Operations. Quality. Controls. Process Improvement.
A career built on understanding complex processes, strengthening controls, solving operational problems, and helping teams perform with confidence.
From mortgage servicing during the 2008 housing crisis to small-business lending quality control, Nikita has built a career around operational accuracy, risk awareness, process improvement, training, and trusted execution.
Specific examples of identifying problems, taking action, and driving measurable results.
A Timeliness QC report was generating approximately 100–150 items per day, including large numbers of repeat / duplicate review items. The team eventually became approximately three months behind while new volume continued arriving daily.
Nikita challenged the report logic and escalated that the report was capturing loans too early and too repeatedly within the required communication window. She explained that the report logic should surface accounts at a more meaningful point in the lifecycle.
The team worked through the backlog with support from newly onboarded team members. The report logic was later corrected and unnecessary volume dropped dramatically, at times resulting in zero accounts requiring review.
~100–150 daily items → essentially zero unnecessary items after logic correction
A new "In Review" QC process combined multiple targeted reviews into one questionnaire. Some questions forced reviewers to select Pass or Fail even when a loan had not reached the stage where that control could apply.
Nikita documented each impacted question, explained why N/A was necessary, and formally escalated the issue to department leadership. Working sessions were held using real loan examples so leadership could see the issue in practice.
Review logic was adjusted so N/A could be used when the targeted control genuinely did not apply, resulting in more accurate review scoring.
Improved accuracy of QC scoring by aligning review criteria with the actual loan lifecycle
Targeted reviews had to be tied to a responsible employee, but loans could have multiple processors, underwriters, managers, and other stakeholders. The last person to touch a loan was not always the person responsible for the specific control being reviewed.
Nikita helped identify the inconsistency and collaborated with leadership and peers to review loans together. The team identified actions, notes, keywords, and process indicators that could be used to determine which employee actually owned the targeted attribute.
The team created a working QC ownership guide that standardized how targeted reviews were assigned to the correct employee, improving consistency in how review ownership was assigned across loans involving multiple stakeholders.
Improved scoring consistency and reduced ambiguity in reviewer ownership decisions
A new offshore QC team in Chennai, India needed to learn the team's full set of QC reports and processes.
Nikita co-led the training with another teammate. She helped create the training plan, schedule, daily progress tracking, report-by-report instruction, coaching, and quality feedback. Training lasted approximately 30–45 days. After trainees began working independently, Nikita and her teammate reviewed their work the following day, provided Pass/Fail feedback through SharePoint, and made themselves available for immediate questions.
The team's process errors decreased to essentially zero during the ramp-up period, with remaining questions largely involving judgment-based decisions under ambiguous procedures. Nikita remained a primary offshore-team point of contact through the end of the role.
9-person offshore team | ~30–45 day onboarding | near-zero process errors after ramp-up
The QC team originally had approximately three people and could coordinate assignments informally. After three additional employees joined, the informal system no longer scaled.
Nikita and her manager recognized the need for a more structured workload approach. Nikita took ownership of creating and maintaining an assignment / rotation system to balance workload, rotate reports, cross-train team members, maintain coverage, and ensure everyone stayed familiar with different processes.
The expanded team had a clearer and more equitable approach to monthly report ownership and workload distribution, with strengthened cross-training and shared process knowledge.
Structured workload distribution with cross-training and coverage across the expanded team
During the Pega system transition, some customer letters experienced issues such as failing to open, print, or send successfully. Ownership between operations and technology was not always immediately clear.
Nikita tracked not only her own incidents but her team's incidents as well. She opened and followed incidents, monitored affected accounts, communicated with Technology, joined Zoom calls, used Teams/chat and email, revisited accounts to verify whether issues were corrected, and worked with underwriters and managers to ensure customer letters were regenerated or resent when necessary.
Helped maintain follow-through on customer-communication issues during a complicated system transition and supported an operational workaround when technical ownership was unclear.
Maintained accountability for customer communications during a major system transition
A progression built on learning processes, understanding risk, improving them, and teaching others to do it well.
Reviewed employee and task-level lending activity for adherence to established procedures, risk controls, documentation requirements, and quality standards. Conducted end-to-end and targeted quality reviews across multiple stages of the small business lending process.
