Taking $200M a Year Out at Fortune 100 Scale

From a principal's prior executive role. Shown to illustrate the leadership we bring, not a client engagement.

The Situation

A Fortune 100 financial services enterprise served 13 million members and held more than $108B in banking assets. At that scale, every technology decision carried real weight: card processing, channel architecture, and operational stability each affected millions of people and large sums of money. The bank needed technology leadership that could cut cost and speed up delivery while keeping a very large estate stable. It also needed someone who could speak to the bank president in business terms and to engineering teams in technical ones.

The Mandate

• Over roles of increasing scope, from ITIL/ITSM architect through global IT operations and application development, lead technology for the bank division as Division CIO.
• Lead more than 400 technology professionals and budgets of up to $100M across deposits, payments, cards, and lending.
• Work with the bank president and senior executives to turn enterprise goals into technology strategy, investment plans, and priorities.

What We Did

Converted card processing

Our principal led the technology conversion of debit card processing from the Mastercard network to Visa, with credit card processing following. The 18-month program delivered $200M in annual savings.

Brought discipline to operations

He implemented the enterprise's first ITIL process and technology architecture. System availability rose 20% year over year across more than 5,000 servers, six mainframes, and 38,000 devices serving 13 million members.

Changed how software got delivered

An enterprise SAFe Agile transformation cut time-to-market 42% and reached 92% delivery predictability. Faster delivery mattered only because it stayed predictable, and the business could plan around it.

Rebuilt the channels

The organization's patented Remote Deposit Capture platform was advanced into a first-to-market secure mobile banking capability. The web and mobile channels were then re-architected, cutting operating costs by more than $30M a year.

The Results

Taken together, these programs show a consistent pattern: large savings came from structural changes, not from cutting corners. Moving card networks, standardizing operations, changing the delivery model, and re-architecting channels each removed cost while the bank's service to members improved. The technology organization also spent this period as a top-two Computerworld "Best Places to Work in IT," a reminder that large change and a strong team culture can coexist.

Why It Matters for You

Few organizations operate at this scale, but the decisions are familiar to any bank, credit union, or fintech: whether to change a processing partner, how to stabilize operations, how to deliver faster without losing control, and where channel costs are hiding. Leaders who have run these programs inside a Fortune 100 institution know where the risks sit and how to sequence the work. RIG brings that experience to mid-market organizations that need the judgment without the overhead of a large enterprise.