Today, on International Women’s Day, we’re launching our Women Leaders at PayPal series. Each month, we will feature the story of one leader at
PayPal who inspires us – both personally and professionally. This month, we are featuring Kathleen Pierce-Gilmore, who leads the
consumer credit business for the Americas.
Q: People’s perspectives and unique view of the world often develop at a young age? How did your childhood impact who you are today?
A: I lived a pretty normal life until I was nine and my parents divorced. Soon after, I moved to San Diego, California, with my mom, my older brother and my soon-to-be step dad. My mom and her new partner were not equipped to support our family as we embarked on the next chapter together. We lacked stable income and managed through a series of financially irresponsible decisions, including taking on significant credit card debt to stay afloat. The fear of not being able to make ends meet persisted for the rest of my upbringing.
Growing up in a family that lacked financial stability was the very thing that shaped my own obsession with being disciplined and prudent with money. It served as motivation for me to work my way through college so that I could break away from the anxiety of being poor.
Tell me about your career history. Have you always been in payments and if so, why?
The financial services space has always been important to be because it hits so close to home. The relationship you have with your finances has a profound impact on your life and that of your family. I had a personal understanding of this early on, and that’s probably why I’ve been in the payments industry most of my life.
After spending my first few years out of college in consulting -- traveling the world, working with inspiring C-level executives and learning as much as I could – I was ready to take the next step in my career.
I wanted to work for a company that I was passionate about. I had long been a loyal American Express customer and I really connected with the brand. Discipline and financial responsibility were baked into their products, and I loved the idea of having to pay your bill every month. Coming from my background, watching my parents deal with massive credit card debt, this was really important to me. I enjoyed my time at American Express. I learned a lot and moved up from senior manager to director to vice president across teams from strategic planning to merchant services. I made a lot of friends and had several mentors there. But after eight and a half years, I was ready for something new.
I took a job at Capital One as managing vice president of card marketing operations. After some time, I became aware of the negative outcomes our products were leading to for many of our customers. I thought of my own family and the burden of debt that hung over us for so many years. I realized I could help my company see the perspectives of our customers better because of this. I became really connected with this idea of a company having a mission around helping the financially vulnerable -- the people who generally pay more for financial services than anyone else. When I learned about the vision PayPal was embarking on -- to provide more affordable financial services to the underbanked and the underserved through the reimagination of money – I knew I wanted to join the company. I left Capital One after four years to come to
PayPal and lead the Credit business in the Americas.
Was there a defining moment in your life that helped you to get to where you are today? For so long, I was embarrassed about what my family and I went through and I tried to hide where I came from and the fact that my parents were financially irresponsible. My background undoubtedly played a big role in who I am today but I was too ashamed to share it.
Before I joined PayPal, I had an experience that changed the feeling of shame into a feeling of conviction for doing what’s right for customers. I was sitting in on a call listening to one of my colleagues cross-sell payments insurance to a customer. The salesperson repeatedly tried to sell payment protection insurance and identity theft protection to a woman who hadn’t even asked about insurance or theft protection. I realized during that call that we didn’t have the best interest of our customers in mind, but it was simply about making more money. Instead of taking the time to educate her about credit and how, when needed, credit can be used responsibly and make a positive impact, the sales person was just pushing her to sign up for something she didn’t need.
At that moment, I imagined my own mom on the other end of the line and felt a deep sense of responsibility to help push my company to offer credit in a way that positively impacted our customers. I made it my mission to give a voice to the millions of people who were our customers with whom our employees had lost touch. I became passionate about how financial services were impacting the people of America. I was relentless and fearless in my efforts to expose this to leadership at the company, and was successful in working to shut down that specific program.
Who are some of your mentors?
Throughout my life I’ve had two types of mentors: untraditional mentors – the people who I knew I didn’t want to be like, and traditional mentors – the people I looked up to and wanted to be like. But I learned from both. The untraditional mentors in my life were some of the people I was closest to, like my mom. I made a lot of decisions in my life specifically because I saw what her life was like and didn’t want to make the same mistakes. I also had mentors who were professors and colleagues. Many of the women I worked with at American Express were mentors to me.
What advice would you give to your younger self?
When I was in my early 20s, I thought I needed to be perfect. I tried to be as smart as possible and was constantly focused on improving myself, which was great, but I also tried to hide my flaws or anything that wasn’t perfect in my life. What I have learned since then is that my background and my imperfections are partly the source of value of who I am. All of those warts from my life and the mistakes that I’ve made, are how I developed an incredible view of the world and my unique perspective. It’s when I expose my own vulnerabilities and flaws that I often connect the most with others. My advice to my younger self would be to allow space for failure and to embrace my “checkered past” as a part of what’s shaped my character.
What advice would you give to rising women leaders?
Havecourage, be fearless, take risks and don’t be afraid to be vulnerable. Always go into any situation open to learning something new and different. I used to be afraid to not have the answer. When you’re focused on that, when you don’t let yourself be wrong, you close yourself off from asking questions and learning something new. Your thinking changes so much when you are open to something you may not expect.
*Opinions expressed here represent the employee and not PayPal, Inc.