Risky Women Podcast | Talent Management and the Nature of Work

Tonya Hummers, Managing Director at Protiviti, speaks with Sarah Olthoff, Senior Vice President and Chief Business Risk Officer at Discover, about talent management, the nature of work, and the skills risk roles need most.

Sarah K. Olthoff serves as a Senior Vice President of Business Risk Programs at Discover Financial Services.  In this role, Sarah is responsible for development, implementation, and oversight of the business risk management program across the enterprise.  This program include the Business Risk Offices that directly support Discover’s business units as well as centralised risk management functions that enable consistent and effective execution of risk activities, such as Change Management, Issue Management, and Risk Reporting.  Prior to this role, Sarah served as VP, Internal Audit overseeing the Regulatory Compliance Audit Program, which provides independent assurance around regulatory compliance and financial crimes risk.

Prior to joining Discover in September 2020, Sarah spent twenty-two years at Capital One Financial Services, where she held various leadership roles in Corporate Compliance and Risk Management, including: Card Compliance Officer, SCRA Compliance Officer, KYC Program Accountable Executive, and Compliance Management Program Accountable Executive.  Sarah has deep expertise in financial services laws and regulations, compliance management programs, and risk management systems and frameworks. She is an experienced financial services leader, who develops an avid followership through her commitment to development, diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Tonya has more than 25 years of experience in consulting and financial services.  She joined Protiviti in 2021 as the Business Performance Improvement Financial Services Industry Leader.  She has leadership experience that includes global project and engagement management within the Financial Services and Non-Profit industries.  Tonya has a consistent record of success in delivering large-scale, complex business process and technology-based change projects on time and on budget.  She has extensive experience with finance functions, processes and systems surrounding financial and management accounting, financial reporting, planning and forecasting and risk management and compliance.

Tonya Hummers has held several senior roles throughout her career, responsible for leading large AML-KYC remediations and many complex SAP, PeopleSoft and Oracle Financials implementations for large-scale clients while at EY, IBM and PwC.  She brings global experience to Protiviti, having worked in many countries outside of the United States, including India, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Switzerland, Mexico, Bermuda, Canada and the U.K.  She also served as a Vice President in the Private Banking division at Chase Bank, where she led the Financial Planning and Analysis group for technology and operations.