Carrie H. Cohen will be the federal bank deposit insurer’s independent “transformation monitor,” charged with auditing the agency’s ongoing efforts to implement recommendations for improving the agency’s workplace culture.
Cohen, partner at Morrison Foerster LLP, was selected for the new post Wednesday by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) Board, the agency said.
The FDIC said Cohen will audit the FDIC’s ongoing efforts to implement its “Action Plan for a Safe, Fair, and Inclusive Work Environment,” including recommendations from an independent third-party review of the agency’s workplace culture, and report monthly to the agency’s board and employees.
The FDIC issued a request for proposals in May to fill this role. Specifically, the agency sought someone who would “provide advisory services to monitor and audit recommendations the FDIC adopts to remediate its culture, policies, procedures, and structures that impact sexual harassment, discrimination, and other interpersonal misconduct,” it stated in its original solicitation.
The third-party review recommended that reporting take place monthly for the first year and “routinely thereafter” until the work is completed, the agency explained. “The reports submitted to the FDIC Board should be made available to all FDIC employees,” according to the report. It also stated that the transformation monitor “should consult and coordinate” with the director of the agency’s Office of Minority and Women Inclusion to the extent any of this transformational work affects areas within that office’s statutory authority.
The FDIC, in Wednesday’s release, said Cohen’s appointment follows a competitive federal contracting process in which the FDIC solicited request for proposals from law firms and consulting firms to serve as transformation monitor. Following an evaluation of all proposals submitted, the FDIC Board engaged in an interview process to complete its consideration of candidates, it said.
Cohen, it said, serves at Morrison Foerster LLP as global co-chair of the firm’s DEI Strategy + Defense group, Investigations + White Collar Defense practice, and Women’s Strategy Committee. Among other things, it said she formerly served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) and as an Assistant Attorney General for the New York State Attorney General’s (NYAG) office.
FDIC Board Appoints Carrie H. Cohen as Independent Monitor to Support Cultural Transformation