Initially attracted to Women in Derivatives (WIND) – an organization that supports women in finance – to grow her network within the financial industry, Amy Iseppi, a DTCC Senior Relationship Manager, recently became a WIND Ambassador.
The 501c3 nonprofit organization says, “WIND Ambassadors play a vital role by providing support to WIND's committee chairs to achieve their mission to attract, retain, educate and develop female leaders in the financial industry.’’
We caught up with Iseppi to find out about her new role as a WIND Ambassador and DTCC’s mission to support women in the financial industry.
What is your role at DTCC?
AI: In my role as a Senior Relationship Manager, I focus on strengthening and expanding DTCC’s relationships with strategic clients. As the co-lead of the CTM Working Group and client engagement lead on ITP’s Match to Instruct initiative, I seek to elevate the voice of the client and apply my strategy background. Prior to joining Relationship Management, I was a Partner Alliance Manager for one year after joining DTCC in 2020.
Why did you choose to become part of WIND?
AI: Several years ago, I recognized that while I had a strong network, it was very concentrated to Boston. An industry colleague who worked at SIFMA [Securities Industry and Financial Securities Association] told me about WIND, so that I could attend events in person if I happened to be traveling to New York City or Washington D.C. when an event took place. While I attended one event in Boston in early 2020, most of my involvement has been virtual. The virtual events have offered the ability to network with many women working across the financial services industry in the U.S. and U.K.
Tell us about your role as a WIND ambassador?
AI: WIND named me an Ambassador in July following my active participation in the Rising Stars cohort program in 2021 and continued involvement with WIND in 2022 (for example, moderating a conversation with Marisol Collazo focused on Enhancing Executive Presence as part of WIND’s webinar series in celebration of Women’s History Month). I was excited to take on the WIND Ambassador role to continue my involvement with WIND.
I am honored to have recently been recognized with a Rising Star Award at the WIND 2022 Gala!
How does DTCC make an overall effort to support women in finance?
AI: Since joining DTCC, I have felt empowered to take on leadership roles and have felt supported by my colleagues. In my view, the best way that an organization can support women in finance is by giving women the opportunity to lead and have an impact to demonstrate their own capabilities. In my experiences, I have seen that embedded within the organization, and I am grateful for that. I also knew that women from DTCC were active in WIND before I joined DTCC, which was a positive signal to me.
What is the best piece of advice you can give women working in finance?
AI: Be authentic – know who you are, what you want to achieve, and establish relationships based on trust and honesty. It can be difficult to navigate situations that inevitably pop up in your career, but if you stay true to your authentic self and believe in your voice, you have the best opportunity to be successful.
How do we encourage more women to pursue careers in finance?
AI: It’s important to demonstrate to women how many different roles and paths are possible in finance. It’s critical that more organizations invest in ways that can show this to women.
While I was in college, I visited multiple Wall Street banks where I could speak with women working in many different functions and even participate in job shadows to see firsthand what these opportunities could look like for me if I decided to pursue them. That encouraged me to pursue opportunities on Wall Street, but I wasn’t exposed to how many other opportunities there were in finance to have considered those.
WIND does an excellent job at demonstrating how diverse the opportunities are within the industry, which is another reason why I’m excited to be a WIND Ambassador. I hope to see more organizations support WIND and invest in other ways to encourage women to pursue careers in finance.
< Return to Life at DTCC