Evaluated AML/sanctions-related and other risk alerts to verify that required due diligence was completed and properly documented. Reviewed prohibited-industry, fraud-related, credit-report, customer-letter, timeliness, and other targeted risk/control attributes.
Documented formal Pass/Fail quality results and identified specific procedural or control failures requiring corrective action. Communicated deficiencies directly to responsible employees and, when appropriate, copied managers to ensure remediation and proper documentation.
Served as a trusted resource for judgment-based Pass/Fail/N/A determinations when procedure language or loan circumstances required interpretation. Encouraged peers and offshore reviewers to challenge unclear procedures when control language did not support consistent or accurate review outcomes.
Escalated process and control concerns to department vice presidents and participated in working sessions using live loan examples to demonstrate operational discrepancies. Documented review questions requiring revised Pass/Fail/N/A logic and provided business rationale supporting changes to the QC process.
Collaborated with leadership and peers to develop a QC ownership reference guide identifying which employee should be graded for each targeted review based on notes, process actions, and documented ownership indicators. Helped standardize targeted-review scoring by improving consistency in how review ownership was assigned across loans involving multiple processors, underwriters, managers, and stakeholders.
Identified flawed logic in a Timeliness QC report generating approximately 100–150 review items per day, many of which were recurring or duplicate items. Challenged the report design and escalated concerns that accounts were being captured too early and too frequently within the required communication window. Contributed to process changes that substantially reduced unnecessary review volume, with some daily runs subsequently returning no accounts requiring review. Supported recovery from an approximately three-month backlog while new Timeliness-report volume continued arriving daily.
Helped onboard three new QC team members who initially supported backlog reduction before progressing into full report rotation and independent work. Created and maintained a structured assignment and rotation system after team growth expanded the original three-person group. Balanced workload across team members while maintaining report coverage, cross-training, and shared process knowledge.
Co-led onboarding for a nine-person offshore QC team in Chennai, India. Helped create the offshore training plan, training schedule, report-by-report curriculum, and daily progress tracking. Delivered coaching-oriented training across the team's full set of QC reports and processes. Supported approximately 30–45 days of training and ramp-up before the offshore team began independent production work. Reviewed offshore work after production, provided Pass/Fail scoring through SharePoint, and delivered next-day feedback and coaching. Helped the offshore team progress to essentially zero routine process errors during the ramp-up period, with remaining questions focused primarily on judgment-based interpretations. Remained a primary offshore-team point of contact for questions and escalations through the end of the role.
Tracked team incidents involving customer-letter failures during the Pega transition and followed cases through correction. Coordinated across Technology, underwriting, management, Zoom, Teams/chat, and email to help verify that affected customer communications were regenerated or successfully delivered. Monitored low-volume exception reports involving high-value loan transfers, letter-processing exceptions, and Pega loan-build integrity. Escalated identified exceptions immediately to the appropriate business or management teams for resolution. Provided ongoing control-monitoring results to senior management for reports where zero-volume results indicated the process was operating as designed.
Managed delinquent auto-loan accounts and customer collection activity. Joined Ally during a transition period while actively pursuing a return to quality, risk, compliance, and operations work. Maintained financial-services experience while completing college coursework and preparing for a return to controls-focused work.
Began returning to school in 2018 while still working. Following the 2019 Citi Mortgage layoff, increased to a full academic course load. Coursework included graphic design, web design, app development, visual communications, and related technology/design disciplines. Graduated in 2021.
This period is positioned as a reinvention and skill-expansion chapter rather than a career gap.
Citi Mortgage role ended in 2019 following the mortgage-servicing transition to Nationstar / Mr. Cooper.
Served as a primary resource for day-to-day team questions, training, system issues, workflow, access requests, and operational escalation. Supported teams of approximately 16–20 employees in lead / supervisory-capacity responsibilities. Stepped into acting-supervisor responsibilities during extended manager absences.
Assigned workflow, distributed projects, and communicated process changes and operational updates. Monitored productivity and supported daily reporting and inventory-management activities. Conducted spot checks to verify employee adherence to procedures and reduce operational and compliance risk. Supported employee system access, onboarding, software requests, and operational readiness.
Participated in meetings with vice presidents and senior vice presidents within Default Management to discuss operational obstacles, risks, and process solutions.
