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Leaders In Payments
Leaders In Payments
PayTech Women Leadership Summit Day One | Episode 444
Recorded live from the PayTech Women Leadership Summit in Atlanta, we bring you a rapid, energizing tour of leadership lessons from executives, board members, and rising voices shaping the future of payments and fintech. A special thanks to our episode sponsor Global Payments.
Across crisp conversations, a common theme emerges: community multiplies competence. You’ll hear how curiosity fuels influence, why relationships beat résumés, and how owning your personal banner outlasts any company logo.
Chrissy Wagner (FIS) opens with a hard truth many leaders overlook—self care is strategy. When your cup is full, you lead with clarity and generosity. Margaret Weichert draws on three decades across Bank of America, First Data, Accenture, EY, and The Clearing House to champion curiosity as a daily practice: learn the tech, the processes, and the business context so every presentation connects to customer value and shareholder outcomes. That framing travels across product, risk, and operations, especially as rails evolve and real-time becomes table stakes.
Relationship building gets tactical with Rebecca Walden (Corvia), who shares how to deepen ties beyond LinkedIn: Zoom coffees, thoughtful introductions, timely articles, and in-person meetups that convert weak ties into trusted allies. Executive coach Cynthia Knowles underscores investing in purpose and skills, noting that the summit creates rare neutral ground where fierce competitors become generous collaborators. Melissa Desjardins (Protiviti) offers a powerful structure—build a personal board of directors who challenge your assumptions and push you to take bold steps, then return the favor for others.
From the talent pipeline, Laura Gibson Lamothe (Georgia FinTech Academy) shows how belonging accelerates careers, especially for those who haven’t always seen themselves reflected in leadership. Kathy Kmiotek urges leaders to own their personal banner—your story, your value proposition—through every career shift. And Naomi Donaldson (FISERV) connects the dots across industry change, from cash and checks to crypto, stablecoins, and agentic commerce, while navigating the realities of growth, family, and leadership on a shared stage with industry rivals.
If you care about payments innovation, career momentum, or simply leading with purpose in a competitive market, this conversation delivers practical, repeatable moves you can use today.
Hello everyone and welcome to the Leaders in Payments Podcast. I'm your host, Greg Myers, and today we're podcasting from the PayTech Women Leadership Summit in Atlanta, Georgia. So this episode is going to be called the 321 Podcast. It's three questions, two minutes, and one impactful statement from our guests. Our guests today are going to be speakers, executives that are at the conference today. So I want to give a special shout out to our sponsor, Global Payments. So thank you for sponsoring this episode and on to the show. Our first guest is Chrissy Wagner.
SPEAKER_01:My name is Chrissy Wagner, and I'm the senior vice president of GoToMarket at FIS.
SPEAKER_04:What's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact as a leader?
SPEAKER_01:That's a great question, Greg. I think women often neglect their own needs. And I think that's true in life and in work. So the one piece of advice I would say is take care of yourself. Be sure to fill your cup so that you can actually pour into those around you and meet the needs of those around you. I think that's probably one of the most important things as female leaders we can do.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. I think it's a great piece of advice. So last question What do you think makes the Pay Tech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals in payments and fintech?
SPEAKER_01:So it's been a few years since I've been at PayTech Women. I'm happy to be back. It feels a bit like coming home, like a family reunion almost. Um what I would say, Greg, is this event, you've got women who have gone before us, who have learned so much and are willing to share what they've learned. And you have younger women in their career or even mid-career women who are eager to learn. And so the energy around that thirst for knowledge and the and the connection with other women is so palatable, palatable here that it just makes it such a valuable event and such a good, good use of time.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, great. Thank you so much for your time. Our next guest is Margaret Weikert.
SPEAKER_03:It's wonderful to be here. Um, I'm Margaret Weikert. I'm the CEO of the Morgan Weikert group, and I've spent 30 years in the payments industry working for companies like Bank of America, uh, First Data before it was SpyServe, and then consulting firms including Accenture and EY. And then most recently, I was the chief product officer at the Clearinghouse.
SPEAKER_04:Right, where we actually, you were on one of my podcast episodes. So it's great to meet you in person. Um, so quick question: what's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact on the industry?
SPEAKER_03:So I think curiosity is one of the capabilities that you can cultivate to learn more about your industry, whatever part of it you're in, you can learn about the technology in your industry, the processes in your industry, the business context. And use all of that to frame whatever your job is in a way that connects to why are customers interested in what you're doing? Why are shareholders interested in what you're doing? And when you make presentations in your leadership areas, you think about both of those questions.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, I think that's great advice. So, one last question. What do you think makes the PayTech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals in payments in FinTech?
