How Anne-Marie Kelly found her voice — and helps others find theirs
Anne-Marie Kelly is a Catalyst Ambassador, an alum of the Mastercard Emerging Leaders Cyber Initiative (ELCI) and a former mentor of ELCI.
Anne-Marie Kelly spent 18 months sitting at a table where nobody seemed to see her.
As a young professional representing her organization at meetings of Canada’s banking security leaders, she was often the only woman in the room. Years later, she learned that some of the attendees had given her a nickname.
It was after that I learned my nickname was Casper. Because they never saw me.
She had a seat at the Canadian Bankers Association, at a table with 26 men. The heads of security from Canada’s major banks met regularly with law enforcement representatives from across Canada. Most of the people around the table were former law enforcement officers who had gone on to lead security functions at Canada’s largest financial institutions.
She was the only woman in the room.
“It was a time when women didn’t traditionally have a place,” she says.
Anne-Marie was deliberate about her behaviour. The meetings ran from 10 a.m. to noon, and she would arrive one minute before they started. She always sat in the same seat and left exactly at noon.
“I never hung around to socialize or network because I didn’t want to be seen as that young, pretty thing that only has a voice in the room so that her bank is represented,” she says.
“I didn’t share the same voice as everyone, and so it took, sadly, 18 months to actually be heard and respected at the table. Back then, I didn’t want to be that young female who was seen for her body parts, and that was it.”
Today, Anne-Marie Kelly helps create the kind of supportive community she wishes had existed earlier in her own career.
Her path into the field wasn’t the one she had imagined.
Anne-Marie’s uncle, a police officer, was her through-line to security.
“I always wanted to be a police officer.”
But her uncle was dead set against it.
At his advice, she sidestepped the path she had always envisioned, though she never lost her fascination with investigations and security. Instead, she took a finance role and approached her CEO with an idea.
“I think I want to start an investigation services team. Will you let me?”
He said, “Go ahead.”
Quickly, she sought out a mentor from Waterloo Regional Police, who walked her through the Criminal Code and what she needed to understand about financial crimes.
That decision changed the course of her career.
Like a moth to a light, she immersed herself in fraud investigations. Anne-Marie soon realized that financial crime was deeply connected to identity, cyber threats, digital transformation, and national security.
“I was building up my network,” she says. “And so that’s really where my career changed totally. It was my happy path. Being in financial crimes without carrying a gun and doing what it takes to be a police officer.”
Over time, she specialized in helping organizations modernize how they detect, investigate, and respond to financial crime. Her work has included anti-money laundering, fraud prevention, identity verification, investigations, and emerging technology strategies.
“Financial crime prevention sits at the intersection of technology, human behaviour, geopolitics, regulation, and operational resilience,” she says. “It’s constantly evolving, which means there is always a need to innovate and think differently.”
Anne-Marie Kelly was working at Mastercard when she heard about the Catalyst’s ELCI program. It immediately sparked interest and a passion for growing alongside women cyber leaders, and she approached her mentor about possible involvement in the program. Another strong and broad-thinking female leader, she instantly encouraged Anne-Marie. From a background as VP of Global Product Development, Identity Verification, Anne-Marie jumped into ELCI as both a student and a mentor. Now, she continues her passion for the Catalyst, as an Ambassador.
She leads enterprise operational strategy and performance, transforming complex risk, identity, and compliance frameworks into engines for secure growth. Operating at the intersection of strategy, execution, and commercial impact, she designs scalable decision frameworks that balance robust protection with frictionless customer experiences.
As a prominent voice in the ecosystem, she frequently speaks at major conferences, leads industry forums, and contributes to sector publications to shape the future of digital identity modernization and enterprise resilience. She advises senior public and private sector leaders on translating advanced technologies into automated, high-volume workflows that organizations can adopt with confidence.
That commitment to helping others navigate complexity extends beyond the workplace.
ELCI is not just a skills-based program, according to Anne-Marie. It’s community building.
By the second session, the tears are flowing, imposter syndrome has passed through, and everybody unifies in their purpose for being there.
What differentiates ELCI, according to Anne-Marie, is that it brings together leaders who are genuinely focused on impact, not just networking. Long after the program ends, cohort members remain connected, sharing information, solving problems, and charting their careers together.
“There’s a rare level of openness and collaboration across industries, disciplines, and generations of leadership,” she says.
“What I love about the ELCI program,” says Anne-Marie, “is that it brings women and non-binary folks from different sectors and career stages together. You have women in the room who sit on boards, who are VPs, and women who are just beginning their careers.”
Anne-Marie believes that community creates empowerment for women to stand up and speak out.
Anne-Marie’s life mission is to teach people how to be vulnerable. She advocates for actionable ways to build self-awareness and confidence.
The key, she says, is “practice, practice, practice.”
ELCI creates exactly that kind of environment. The program culminates in a presentation to a board panel, and Anne-Marie believes the experience builds confidence that extends far beyond the classroom. Participants leave better equipped to contribute ideas, advocate for themselves, and use their voices in meaningful ways.
Identity, Anne-Marie says, is at the centre of everything in cybersecurity. Organizations hear the buzz around AI and may rush to deploy it, but they often lack a deep understanding of how it works or how to govern it responsibly. From fraud prevention to AI governance, organizations increasingly need to know who is accessing systems, how information is being used, and whether digital interactions can be trusted.
“The Catalyst brings such important academic perspectives and also professionals and technologists that can bring in those subject matter experts to bridge all of it together,” she says. “I feel we’re at a time where all of it has to converge.”
As a Catalyst Ambassador for two years, Anne-Marie sees the role as a way to connect people, ideas, and opportunities across the ecosystem.
“It’s about creating bridges between industry, academia, startups, financial institutions, and emerging leaders. In many industries, especially cybersecurity and financial crime prevention, knowledge is often fragmented across organizations and sectors.”
The work matters to her because she believes the platform helps break down those silos.
Anne-Marie explains that a large part of the role is helping amplify important conversations around cybersecurity, AI, financial crime prevention, and digital trust. Ambassadors support these goals through mentorship, speaking engagements, community involvement, and by helping people navigate and connect within the network.
“The most meaningful part for me has been seeing the power of the community firsthand,” she says.
Anne-Marie believes the Catalyst occupies a unique position, bringing together government, industry, academia, and emerging talent.
“It’s a unique spot right now in today’s world,” she says.
Some of the most valuable outcomes happen when people from completely different backgrounds and geographies come together to solve a shared problem. Watching those relationships and collaborations develop has been incredibly rewarding.
“I think it plays an important role in helping build the next generation of leaders by making expertise and mentorship more accessible.”
Recently, she took up tennis after a friend’s daughter challenged her to a tournament. Having not picked up a racquet since eighth grade, she bought a pair of clay-court shoes and started asking everyone she knew to play.
“If I couldn’t find someone, I would just go to a school and hit a ball,” she says.
The same determination that helped her build a career in financial crime and identity security also shows up in the way she approaches new challenges.
For Anne-Marie, the value of community comes down to one thing: helping people find their voice sooner than she did.
Whether through ELCI, mentorship, or her work as a Catalyst Ambassador, Anne-Marie continues to create spaces where people can be seen, heard, and empowered to lead — without spending 18 months waiting for a seat at the table.
Click to learn more about how ELCI might support your path: https://cybersecurecatalyst.ca/elci/