn’t actually that good. So I was probably not going to be big on Broadway. And then for a long time, I really wanted to be a Supreme Court justice. That was like my path for a good way through college and stuff. I was pretty sure I was gonna go to law school and, and really try and work towards towards that. And then reality set in when there’s like, you know, there’s only nine of those!

Tonya Hummers 31:15
Odd are in the mega millions, right?

Sarah Olthoff 31:16
Oh, yeah. No, probably not super likely. So, so had the opportunity to get into banking and don’t regret it.

Tonya Hummers 31:24
Awesome. What’s your favorite podcast or your favorite book? Either one.

Sarah Olthoff 31:28
Oh, God, I’m not a big podcaster!

Tonya Hummers 31:31
Oh, but you’re on a podcast. Gotta change the mindset!

Sarah Olthoff 31:35
I shouldn’t say that on a podcast. Yeah. I do occasionally listen to Breaking Banks, which I think is it pops up in my my my feet every once in a while. And I’ll take a listen, which is got some interesting perspective from an industry perspective. But I’m a huge reader. So like to find a favorite book would be really hard. I love to read. And there’s a book though that has a funny name. It’s called How to Wash a Chicken. And it’s, it’s it’s a book that Roger Hochschild our CEO mentioned recently that it’s about presentations, and how to think about giving presentations. And he didn’t write it. But it’s a book I found to be really interesting to think about presentations, and I just I recommend it a lot to people if something you’re thinking about is how to become better at presenting, putting together presentations. Plus, it’s got kind of a fun, funky name.

Tonya Hummers 32:34
Always great. Alright, last question of the day that we’re going to wrap with is probably important to a lot of our listeners that are there want to understand what you think? What advice would you give to women who are pursuing careers today in risk and compliance?

Sarah Olthoff 32:47
Do it? Do it now. We need you we need you. I think there’s so much that women excel at that is great in in the Risk and Compliance spaces of being natural problem solvers, being able to juggle so many different things at the same time. Not that men can’t do it. But yeah, but I think it it really is a great space for women. And I kind of stumbled into it early in my career and just was like, Oh, I really like this risk stuff. Yeah. And I found it to be a really great space to spend my career. And so I would encourage anybody who who dabbles in it and thinks that might be their jam to stick with it.

Tonya Hummers 33:37
Awesome. Thank you so much, Sarah. Yeah, you heard it right here. Enter the career of risk and compliance if you have not already!

Sarah Olthoff 33:43
We’d love to have you!

Tonya Hummers 33:43
So Sarah Olthoff with Discover thank you again. And thanks, everyone, for joining us for the podcast.

Sarah Olthoff 33:49
Yes. Thank you for having me.

Kimberley Cole 33:51
Thank you for listening to this episode of Risky Women Radio, be part of the ongoing conversation and learn more about our events and other programs at riskywomen.org