SPEAKER_03:Well, it's really interesting because I have seen the women who are leaders of this uh great event as mentors, as teammates over decades. Um, Diane uh vote Farrow was one of my former bosses. Kim Fitzsimmons was a colleague. And Linda Perry I've known since she was at Visa a long, long time ago. And the relationships that people have cultivated at this event around content and around performing and doing well in business, I think are very rich relationships that are deeper because of the content, not just because of the relationship.
unknown:Right.
SPEAKER_04:Well, Margaret, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you.
SPEAKER_04:Our next guest is Rebecca Walden.
SPEAKER_05:I'm Rebecca Walden. I currently serve as the head of strategic partnerships and marketing operations for Corvia.
SPEAKER_04:What's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact as a leader?
SPEAKER_05:Number one would be deepen your relationships, cultivate, right, new relationships. And then the people where you just really click. We all we all have that. You just kind of get a feeling about somebody there's mutual interest, or maybe they have achieved a goal that's part of what you want for your career future. Invest the time. Uh, get Zoom chats are great for that. Um, if you can't get together in person. Uh as you feel like you've got common ground and mutual interests. I mean, there's an art to it because you don't want to seem like you're being icky and transactional. Um, sure, friend them on you know your personal social media feeds, and and then you kind of get a little more of a glimpse of who they are. Uh when business brings you to their city, plan ahead. Text them. Can you meet for a drink? Can you meet for breakfast? Can you meet for dinner? Um add value to them. Uh as we get to know people, start thinking about what are some connections I can offer to make. Uh that's going to make you stand out in their network. And then there's just this something beautiful that happens when you share your goals with them and they share theirs with you. I think as humans, we're hardwired just to want to help each other. Um so you'll you'll find that fruitful development start with that. But it can't just be forgive me for the direct way of saying it, hiding behind, hey, let's connect on LinkedIn. A direct message on LinkedIn isn't gonna cut it. Um can't hide behind email. You need you need to make the effort to really build and then maintain that relationship, keeping in mind that it's got to be a give and take or it's just a non-starter. Right.
SPEAKER_04:I think that's a great piece of advice. So, one last question. What do you think makes the PayTech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals in payments and fintech?
SPEAKER_05:That is a great question. This is my fourth. Uh, and it's the collegiality. Uh, it's always hard. I don't care how extroverted you are when you are the new kid at an event. Um, it gets easier as you have people you recognize. But even now, if I were to only speak to the people that I know, what a missed opportunity. Um taking an interest in others being the first person to come up, glance at the name tag, extend your hand. Hey, I'm Rebecca. Tell me, like I'm so happy to meet you. Tell me about you. Um you just be surprised at what you learn. And then somebody else walks by and what you just learned about this person. Y'all need to know each other. Like that, that's the magic that you can't replicate on Zoom. Uh so that would that would far and away be what I would say folks should prioritize here and really not just the summit, but what makes any event special.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Well, Rebecca, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you.
SPEAKER_04:Our next guest is Cindy Knowles.
SPEAKER_02:My name is Cindy Knowles. I'm formerly with FIS. I was uh head of uh business administration, which is a fancy way of saying I was kind of chief of staff for the president of the organization at that time. Um I retired from FIS a couple years ago, but I'm heavily involved in PayTech Women today as one of their executive coaches. And I got into coaching probably about three years ago and just loving it.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, great. So, what's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact?
SPEAKER_02:Wow, so that's uh a broad question, but uh very easy for me because near and dear in my heart, of course, is executive coaching now. Um it's investing in themselves and investing themselves, the best way they can do that is being a part of this great organization, networking, learning about all the things available to them, staying fresh in the industry, but investing in themselves in terms of where they want to go next in their career, understanding their why, um, fulfilling their purpose, and and knowing that you integrate your professional life and your personal life, they they make you a whole person. So one area can influence the other. So it's really not until you really dig deep and start investing in yourself that you can make those great strides for your future.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. One final question. What do you think makes Pay Tech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals and payments?
