Spotlight on Director-at-Large Erica Benjamin

October 30, 2024

Giving back by fostering engagement through education & mentoring


A director-at-large is a member of a governing board or organization who has flexible duties and is available to take on tasks as needed. No one is better suited to fill that role at the FWA than Erica Benjamin.


Erica is a master juggler who is always ready to step in wherever she’s needed without missing a beat. By day, she serves in a high-powered, senior management role as a transformational leader in BMO’s U.S. CEO Office, managing the Enterprise Wide Regulatory Program Management Office. By night and at the weekends, she’s the mother of a high school travel hockey player and a middle school daughter involved in various sports and Girl Scouting events.


Sherree DeCovny, co-chair of the FWA’s Marketing & Strategic Communications Committee, talked to Erica about her decades-long career in the financial services industry and how the FWA has contributed to her success.

Sherree: Erica, to start off, please tell us about your professional career journey?

 

Erica: My career in financial services spans more than 30 years. After I graduated from university, I joined the analyst program at Lehman Brothers, and up until two years ago, I worked in capital markets. I’ve done everything from sales, trading and operations to program management and senior level management.

 

Things haven’t always been smooth sailing. I survived 9/11. Then during the 2008 financial crisis, thousands of people were displaced, and my career went away overnight. I had to find my support system, rebound, redirect and build myself back up. Luckily, Barclays acquired Lehman Brothers’ investment banking business, and I was part of that buyout. The six months I worked for Barclays was the toughest time of my life. I just had a baby, and I only took a three-week maternity leave because I was fighting for my job. Several of us left Barclays and went to Nomura, which wasn’t a good fit for me, but I was thankful to have a job.

 

I got my job at BMO by leveraging my contacts from Lehman Brothers. I learned an important life lesson: The best jobs aren’t the ones that are posted, they’re from referrals from your network. The more people you know, the more opportunities come your way.

 

About three years ago, BMO decided to purchase Bank of the West, and I was asked to leave capital markets and move to the central M&A team to help with the acquisition. As a chief administrative officer, my responsibilities ranged from real estate to professional development. That’s when I became involved with diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and groups such as the FWA.

 

The Bank of the West acquisition was completed in September 2023, and the bank is much bigger now. I currently work for the chief administrative officer for the U.S. holding company, and I run various regulatory program management initiatives.

 

Sherree: How long have you been a member of the FWA?

 

Erica: BMO has been a President’s Circle member of the FWA for about seven years, and I joined the FWA through the BMO relationship. I’m proud to say that BMO supports various education-oriented nonprofits, including the FWA’s education portfolio.

 

I enjoyed attending the FWA events and meeting people in the organization, but I had to take a step back when I transitioned from capital markets to an enterprise role. However, I’ve become more involved in the FWA and other women’s networks over the past year.


Sherree: Why did you decide to pursue a leadership role in the FWA?

 

Erica: I joined the FWA’s board in June 2024. I serve as director-at-large, but I don’t actually serve on any specific committees yet, although I’m sure I will soon. I’m particularly interested in education and mentoring. I’m currently working with Jackie Linden to review the educational portfolio. I also joined a special committee tasked with getting FWA members and the board more engaged.

 

Sherree: How have you benefitted from the FWA personally and professionally?

 

Erica: It all comes down to networking with likeminded, smart people who have been through a lot in their career. It’s so important to have that network of women who can lift you up and give you support along your career journey. Tons of job opportunities come about just by talking to people.

 

What I like about the FWA is that it’s multigenerational. We have members who have been in the industry for several decades, and they bring a high level of knowledge, expertise and guidance to the table. We have members who serve in middle management roles. And at the other end of the spectrum, we have young members at the very beginning of their careers.

 

In addition, I think the FWA’s content and events provide a great opportunity for professional development.

 

I’m at a point in my career where I hope the end is closer than the beginning. I feel like it’s my turn to give back because I’ve been very fortunate to have people help me along the way with mentorships and job opportunities. That’s one of the main reasons why I joined the FWA – to give back.

 

Sherree: What would you like to see the FWA do in the future?

 

Erica: We’re a membership-led organization, so we need to figure out how to increase membership and attract people in different finance roles. As such, our events need to appeal to a variety of people. We also have to update our branding and expand our base of corporate sponsors.

 

Sherree: How can people get the most out of their FWA membership?

 

Erica: If you just want to join the FWA because you want your name on the list, you’re not going to get anything out of it. Get involved. Raise your hand. Go to events. Ask questions. You can’t be everything to everyone all the time, so ask for help because FWA members will come to your aid.

