The Innovative Payments Association is a trade association for all companies involved in providing payments cards to consumers, businesses, and government, which can be used nationwide. My job is to provide information, advice, and advocacy to help those companies improve the finances of individuals, companies, and government agencies.

Mercator Advisory Group is an independent research and advisory services firm exclusively focused on the payments industry. Mercator Advisory Group is also the publisher of PaymentsJournal.comAs the Director of the Prepaid Advisory Service, I led research and custom consulting projects related to open-loop and closed-loop prepaid payments, including gift cards, general purpose reloadable cards, and benefits disbursement cards. My clients included retailers, the world’s largest payment issuers, acquirers, processors, and technology providers. My responsibilities included producing 20 research documents each year. Examples of those documents were a benchmark of the size of the U.S. closed-loop gift card market, and a forecast of the growth of the prepaid industry in the United States. I also led consulting projects focused on business strategy, competitive intelligence, and go-to-market models. One of the most important aspects of my job was providing ongoing service to clients to help them understand the changing landscape of payments. I have been a featured speaker at industry conferences and client events on the future of payments. My U.S. prepaid market sizing work has led to requests to conduct the same work for the open-loop prepaid market in Canada. The first results were published in 2016. On the consulting side, I led a project for the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Postal Service to evaluate the opportunities for offering financial services through the Post Office. That work was used by the OIG to produce a research brief for Congress and other stakeholders about the options open to the Postal Service.

Mercator Advisory Group is the leading, independent research and advisory services firm exclusively focused on the payments industry. Mercator Advisory Group is also the publisher of PaymentsJournal.comAs a senior analyst, I wrote market research reports, participated in custom consulting projects, and provided support to other payments practices.I was responsible for producing 20 market reports on various aspects of the payments industry. I also led and supported custom consulting projects. Additionally, I provided ongoing client support by answering inquiries and providing ad hoc research support. Our research focused on high-level industry issues, but we often received requests for detailed information on market participants. I suggested that the company create a research series of company snapshots to highlight industry participants. Mercator Advisory Group now offers this as a service to its research subscribers. After developing a reputation for expertise in the industry, my personal reputation and contacts helped me to initiate contacts that resulted in over $100,000 in new business in 2013. In 2014 I was promoted to be the director of the practice.

The crash of 2008 did not spare the financial journalism industry. Having been laid off in a round of cost cutting, I quickly began to build a freelance business to leverage my skills as a reporter, writer, editor, and market researcher.As an independent writer, I generated Web content, blog posts, and news articles, for a variety of clients including: the Bank Administration Institute (BAI), the Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI), and Digital Transactions Magazine. I still enjoy good working relationships with these clients today. This work led me into market research and consulting. My most notable work in this regard was an in-depth research report and case studies for the National Community Investment Fund (NCIF), which provides support to Community Financial Development Institutions (CDFIs). I wrote the report report "Demystifying Prepaid Cards: An Opportunity for the Community Development Banking Institution Sector", which was identified as one of "15 Must Read Prepaid Debit Card Research Reports" by GetDebit.com. This work led me to my next position as a senior market research analyst.

SourceMedia, an Observer Capital company, is a diversified business-to-business digital media company serving senior professionals in the financial, technology, and healthcare sectors.I served as an editor and reporter across multiple publications in the cards group of publications. I was responsible for reporting and writing stories, recruiting freelancers, and editing articles. My primary job was to serve as the Managing Editor for Prepaid Trends, a bi-weekly electronic newsletter on prepaid cards.This role required me to perform all of the editorial functions of the publication from editing freelancers to doing layout of the copy to publishing and distributing the PDF files to subscribers. At the same time, I worked as a reporter for CardLine and CardLine Global, which are daily electronic newsletters about the payments industry. The editorial meeting would be held first thing in the morning, and I was producing articles on a noon deadline each day.While doing these jobs, I served as the founding editor of Mobile Banker, a bi-weekly electronic newsletter about mobile banking and payments. The organization recognized early the importance that mobile devices would have in the future of payments, and so we established a dedicated electronic newsletter to the topic.Working on all of these publications let me develop background knowledge and a network of contacts that would leave me well prepared for become a researcher and consultant in payments.

American Banker is the leading information resource serving the banking and financial services community.The daily print edition of American Banker was first published in 1835. Its online counterpart has been live since 1996.As the Midwest correspondent, I covered community banking and agricultural lending throughout the middle of the United States. When needed, I would extend my geographic coverage to make sure that I was fully covering specific topics such as agricultural lending or community development. During this time, I developed a strong network of sources on multiple beats. This allowed me to get a jump on other publications, such as when I broke the story of Dutch Banking Giant Rabobank's attempt to buy a government-sponsored Farm Credit Institution in the United States. Covering community banking led me to cover community development and efforts to help low-income people build assets. As part of this work, I became the in-house expert on payday lending and broke the story of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency telling payday lenders to "stay the hell away" from its banks. The combination of agricultural and community banking led to my being involved in a series on banking immigrant populations. I was the one to suggest and write the story about the regulatory and legal concerns around banking new arrivals to the United States. The skills and knowledge learned in this role prepared me for expanding my knowledge of financial services into the payments world. My knowledge of banking gained from this job helps me bring an additional layer of analysis to my payments work.

Federated Investors is one of the nation's largest investment managers with $351.0 billion in assets under management.As part of the municipal mutual fund group, I was responsible for analyzing the performance of Federated funds against other mutual funds. This work was used to calculate performance bonuses of the investment professionals working in the group. Additionally, I did credit analysis on money market credits, using the Federated methodology for short-term municipal notes. When Federated Investors wanted to convert one of its long-term bond funds into a high yield municipal fund, I was part of the team to help analyze longer-term bonds. I helped to develop the analytical process for looking at unconventional bonds backed by atypical assets such as trailer parks, cemeteries, and even buffalo herds. Understanding credit analysis and securities gave me a knowledge of the credit process that aided me in learning about the larger financial services industry.