Supported Citi Mortgage's servicing transition to Nationstar / Mr. Cooper. Helped ensure records, servicing information, and operational processes were organized for transition activities. Wrote detailed step-by-step procedures and job aids for both U.S.-based and offshore employees. Supported knowledge transfer by documenting workflows in practical, task-level instructions. Trained offshore team members on day-to-day responsibilities and served as a central point of contact during transition activities. Scheduled and facilitated training calls and worked directly with offshore management and team members. Supported audit/compliance-related activities, operational cleanup, reporting, process execution, and transition readiness.
Reviewed foreclosure timelines to determine whether required servicing activities were completed within investor-defined windows. Reconstructed loan histories across areas including loss mitigation, modification, forbearance, bankruptcy, and foreclosure.
Identified departments responsible for timeline delays and contacted business areas to validate dates, chronology, and documented servicing activity. Determined whether assessed compensatory-fee days were accurate, overstated, or understated based on available documentation. Supported financial reconciliation involving credits or payments associated with validated timeline adjustments.
Communicated directly via email with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac representatives regarding timeline and fee determinations. Worked ongoing compensatory-fee inventory using SharePoint and spreadsheets.
Became an early SME-type resource after quickly learning the newly established process. Served as first point of contact for team questions before escalation to management. Provided side-by-side training and operational support to team members. Supported approximately 16–20 employees across questions, systems, access, meetings, reporting inputs, and process guidance. Facilitated meetings and supported manager-level operational responsibilities. Assumed acting-supervisor responsibilities during an extended manager leave. Helped maintain accuracy and integrity in fee determinations regardless of whether the result financially benefited Citi or required additional payment.
Reviewed borrower and servicing information across multiple systems for consistency and accuracy. Verified identifying and servicing data such as names, addresses, account information, modification activity, and forbearance status. Helped identify mismatches across systems in a post-housing-crisis mortgage environment. Supported operational accuracy, data integrity, and servicing-control requirements. Developed experience in back-office operations, risk awareness, quality, and compliance-focused work.
Managed delinquent residential mortgage accounts and worked directly with borrowers experiencing financial hardship. Discussed repayment arrangements, budgeting, forbearance, loan modifications, short sales, and foreclosure-prevention options. Helped borrowers understand available alternatives before foreclosure.
Performed borrower research and contact-location activities on difficult-to-reach accounts. Worked within a performance environment that included collection targets and tiered incentive / bonus structures. Consistently recalls meeting assigned collection goals. Developed foundational expertise in mortgage servicing, loss mitigation, delinquency management, customer communication, and financial-services operations.
Managed a portfolio/list of customers several months delinquent on rented washer and dryer accounts. Contacted customers regarding past-due balances and worked to secure payment. Built early experience in collections, account management, call-center operations, and customer outreach.
Worked through ASAP Temp Agency in an evening outbound mortgage call-center assignment. Contacted customers using approved scripts regarding potential mortgage, HELOC, and financing needs. Identified interested customers and transferred qualified leads to sales representatives. Gained early financial-services and mortgage-industry exposure.
Supported seasonal gift-wrapping operations while also working at Steak 'n Shake. Prepared customer purchases for presentation and return to the retail floor. Balanced overlapping part-time work responsibilities during early career.
Began working while in high school and remained with the company into early adulthood. Worked as a server and across drive-thru, cashiering, shakes, cleaning, food preparation, grill/fryer support, weekends, and overnight shifts. Frequently worked high-demand and late-night schedules in a 24-hour restaurant environment. Developed early strengths in customer service, adaptability, multitasking, cash handling, teamwork, and operational awareness.
Throughout her career, Nikita was repeatedly selected to train, coach, onboard, organize, troubleshoot, and lead work even when her formal title did not include "manager" or "SME."
The skills and expertise developed across 18+ years of operational, quality, and controls work.
Formal credentials and ongoing professional development.
Currently completing formal PMP preparation to strengthen and validate extensive real-world experience in project coordination, process improvement, change execution, stakeholder management, workflow planning, and operational leadership.
Volunteer work and community involvement beyond the office.
Interested in discussing how Nikita can contribute to your operations, quality, or risk team?