Global Capital Leadership: Rethinking Strategy in an Uncertain World

May 14, 2026
By Sherree DeCovny Back in 1785, Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote, “The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” The line still resonates today: even the most carefully constructed plans can be disrupted. What ultimately determines success is not perfect foresight, but adaptability and the ability to pivot when conditions change. That lesson was brought into sharp focus for this year’s International Business Conference. Originally planned for the UAE in April, the event had to be completely reimagined when conflict with Iran escalated in February. Months of preparation were set aside, and the format was rebuilt in a matter of weeks. The result was a hybrid approach: a virtual lunch panel on May 5, followed by a half-day in-person gathering in New York City on May 6 — hosted at Akin in partnership with ABANA.co, with hospitality from HE Amna Almheiri and the UAE Consulate in NY — bringing together nearly 100 participants.

Financial Literacy Isn’t Just About Money - It’s About Possibility

April 30, 2026
By Robert Brown The student stayed behind after the workshop. While others filtered out, she walked up quietly and asked for an extra set of materials. Not for herself, but for her mother, who didn’t speak English. She wanted to take the lesson home. That moment says more about financial literacy than any definition ever could. For many young people, the question isn’t just Can I afford this? It’s Do I understand how money works at all? And more importantly, Can I use that knowledge to shape my future? That gap between access and understanding is where confidence is either built or lost. The reality is, most students are never taught these skills in a meaningful way in school. And for many, this is the first time anyone has explained it in a way that actually sticks.

When the World Shifts, You Shift with It

April 23, 2026
For months, FWA Executive Director Alissa Desmarais and I had been building toward something incredible: a six-day International Business Conference in the UAE, complex and high-stakes, the kind of undertaking that requires you to hold a hundred things in your head at once while also holding your team together, your partners together, and yourself together. The FWA has more than 40 years of experience organizing international conferences around the world; what we were doing was not new. But as we stepped into our new roles as the conference organizers, with the support of a great IBC committee, this one felt different. More meaningful, because it was ours. We were proud of what we were creating. And then the world changed around us. I won’t pretend the decision to pivot was easy, because it wasn’t. There is a particular kind of grief that comes not from losing something you already had, but from letting go of something you had worked so hard to build and had not yet gotten to experience. We had to look at the geopolitical reality of the region, at what was happening, at what we could not control, and make a call. The kind of call that no planning document prepares you for. We chose to pivot. On May 5th and 6th, FWA will host the Global Capital and Leadership Forum in New York. A virtual lunch panel, followed by an in-person morning program at Akin, right in the heart of the city. Smaller in scale, yes. But not smaller in purpose. We kept the questions we had always meant to explore: how shifting alliances and energy transitions are redrawing the map of global capital, what resilient leadership looks like in a world that will not hold still, how women are shaping the future of finance across cultures and geographies. Her Excellency Amna Almheiri, Consul General of the United Arab Emirates in New York, will close our forum. The relationship did not end when our plans changed. The dialogue did not stop. It just found a different room. What I have learned from this experience is something I keep coming back to: a pivot is not the opposite of commitment. Done with clarity and care, it is one of commitment’s truest expressions, because it means you care more about the mission than about being right about how you planned to serve it. It means you can look at the people who gave months of real effort to a plan that changed and help them see that nothing they did was wasted, because it wasn’t. It means you can let go of the version of success you had pictured and trust that a different shape can carry the same substance. I think about the women in this community who have had to do this in their own careers and lives. Who had to walk away from something they had built toward for years, not because they failed but because the world shifted and they were honest enough to shift with it. That takes courage. It takes the kind of steadiness that is very easy to admire from the outside and very hard to practice from the inside. The forum is still taking shape. The work continues. And I am proud of what we are making, not in spite of how we got here, but because of it.

SAVE THE DATE: Global Capital & Leadership Forum

April 9, 2026
The MENA Capital Landscape: Risk, Resilience & the Road Ahead May 5–6, 2026 Join the Financial Women's Association for a timely conversation on sovereign capital, energy transition, AI, and the geopolitical forces reshaping global finance. When our UAE trip was cancelled, we immediately looked for ways to bring the experience to our community here in NYC - this forum captures the spirit, substance, and strategic importance of that journey. Registration details coming soon - save the date on your calendar now! Virtual Lunch Panel · Tuesday, May 5 In-Person Morning Program in New York City · Wednesday, May 6 One registration. Two experiences. One conversation.
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