Brent Beardall has only had two employers in 30 years, describes himself as the luckiest man alive, and means it more than most people who say it.
In this episode of What Fuels You, host Shawna Suerland sits down with the President and CEO of WaFd Bank for a conversation that covers a lot of ground: growing up in Southern California, losing his father at 15, a Mormon mission in the poverty-stricken outskirts of Mexico City, 25 years of rising through one of the Pacific Northwest's most storied financial institutions, and surviving a plane crash on January 2, 2023 that killed his friend in the cockpit beside him. Through all of it, Beardall returns to the same conviction: give back, stay curious, and leave things better than you found them.
📋 Episode Chapters
| 00:00 | Rapid fire: mountains vs. beach, water polo, early rising, and Depeche Mode at the LA Coliseum |
| 08:00 | Growing up in Anaheim Hills; working in bank collections at 16; losing his father at 15 |
| 16:00 | BYU, a 2-year Mormon mission in Mexico City, and the case for mandatory national service |
| 24:00 | Deloitte, WaFd Bank, and why he has only had two employers in 30+ years |
| 30:00 | Running toward problems: how mastering FASB 133 made him an accidental expert and changed his career |
| 36:00 | Becoming CEO in 2017: being the luckiest man alive, and merging your professional and personal self |
| 40:00 | AI in banking: riding the wave or getting crushed by it, and the vision for a personal CFO in your pocket |
| 44:00 | The plane crash: January 2, 2023, the Rose Bowl, and surviving a plane crash that nearly took everything |
| 50:00 | It's okay not to be okay: survivor's guilt, vulnerability as a leader, and telling people you love them |
| 52:00 | What fuels Brent: giving back and leaving the campsite better than you found it |
Running Toward Problems
Brent Beardall did not become the CEO of Washington State's largest bank by waiting for opportunities to come to him. He became CEO by consistently doing the thing nobody else wanted to do.
The clearest example came early in his WaFd career. A new accounting standard, FASB 133, landed in the financial industry with 1,232 pages of dense regulatory language and zero established experts. Everyone else stepped back. Beardall printed the whole thing, read it cover to cover, highlighted it, and asked questions until he understood it better than anyone around him.
"That's the great thing about running towards challenges. Don't just do what everybody else has done. Run towards a challenge. And now all of a sudden you gain that expertise."
— Brent Beardall
It is a philosophy that has defined his entire arc at WaFd. He joined in 2001 after a stint at Deloitte, where he had been assigned to audit Washington Federal Savings and Loan. He rose through finance and operations. He became only the sixth CEO in the bank's 108-year history in 2017. Along the way, he passed on an early opportunity to join Amazon. No regrets.
"I love what I get to do every day. I love what I get to do and who I get to do it with." When he updated his LinkedIn profile with the CEO title, he added four words: "I am the luckiest man alive."
Shaped Early: The Beach, the Bank, and a Father Lost Too Soon
Beardall grew up in Anaheim Hills, California, the youngest of three children in a family where his father was a banker. He was working in the file room of his father's bank by age 14. By 16, he was in the collections department, calling borrowers behind on their loans.
"It was a wonderful education. I got to learn about leverage and I got to learn how many people are living above their means. Being a kid in high school, I always thought you could know how well someone was doing by their car. Not true."
— Brent Beardall
At 15, his father passed away. His brother was on a Mormon mission in Venezuela. His sister was in and out of college. Beardall stayed home with his mother and quietly took on the responsibilities of the household: the yard, the roof, the painting, everything.
"Whether it was real or perceived, the perception was: I need to take the mantle from my dad and take care of my mom." He describes it as something he thought at the time was the worst thing that could happen to him, and something he now sees as one of the most formative experiences of his life. It gave him a switch, he says: the ability to flip between being very serious when the situation demands it and letting go and enjoying life. Both are necessary to stay healthy.
Mexico City and the Case for Mandatory Service
After returning to BYU from his Mormon mission in Mexico City, Beardall graduated with a master's degree in accounting while working 40 hours a week to avoid graduating with debt. But the mission itself was the education that stuck.
