SpringFour was excited to attend the Women Tech Founders Awards night on November 8th.  The event gathered together the leading women in the tech ecosystem, and their supporters, to celebrate success, leadership, and innovation, and there was great energy in the room.

The awards were “created to equalize the image of power in technology and leadership, while creating an army of role models for the next generation. The role models we want our daughters and their daughters to see.” This was evident in the stories shared by women about women-led startups.  Not only were the awards a great place to create community, but we were also there to support SpringFour’s Co-Founder & CEO, Rochelle Gorey, who was recognized as a finalist in the Social Impact category. Every nominee in the diverse categories celebrating woman founders were impressive. The Award categories covered a broad range of sectors including among others: Corporate Tech Leader, Lifestyle, Investor in Women, Health & Biotech and Fintech.

Rochelle was nominated in the company of so many other great women, but most importantly for SpringFour, in a category that is at the foundation of our company. While our impacts have been well documented, and we are proud of each one, at the heart of it all is improving the financial lives of people across the country. Creating impact for millions of individuals and families, enabling them to achieve financial health, and helping their communities prosper.

The Awards night was a celebration of women in a field that is often dominated by men. It highlighted the importance and power of diversity and equality in innovation. We were honored to be a part of it and are extremely proud of Rochelle’s recognition as a leader in this space. And we thank our partner and mentor BMO Harris Bank for nominating Rochelle.

 Katie Donohue and Rochelle Gorey of SpringFour with Ben Schack, BMO Harris Bank.

Katie Gottschall Donohue

Vice President, Strategy and Customer Engagement, SpringFour Inc.

We are proud to be a majority woman-owned business. This certification provides recognition of being a woman led company. It also provides a way to connect to a community of women-owned businesses and a community of shared learning and support.

In a time where women are gaining ground in elections and showing up more in executive suites and boardrooms, we are even more inspired to share our story. When Rochelle founded the company in 2005 she had an idea of wanting to easily connect people with great local nonprofit and government resources that could help them financially. She saw what unscrupulous actors were doing in communities and she wanted people to know who could be trusted and how they could find help. So, along with co-founder Dr. J. Michael Collins, she set about to build the technology to do so. As a female entrepreneur in a word of tech startups, her story is unique, and the WBE certification provides recognition of that accomplishment.

Katie Gottschall Donohue

Vice President, Strategy and Customer Engagement, SpringFour Inc.

Joining Rochelle on the panel was Ric Leitheiser, Head of US Consumer Collections and SB Special Assets at  BMO Harris Bank. SpringFour and BMO Harris launched our official partnership in August of this year. The bank uses both of SpringFour’s high impact products, S4pro and S4direct, to help increase the financial health of its customers. By making SpringFour tools available, BMO Harris ensures that if any of their customers run into financial challenges, they can be connected to SpringFour’s vetted resources to help address the underlying reason(s) for delinquency. Within the first couple of months of partnering with SpringFour, BMO Harris has seen great use of both SpringFour products, and the bank’s agents have expressed the added value SpringFour brings to the customer conversation.  

During the panel, Ric (BMO Harris) shared with the audience that in order to successfully partner with a fintech, there needs to be a shared vision, culture, and goals. Rochelle added that transparency is key between both entities and from this, a feeling of true partnership can result. When this happens, the opportunity for measurable impact is achievable.

Members of the panel explored the need to get vendor compliance management right and that having the right expectations up front can help make or break a deal. Rochelle shared that a key strategy for SpringFour is connecting early with bank leadership and risk and vendor teams to be certain that all involved understand the exact nature of the relationship.

The panel also discussed the evolution of fintech and how many of the most successful fintechs are looking to partner with banks, rather than the fintech or the bank seeking to replace one another.  Also interesting was that fact that many banks are now forming what can be likened to an internal VC unit, where funds and focus are being invested to seriously explore strategic partnerships between emerging / disrupting fintechs and the bank itself.

Other panel participants included: Jason Osterhage, Chief Lending Executive at Alliant Credit Union; Mark Dabertin, Special Counsel at Pepper Hamilton; and moderator Phil Toth, Founder & Managing Director at QueensGiant

Katie Donohue

VP of Strategy & Customer Engagement, SpringFour Inc.