Most Powerful Women to Watch: No. 14, Zions Bancorp.'s Olga Hoff

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Olga Hoff's proudest accomplishment in the past year? 

She created a small-business diversity banking program at Zions Bancorp. Hoff kicked off the program last spring, and by late July, Zions had made $250 million in loans to about 900 small businesses that are owned by minority, women, veterans and LGBTQ entrepreneurs. 

The program relaxes underwriting standards for eligible small businesses and then provides the owners with financial education resources. The small business diversity banking program was launched in conjunction with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's Project REACh, which stands for Roundtable for Economic Access and Change and is meant to help populations historically underserved by the traditional banking system. 

Applicants have benefited from this expanded approval criteria, and the program is working to narrow the loan approval gap for business owners, Hoff said. 

"These folks would not have previously gotten approved," Hoff said. "It is a really meaningful impact to communities. I'm really proud of what we have done."

Hoff, who joined Zions two decades ago, has served as the Salt Lake City company's director of enterprise retail banking since 2018 and oversees retail lending, credit card operations, technologies and the bank's Paycheck Protection Program. The $91 billion-asset Zions funded 77,000 PPP loans totaling $10.2 billion. 

However, Hoff's professional life started in aerospace. But she grew frustrated at the industry's glass ceiling. 

"In aerospace, reliably in every meeting, I was the only woman, and the only one under 30 years old," she said. 

Although Hoff finds banking to be more inclusive, she is still concerned about the future, in particular about the growing popularity of working from home. 

Women who decide to telework or have a hybrid schedule could miss out on making important connections with decision makers, connections that organically happen in an office setting. They could also gravitate to shouldering disproportionately more child care, such as day care pickups or drop-offs. All this could lead to a backslide. 

"Women could potentially get distracted from career goals," Hoff said. "But it also could create opportunities. It's not completely clear to me how this disruption will play out."