How Bread Financial’s CTO is Transforming Fintech with AI & Agile Innovation | Technovation 950
How do you build a modern, AI-powered financial services platform while keeping your workforce agile and innovative? On this ...
Executive Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, Bread Financial Holdings
Search every verified Allegra Driscoll interview, podcast appearance, and on-the-record quote — each transcript cross-checked by AI and human review to confirm speaker identity. In a February 2025 interview on the Technovation podcast, Allegra Driscoll discussed her work as Chief Technology Officer of Bread Financial, a credit card, loan, and payment solutions provider. She stated that the company’s goal is to retire its mainframe and data center dependencies by moving to a public cloud environment, noting that all partner-facing APIs are already in the public cloud. Driscoll described a technology modernization program that includes a shift to a product operating model, which she said involves creating more structure around a shared vision and helping teams understand the "why, what, and how" of their work. She also mentioned increasing investment in team learning platforms and making time for training, such as through innovation sprints or no-meeting Fridays. Driscoll defined diversity as bringing different perspectives and experiences to a team, and advised that if a candidate group shows sameness of experience or style, one should reconsider how the role is defined. She compared the use of generative AI to Marie Kondo’s decluttering method, suggesting it can automate tasks that do not "spark joy" and free workers for creative work. Driscoll expressed excitement about practical use cases for generative AI combined with existing AI capabilities to improve customer and partner experiences. She also noted that she reads historical fiction, crime, comedy, and fantasy, and that she and her husband have three children.
“Our goal is to retire our Mainframe and our dependencies on the data centers and really take advantage of the public Cloud environment which has a lot of capability, a lot of Automation and the ability to scale very very quickly and nimbly.”
“All of our partner facing APIs are in the public cloud and we've seen some great value from that whether it's the basic availability of services or the speed that we can enhance those services for our partners.”
“A big part of shifting to a product operating model is just creating more structure around identifying that shared vision and being clear upfront not just to the commercial teams but down to the individual engineers so that we can help all of that creativity that untapped creativity come to life.”
“When you think about the power of embracing a product operating model, it is really about helping all of the teams that need to work together understand that shared vision and the why, the what, and the how are really important.”
How do you build a modern, AI-powered financial services platform while keeping your workforce agile and innovative? On this ...
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