"If I could be in charge of the world and make one change, I would require 2 years of service for everyone. Something like a Mormon mission, something like military service. Two years where you have to focus on someone other than yourself."
— Brent Beardall
His first assignment was in La Colmena, a neighborhood without paved roads, far removed from the wealth that also exists in Mexico City. The experience was humbling in ways that shaped how he thinks about gratitude, service, and what actually matters.
Banking in the Age of AI: Ride the Wave or Get Crushed
Beardall is clear-eyed about the tension AI creates in a heavily regulated industry. Bank regulators have traditionally been skeptical of generative models because they learn and evolve in ways that complicate oversight. But Beardall treats that tension as a version of the FASB 133 problem: something new, something complex, something worth running toward.
"There is a wave coming to all of us and that is a technological revolution. We can either ride that wave and take advantage, or we're going to get crushed by the wave. And it's up to each of us to figure out how to reinvent ourselves."
— Brent Beardall
His longer-term vision for what AI can do in banking is ambitious and personal: every customer with their own personal CFO in their pocket. Not just a tool that flags duplicate subscriptions, but something that actually analyzes spending patterns, models projected outcomes, and helps people make better financial decisions.
"Wouldn't it be cool if we all had this objective CFO to help us? We're looking at your spending patterns and maybe if you do things a little bit differently, this is where your projected outcome could be."
— Brent Beardall
WaFd has already built in that direction. Beardall describes a wire transfer portal the bank built that uses voice authentication tied to the customer's specific phone, delivering multi-factor security without the friction of branch visits and paperwork. Four years in, zero fraud incidents.
The Plane Crash: January 2, 2023
It started as good-natured ribbing at a client event. A client on the University of Utah board of trustees told Beardall and a fellow WaFd banker they were his two favorite BYU Cougars, while his Utah Utes were headed to the Rose Bowl and BYU was headed to a much less celebrated bowl game. Beardall called the bluff: if we were really your favorites, you'd invite us to Pasadena. The client said yes, on one condition: wear Utah gear.
Beardall's friend Nathan offered to fly them down and back in a day on a private jet. Beardall's two sons were originally going to join. Two days before the flight, his youngest said he didn't feel right about it. Beardall told him he didn't have to go, and flew with just the pilot, the pilot's wife, and one other WaFd banker.
"We took off. Everything was great, going about 200 miles an hour, 200 feet off the ground. And then all of a sudden, for reasons unknown, the plane took a hard turn down and to the left to the point the tip of the wing started scraping on the runway, and then it acted like a catapult, sending the nose directly into the ground."
— Brent Beardall
The plane rolled 12 to 15 times. The wings and engines were severed, which prevented a fire. The pilot was ejected from the plane and did not survive. Beardall was left on the ground in critical condition. First responders were standing over him with arms folded when he regained enough consciousness to reach up and ask what they were doing.
"They wanted to let me pass in peace. They didn't think there was anything they could do for me."
He survived. And the experience reshaped how he thinks about almost everything.
It's Okay Not to Be Okay
In the ICU, a nurse pulled Beardall aside and told him something he has carried with him since. She said she knew his type: an overachiever, someone who would fight back, someone who would beat it. But she warned him that there would be days when it was simply not okay. And that is okay.
"If the listeners get nothing else from this podcast, know my firm belief that it's okay not to be okay. Every one of us is not okay from time to time, from the CEOs of the largest corporations to the janitors to school teachers. And as leaders, we need to speak up and let people know there's times we're not okay."
— Brent Beardall
Beardall has carried that message into how he leads at WaFd. He talks about telling employees and clients that he loves them when he means it, not as a performance but as a genuine acknowledgment that life is short and connection is real. "Life is too short not to let people know when you love them."
He also talks about survivor's guilt with unusual candor for a CEO. Why did he survive when the pilot beside him did not? He does not have an answer. What he does have is a commitment to not waste the time he has been given.
"For whatever reason, God has spared me and allowed me to have a mulligan, extra time, extra innings. I just don't want to let a day get wasted."
