Rachel Gollihue

I actually started in the retirement industry when I was 19 in an entry-level position and worked my way up. I've always been supported by my employer to get certain designations and licensing that I needed to excel in my career. I started in a defined benefits space doing plan terminations for about 5 or 6 years, then moved into a communications role where I helped plan sponsors market their retirement plans, helping them reach their employees and figuring out who best to target, when, and how, and coming up with those campaigns. I spent almost 10 years at a third-party administrator, which is more technical in nature. They're basically like a liaison for clients between the Department of Labor and the IRS, and we helped clients understand how their plans operate. When things would go awry, we would help them get it sorted back out, whether that was negotiating with the IRS, Department of Labor, going through those things and asking for forgiveness, paying fees and fines. In my current role, I actually got a promotion last year. I'm in a sales role working on a small team that helps with sales finals. I'm on a presentation team, but it goes beyond presentation. I prepare materials like all of our presentation decks, anything that supports the finals like bio booklets and table tents, all the fancy bells and whistles that we bring to presentations to tell a client the story of why we're the best fit for them. I'm really a strategic partner, understanding what our competitors are bringing to the market and how we're going to compete, how we're going to win, what challenges we may run into and how we're going to overcome those, and preparing the teams. I'm in a very visible role now within the company, just making sure that we're showing up in our best possible way when we're presenting to prospects and potential new clients.