Title: Debt Manager
Firm: Cook County, Illinois
Age: 39
Cook County Director of Debt Management Olyvia Jarmoszka held positions in finance around the country before returning home to pursue a passion for public service in her native Chicago.
This 39-year-old Rising Star began her career in 2006 as an executive assistant with what was then Siebert Brandford Shank, where the DePaul University international relations graduate excelled.
"I had no idea what public finance was going into it," she said. "Dealing with the government was actually something that I enjoyed, considering my education."
Within a year, Olyvia was promoted to analyst and later spent several years working in investment banking before taking a position as a quantitative banker with Samuel A. Ramirez & Co.
Public sector work felt more purposeful, Olyvia said, and she covered issuers across the country in her role before relocating to Houston as a financial advisor with Hutchinson, Shockey, Erley & Co.
Years later, she'd return to Chicago with valuable sector experience, and a small Chihuahua named Otis, eventually taking a position as a financial advisor with Sycamore Advisors.
Later, with her heart set on public service in her hometown, she accepted a job as a financial research analyst with the chief financial officer's team in Cook County, the nation's second-most populous county, which has Chicago as its seat.
In 2022, Olyvia was promoted to become the first director of debt management in the county's 192-year history, a position she earned with intelligence, skill, and a hard-to-rival diligence, her colleagues said.
"I thought they needed a debt manager, and I asked, 'How do we make that person me?'" she said. "I'm very proud of that achievement and I surely made the case for the $3 billion worth of debt."
Olyvia is her family's first college graduate and her parents, who hail from Poland, are proud of her and her career.
"Growing up in communist Poland, having a job in government was something of status," she said. "They came here with not $10 in their pocket, and here I am."
Olyvia speaks Polish and volunteers within Chicago's large Polish community. She's currently training for the Chicago marathon — her first — and has her eyes set on the future.
"I'd certainly love to make it up to the CFO chair one day," she said. "I've always been focused on bonds and debt and here at the county and I've really expanded my knowledge of finance in general."