— Brent Beardall
5 Key Takeaways
Brent Beardall has only had two employers in 30 years, describes himself as the luckiest man alive, and means it more than most people who say it.
In this episode of What Fuels You, host Shawna Suerland sits down with the President and CEO of WaFd Bank for a conversation that covers a lot of ground: growing up in Southern California, losing his father at 15, a Mormon mission in the poverty-stricken outskirts of Mexico City, 25 years of rising through one of the Pacific Northwest's most storied financial institutions, and surviving a plane crash on January 2, 2023 that killed his friend in the cockpit beside him. Through all of it, Beardall returns to the same conviction: give back, stay curious, and leave things better than you found them.
📋 Episode Chapters
| 00:00 | Rapid fire: mountains vs. beach, water polo, early rising, and Depeche Mode at the LA Coliseum |
| 08:00 | Growing up in Anaheim Hills; working in bank collections at 16; losing his father at 15 |
| 16:00 | BYU, a 2-year Mormon mission in Mexico City, and the case for mandatory national service |
| 24:00 | Deloitte, WaFd Bank, and why he has only had two employers in 30+ years |
| 30:00 | Running toward problems: how mastering FASB 133 made him an accidental expert and changed his career |
| 36:00 | Becoming CEO in 2017: being the luckiest man alive, and merging your professional and personal self |
| 40:00 | AI in banking: riding the wave or getting crushed by it, and the vision for a personal CFO in your pocket |
| 44:00 | The plane crash: January 2, 2023, the Rose Bowl, and surviving a plane crash that nearly took everything |
| 50:00 | It's okay not to be okay: survivor's guilt, vulnerability as a leader, and telling people you love them |
| 52:00 | What fuels Brent: giving back and leaving the campsite better than you found it |
Running Toward Problems
Brent Beardall did not become the CEO of Washington State's largest bank by waiting for opportunities to come to him. He became CEO by consistently doing the thing nobody else wanted to do.
The clearest example came early in his WaFd career. A new accounting standard, FASB 133, landed in the financial industry with 1,232 pages of dense regulatory language and zero established experts. Everyone else stepped back. Beardall printed the whole thing, read it cover to cover, highlighted it, and asked questions until he understood it better than anyone around him.
"That's the great thing about running towards challenges. Don't just do what everybody else has done. Run towards a challenge. And now all of a sudden you gain that expertise."
— Brent Beardall
It is a philosophy that has defined his entire arc at WaFd. He joined in 2001 after a stint at Deloitte, where he had been assigned to audit Washington Federal Savings and Loan. He rose through finance and operations. He became only the sixth CEO in the bank's 108-year history in 2017. Along the way, he passed on an early opportunity to join Amazon. No regrets.
"I love what I get to do every day. I love what I get to do and who I get to do it with." When he updated his LinkedIn profile with the CEO title, he added four words: "I am the luckiest man alive."
Shaped Early: The Beach, the Bank, and a Father Lost Too Soon
Beardall grew up in Anaheim Hills, California, the youngest of three children in a family where his father was a banker. He was working in the file room of his father's bank by age 14. By 16, he was in the collections department, calling borrowers behind on their loans.
"It was a wonderful education. I got to learn about leverage and I got to learn how many people are living above their means. Being a kid in high school, I always thought you could know how well someone was doing by their car. Not true."
— Brent Beardall
At 15, his father passed away. His brother was on a Mormon mission in Venezuela. His sister was in and out of college. Beardall stayed home with his mother and quietly took on the responsibilities of the household: the yard, the roof, the painting, everything.
"Whether it was real or perceived, the perception was: I need to take the mantle from my dad and take care of my mom." He describes it as something he thought at the time was the worst thing that could happen to him, and something he now sees as one of the most formative experiences of his life. It gave him a switch, he says: the ability to flip between being very serious when the situation demands it and letting go and enjoying life. Both are necessary to stay healthy.
Mexico City and the Case for Mandatory Service
After returning to BYU from his Mormon mission in Mexico City, Beardall graduated with a master's degree in accounting while working 40 hours a week to avoid graduating with debt. But the mission itself was the education that stuck.
