Debra Salazar

I began my professional career in the housing industry as a leasing agent. From there, I moved into collections and lending. I have worked in a variety of environments from a pay day loan company to Associates Financial and then Citibank. Including both direct and indirect lending. I took my credit experience to a retail environment and added customer service and sales skills. Eventually, I ended up as a Profit Center Manager for a business to business sales company. After 37 years in retail and retail finance, I moved to a corporate customer service position with American Electric and Power. At AEP, I facilitated the customer service for internal clients of telecom devices. I supervised the customer service representatives, managed vendor relationships, worked with IT to keep our tools current, assisted in negotiating vendor rates and provided financial data to AEP upper level management. In additional to a great working environment, AEP gave me the valuable gift of a Franklin Covey Leadership training program. After eight years, when my position with AEP relocated, I took a sabbatical. During my sabbatical, I went back to school and studied two of my passions, sociology and economics. I attended TCC and I worked part-time at two companies. Both of these companies, The Body Shop and Starbucks, have business models that incorporated high ethical standards for the sourcing of their products and an activist approach to business. I decided to return to retail finance with a focus on economics and socially responsible practices. Starting over as a teller, I found my home in a Credit Union, Tulsa Federal Credit Union. Today, I have the good fortune to be a Mortgage Loan Officer at Tulsa Federal Credit Union.