SPEAKER_02:Oh my gosh. Well, I've been with PayTech Women for over 10 years now. Uh, it might be even longer than that. And when I started, we had about a thousand members, and the summits were probably about a hundred people. Um now here we are, fast forward, over 7,000 members. We've got over 700 women here, and it's just an incredible place to, like I said before, network. Um the guards are down. It's it's like we're all working for competitors, and uh, we might be fierce competitors out in the marketplace, but when we come here, the walls come down and we're sharing, we're learning, um, we're respecting each other and you create these long-lasting friendships that keep going and going. So it's just a I can't say enough about the organization. It's just a fabulous, fabulous place. I haven't been here uh to a summit in over five years, and um it's like old home week, seeing people that I hadn't seen in a while. You know, with COVID and other issues along the way, we instead of seeing somebody in a little square, we're now seeing each other in the world.
SPEAKER_04:And isn't it so much better than it's so much wonderful?
SPEAKER_02:It's so wonderful, yes.
SPEAKER_04:Well, Cindy, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you. It's a pleasure meeting you.
SPEAKER_04:Our next guest is Melissa Desjardin.
SPEAKER_00:My name is Melissa Desjardin. I'm a director at Protivity Consulting.
SPEAKER_04:What's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact?
SPEAKER_00:So a piece of advice that was shared with me many years ago and it stuck with me is to build your own personal board of directors. And so what that means is look within your network and draw from people that you know. They could be friends, colleagues, clients, even, but people in your network. And that you can consider your own personal board of directors, people that you go to for advice and counsel, people that you trust, um, and people that will tell you the truth, um, even if it's a hard truth sometimes, or if you're making a decision about your career and you really need to validate that decision or have someone challenge you. Um, I do have a group of people that I consider my own personal board of directors, and they've certainly challenged me through the years to take risks to be bold. Um, so I would encourage people in payments uh to look for that board of directors and uh really leverage that, and then in turn be an advisor or a you know a board member for someone else as well.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, I think that's great advice. So, final question what do you think makes the PayTech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals in payments?
SPEAKER_00:Oh, it's so valuable because it gives us the opportunity to build our network, to meet new people, to step outside of our comfort zone. There are speaking opportunities that people can take advantage of. But really, just that power of networking, having conversations, sitting down with someone new and asking them questions, um, and then taking that networking and building on from it after the leadership summit, um, continuing to expand that and develop those relationships.
SPEAKER_04:Do you have a suggestion on how people should connect after the event?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I have found that LinkedIn is very helpful just to stay connected in terms of, you know, when people are posting different things that you know they're involved in, whether it be other events or other activities they're you know involved in, it gives people the opportunity to get that visibility and say, oh, you're going to be at this conference in a few weeks, I will be there too. Let's connect for coffee. Um, so LinkedIn has been very helpful. But beyond that, you know, remember what you talked about with people at the leadership summit. And if there's a topic that really resonated with you during your particular conversation and something comes up a month, two months later in the news related to that, send an article to that contact and continue the conversation and really look to cultivate those relationships and deepen uh those connections.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Well, Melissa, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_00:Of course. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_04:Our next guest is Laura Gibson Lamoth.
SPEAKER_06:My name is Laura Gibson Lamoth. I am the executive director of the Georgia FinTech Academy, a talent development initiative in the University system of Georgia, bringing together 26 universities for fintech education.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, great. So, what's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact?
SPEAKER_06:Well, one piece of advice is kind of hard. Um, I tend to pontificate, but I would say one of the biggest pieces of advice that was offered to me is that connecting and building a community and a network is so much more important. Your network is your net worth. I love that saying, and I I've now kind of adopted that uh mentality and passed that on to students. You know, for years within uh the payments and banking industry, it was definitely harder to connect with uh a community that didn't necessarily reflect who I am. Um, there wasn't many leaders that looked like me. And so coming through organizations like PayTech Women has offered uh a sense of community and a sense of belonging, but then also access to a lot of resources uh and information to help people amplify their careers.
SPEAKER_04:Okay, one final question. What do you think makes the PayTech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals and payments?
SPEAKER_06:Well, as a board member and executive committee uh secretary this year, I'm really excited about the summit and how it's progressed over the years. I've been a member myself personally for almost 12 and kind of being a part of the leadership team and seeing the behind-the-scenes efforts to put together uh such an amazing uh agenda and day for a couple of days for our attendees. It's not only bringing the expertise and the technical um knowledge to the table, it's it's developing uh personal and professional journeys for people, um, people to get access to not only things that help promote themselves as individuals, but then provide them access to the thought leadership and uh technical expertise as well. So it's a marriage of both pieces, I think, that help uh build well-rounded talent for the future. And as we're all continuing on this journey of continuous learning, I think it's really important to make sure that we're uh fresh and up to date with the emerging trends in the industry, um, and then make ourselves competitive in the and very competitive market.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Well, thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate you being here. Thanks. It's great to be here. Our next guest is Kathy Kamayatech.