"If I could be in charge of the world and make one change, I would require 2 years of service for everyone. Something like a Mormon mission, something like military service. Two years where you have to focus on someone other than yourself."
— Brent Beardall
His first assignment was in La Colmena, a neighborhood without paved roads, far removed from the wealth that also exists in Mexico City. The experience was humbling in ways that shaped how he thinks about gratitude, service, and what actually matters.
Banking in the Age of AI: Ride the Wave or Get Crushed
Beardall is clear-eyed about the tension AI creates in a heavily regulated industry. Bank regulators have traditionally been skeptical of generative models because they learn and evolve in ways that complicate oversight. But Beardall treats that tension as a version of the FASB 133 problem: something new, something complex, something worth running toward.
"There is a wave coming to all of us and that is a technological revolution. We can either ride that wave and take advantage, or we're going to get crushed by the wave. And it's up to each of us to figure out how to reinvent ourselves."
— Brent Beardall
His longer-term vision for what AI can do in banking is ambitious and personal: every customer with their own personal CFO in their pocket. Not just a tool that flags duplicate subscriptions, but something that actually analyzes spending patterns, models projected outcomes, and helps people make better financial decisions.
"Wouldn't it be cool if we all had this objective CFO to help us? We're looking at your spending patterns and maybe if you do things a little bit differently, this is where your projected outcome could be."
— Brent Beardall
WaFd has already built in that direction. Beardall describes a wire transfer portal the bank built that uses voice authentication tied to the customer's specific phone, delivering multi-factor security without the friction of branch visits and paperwork. Four years in, zero fraud incidents.
The Plane Crash: January 2, 2023
It started as good-natured ribbing at a client event. A client on the University of Utah board of trustees told Beardall and a fellow WaFd banker they were his two favorite BYU Cougars, while his Utah Utes were headed to the Rose Bowl and BYU was headed to a much less celebrated bowl game. Beardall called the bluff: if we were really your favorites, you'd invite us to Pasadena. The client said yes, on one condition: wear Utah gear.
Beardall's friend Nathan offered to fly them down and back in a day on a private jet. Beardall's two sons were originally going to join. Two days before the flight, his youngest said he didn't feel right about it. Beardall told him he didn't have to go, and flew with just the pilot, the pilot's wife, and one other WaFd banker.
"We took off. Everything was great, going about 200 miles an hour, 200 feet off the ground. And then all of a sudden, for reasons unknown, the plane took a hard turn down and to the left to the point the tip of the wing started scraping on the runway, and then it acted like a catapult, sending the nose directly into the ground."
— Brent Beardall
The plane rolled 12 to 15 times. The wings and engines were severed, which prevented a fire. The pilot was ejected from the plane and did not survive. Beardall was left on the ground in critical condition. First responders were standing over him with arms folded when he regained enough consciousness to reach up and ask what they were doing.
"They wanted to let me pass in peace. They didn't think there was anything they could do for me."
He survived. And the experience reshaped how he thinks about almost everything.
It's Okay Not to Be Okay
In the ICU, a nurse pulled Beardall aside and told him something he has carried with him since. She said she knew his type: an overachiever, someone who would fight back, someone who would beat it. But she warned him that there would be days when it was simply not okay. And that is okay.
"If the listeners get nothing else from this podcast, know my firm belief that it's okay not to be okay. Every one of us is not okay from time to time, from the CEOs of the largest corporations to the janitors to school teachers. And as leaders, we need to speak up and let people know there's times we're not okay."
— Brent Beardall
Beardall has carried that message into how he leads at WaFd. He talks about telling employees and clients that he loves them when he means it, not as a performance but as a genuine acknowledgment that life is short and connection is real. "Life is too short not to let people know when you love them."
He also talks about survivor's guilt with unusual candor for a CEO. Why did he survive when the pilot beside him did not? He does not have an answer. What he does have is a commitment to not waste the time he has been given.
"For whatever reason, God has spared me and allowed me to have a mulligan, extra time, extra innings. I just don't want to let a day get wasted."
— Brent Beardall
