Keane has spent three decades building relationships and immersing herself in the mechanics of finance while working her way up from a Citicorp call center to the top of an industry. Keane broke family tradition by pursuing a white-collar career. Her father was a retired New York police officer, had hoped his daughter would follow him into the field. Instead she enrolled at St. John’s University in New York’s borough of Queens and got a part-time job for $5.50 an hour at Citicorp, calling customers who hadn’t paid bills. For the next 16 years, Keane climbed Citicorp’s ranks, eventually running U.S. retail operations before being recruited to GE Capital. After a variety of roles in operations and quality control, she joined its credit-card business. She became the unit’s CEO in 2011
