Welcome back to our Compliance Superhero Series! Every month, we highlight a compliance professional who is doing excellent work and ask them about their background, their thoughts on the industry, and any hidden superpowers they have. I’ve reached out to Marvel about adding them to the next phase of the MCU, but in the meantime, you can get to know them here. This month, we’re highlighting Katie Zahn, a Compliance Officer at First Electronic Bank. The interview has been lightly edited for clarity.
Welcome! Tell me a little bit about yourself and your role at First Electronic.
I’m a Compliance Officer here at First Electronic, and I oversee compliance for one of our lending partners, dealing primarily with small dollar loans and buy now, pay later (BNPL). First Electronic Bank isn’t a typical, commercial bank—we provide banking services for a lot of online lenders.
What was your path to the compliance space?
I actually started my career in healthcare. I went to law school, and got a law degree, but I realized pretty early on that I didn’t want to practice law. I wound up doing an internship at a hospital, where I was able to do half in legal and half in compliance, and the compliance side was what really interested me. From there, I kind of stumbled into the financial services industry, and now I’ve been here for 8 years.
What compels you about the work you do?
That it’s a challenge every day. The industry is always changing, there are new regulations to adapt to, and there often isn’t a black-and-white solution. I love that I’m able to help the company reach its goals while also keeping consumer protection in mind, and making sure that customers get treated fairly.
What’s your biggest piece of advice for a successful compliance program?
Keeping up with news and understanding regulations is critical. I’m constantly reading and learning, just so I can be sure that I’m on top of the latest information I need.
You also need a general understanding of customer feedback and the ability to hone in on where customers are seeing issues. It helps hone your business practices to provide the services they need and ensure they’re being treated the way that they should be.
What tools–software or otherwise–are most important for your work?
Services like PerformLine really allow us to do valuable tasks quickly. PerformLine allows us to ensure that customer-facing materials are what we’ve actually approved, and it’s way easier to do this using an automated service. We utilize a similar service for complaint monitoring.
There’s always going to be an element of human touch that’s required, but automated services, like PerformLine, flag the important issues. That lets us focus our time on the most meaningful items rather than sifting through piles and piles and piles of data.
What do you see happening within the compliance space in the next 1-2 years?
One of the partners I work with is in that BNPL field, so they’re really into more innovative products than a traditional lender. Regulators haven’t found a way to fully tap into regulating them yet, so they’re actively trying to figure out how to pull these sorts of loans into their purview.
Another trend I’m keeping an eye on is anti-money laundering and fraud prevention. We’ve seen some big news stories come out lately about fraud, and regulators are really honing in on making sure that customers’ accounts are kept secure and that we’re not lending to people we shouldn’t be.
What’s your secret superpower?
One that’s been told to me by a lot of employers is my creativity. Working in an industry with innovative products, you have to creatively find ways to meet the business’s goals while balancing regulations and consumer protection. I love the part of the job that’s coming up with creative solutions for novel problems.
