CARLA HASSAN

Calling Carla Hassan a seasoned veteran would be selling her short, as she has spent close to three decades in senior marketing roles. She was at Kellogg for seven years and nearly 13 years at PepsiCo, followed by almost a year and a half at Toys “R” Us, before moving into the finance sector. After a little over three years with Citi, she joined JPMorganChase as chief marketing officer in October 2021.

Starting out as a receptionist at a hair salon in Denver laid the foundation for Carla Hassan’s career in marketing, she told ADWEEK for its Leadership Voices series.

“I recognized the power of when somebody comes into your orbit, how you react to them and what they see sets the tone for the rest of their experience.”

She honed the skills of building and positioning brands in her CPG days, as well as the concept of putting consumers at the heart of everything. She said of her first career pivot, “When I took the role at Toys ‘R’ Us, I really wanted to save Geoffrey the Giraffe.”

While financial services is a completely different, regulated sector, Hassan told ADWEEK it has many of the same principles as CPG.

Hassan shared some of her doubts over the years, telling ADWEEK, “I have a lot of imposter syndrome, much like many other people do. I’m an immigrant. I’m a woman. I did not grow up in financial services. Coming into this role, I did have a lot of questions of, ‘Can I do this?’”

She stressed that banking is a local, community-based business, and it is important to have a positive impact.

“What gets me excited about this space is the convergence of all these different trends together, so when you think about data, new channels, and artificial intelligence, the ability to then personalize for our customers and give them relevant, meaningful interactions,” Hassan told ADWEEK.