SPEAKER_07:I'm uh Katherine Kamayatech. Kathy. I am the founder and principal of Kamayatech Advisors and Consulting and also the voice behind Curiously Kathy. Uh, I bring uh strategy, storytelling, and revenue to the clients I work with. And then under Curiously Kathy, I'm I celebrate curiosity as a as a uh leadership power.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. Well, I might know already know the answer to this question based on that, but I'm gonna ask anyway. What's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact?
SPEAKER_07:Uh, really owning your personal banner. Uh, your corporate banner will change whether you change it or it's changed for you. And so really being true to your personal banner, who you are, what you bring to the table is uh vastly more important than the corporate logo on your on your banner at the time. Okay.
SPEAKER_04:Final question: what do you think makes the PayTech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals in payments?
SPEAKER_07:Oh, this one's a loaded one because I am I sit on the board for PayTech Women. I am also the co-chair for the summit. Uh, and so this agenda was a labor of love uh and a labor of um appreciation to PayTech Women and what they bring to the ecosystem of payments, uh, the ability to connect with women at every level, uh, really have meaningful conversations. Uh, but that power of yes, the power of yes that PayTech Women brings in the women that join this community. I was new to the payments industry almost nine years ago, and this was the organization that welcomed me, that taught me, that allowed me to ask questions, that welcomed the conversations at every level and every part of what the what is the payments ecosystem.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, and it's been 20 years.
SPEAKER_07:20-year anniversary. And so when you think of 2005 to 2025 and how different the world is, how different payments is, what transactions look like today and and how they've shifted, it's it's a world of difference, but there's a continuity line as well. And I like to think that Pay Tech Women offers some of that continuity within an ever-changing uh environment while also really creating a space and a place for women to feel safe, for the allies to really come and help lift the women uh in their ecosystem. And uh really just that through line of while we innovate, while we uh compete as well, there is the celebration of who we are and what we bring to the table. Okay.
SPEAKER_04:Well, Kathy, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate you being here.
SPEAKER_07:Likewise, thank you.
SPEAKER_04:Our next guest is Naomi Donaldson.
SPEAKER_08:Hello, I am Naomi Donaldson. I'm director of product at FISERV. Okay, great.
SPEAKER_04:So, what's one piece of advice you'd share with women in payments who want to grow their influence and make a bigger impact?
SPEAKER_08:Uh, I would definitely say find community. Uh, PayTech Women is an amazing organization. It's one of several organizations uh that help women in payments. There's actually a women in payments organization. There, there's women in tech. There's so many organizations. Um, and and don't just limit yourself to just to women's organizations either, but get involved with community, uh, volunteer, help put on uh events. Uh, and you know, you find yourself sometimes being asked to lead a panel or be a speaker, and you know, you'll see your brand um start to grow and flourish from that.
SPEAKER_04:Okay. So, what do you think makes the PayTech Women Leadership Summit such a valuable event for professionals in payments?
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, um, one thing I absolutely love about this particular summit is that we have so PayTech is payments and technology, those things coming together, and it's part of FinTech Financial Services Technology coming together, two very male-dominated industries coming together. And you have women specifically coming together to not only talk about the evolution of payments, you know, once upon a time it's it's cash, it's check. And now we talk about crypto and stable coin and you know, all of these different ways you can pay, um, you know, from a domestic economy to global, uh, to global commerce, a gentic commerce we've been talking about right now. But you have the ability to learn more about these uh evolving trends in the industry, uh, but then also some things that are unique to us as women, balancing, learning, growing your career in a family, you know, um, and uh all of these different things that are unique to women in this space. Um, I just led a panel. I'm on the panel with uh with two women executives at competing organizations, but we come together to talk about what we're seeing in terms of building partnerships in this space. That is what you have here: a safe space, a neutral ground to come together to talk about the evolution of payments in our respective um uh organizations, but also things that are unique to our experience in this industry.
SPEAKER_04:So, Nayam, we thank you so much for being here and doing this today.
SPEAKER_08:Pleasure speaking with you. Thank you.
SPEAKER_04:It's been a great day recording here at the Pay Tech Women Leadership Summit in Atlanta. A special thanks to all of the guests that are on the show today, and a special thanks to our sponsored, Global Payments. And again, thank you to all your listeners out there. I appreciate your time as well, and until the next story.