Cijara Group
Irma Chilin, Managing Principal of Cijara Group

Irma Chilin, MBA

Managing Principal

Banking-regulatory and BSA/AML practice lead

Leadership

Built inside the regulatory function.

Irma Chilin is the Managing Principal and majority owner of Cijara Group. She brings more than 15 years inside the banking regulatory function - not advising from the outside, but managing examinations from within the institution, with regulators across the table.

As Regulatory Exam Manager at U.S. Bank, she owned the exam and issue-management lifecycle: translating supervisory findings into actionable business response, drafting regulatory responses on deadline, and building the executive and board reporting leadership relied on during examination. Earlier, as VP of Regulatory Affairs Reporting & Analytics at MUFG Union Bank, she stood up a global regulatory-affairs framework - policy, training, and the Archer-based exam and issues reporting platform - and served as incident-reporting lead across operational and cyber events.

Her background spans BSA/AML, RCSA and risk-control design, internal audit (including a bank-wide audit framework across Latin America, Europe, and Japan), and financial planning across a $20M budget.

She holds an MBA in Finance and Management, a Lean Six Sigma Green Belt, and is a Certified Fraud Examiner (in progress). She is fluent in Spanish.

At Cijara, Irma leads the firm’s banking-regulatory and BSA/AML practice.

Representative experience

  • Regulatory examination and issue-management lifecycle at U.S. Bank
  • Global regulatory-affairs framework build - policy, training, and Archer exam/issues tooling (MUFG Union Bank)
  • BSA/AML, RCSA, and risk-control design
  • Bank-wide internal audit framework across Latin America, Europe, and Japan
Connect with IrmaRegulatory & Compliance Practice
Joshua Reh, Principal of Cijara Group

Joshua Reh

Principal

Model risk management and AI governance practice lead

Leadership

Model risk, operational risk, and AI governance - built from the inside.

Joshua Reh is a Principal and co-founder of Cijara Group. He brings 15+ years inside the model risk, operational risk, AI governance, and enterprise data management functions at major financial institutions - not reviewing frameworks from the outside, but building and operating the programs regulators and internal risk committees rely on.

As a VP-level Model Risk and Operational Risk Officer at Wells Fargo, Joshua led the governance program overseeing a biannual review of approximately 600 in-use qualitative and quantitative models across the enterprise. He stood up the system of record that housed and classified nearly 18,000 tools as End User Computing Tools (EUCTs) enterprise-wide - a program that required designing the classification taxonomy, implementation workflow, and ongoing governance infrastructure from the ground up. He has led the remediation of Matters Requiring Immediate Attention (MRIAs) at two separate federally regulated financial institutions - the most serious class of supervisory finding issued by federal banking regulators - working directly with risk leadership and examining agencies to close findings on deadline and under scrutiny. He owned hands-on policy and procedure development to enforce alignment with model risk management regulations, and was responsible for distilling new technology Laws, Rules, and Regulations into actionable requirements converted into operational risk controls across the enterprise. Alongside this, he contributed to regulatory reporting and data governance transformation as a consulting resource working alongside Ernst & Young and Deloitte. Earlier, at Bank of America, he supported CFO Group regulatory reporting infrastructure and global liquidity risk management data sourcing; at Goldman Sachs, he worked in risk analytics and data integration within Operations.

His enterprise data management expertise is grounded in the principles of the DAMA-DMBOK framework - spanning data governance, data quality, metadata management, and master data management - applied at scale across complex, multi-system financial environments.

Beyond his institutional work, Joshua has advised small and mid-size businesses in the real estate and franchise sectors on practical AI governance and adoption - helping organizations without dedicated risk infrastructure assess AI tools, establish responsible-use policies, and align emerging technology deployments with applicable regulatory expectations.

Joshua holds a Master of Investment Management and Financial Analysis (MIMFA) from Creighton University’s Heider College of Business - a rigorous, CFA Institute-affiliated program focused on investment analysis, portfolio management, quantitative methods, and financial risk - and a BS in Finance from SUNY New Paltz. He holds a Lean Six Sigma Green Belt (awarded July 2024) and AWS and Azure AI certifications.

At Cijara, Joshua leads the firm’s model risk management and AI governance practice.

Representative experience

  • MRIA remediation at two separate federally regulated financial institutions, working directly with risk leadership and examining agencies
  • Biannual governance review of ~600 production qualitative and quantitative models (Wells Fargo)
  • Enterprise EUCT program - classification taxonomy and system of record for ~18,000 tools (Wells Fargo)
  • Model risk management policy and procedure development aligned to federal regulatory standards
  • Technology LRR distillation into operational risk controls across the enterprise
  • Enterprise data governance aligned to DAMA-DMBOK principles across complex financial environments
  • Regulatory reporting and data governance transformation alongside Ernst & Young and Deloitte
  • CFO Group regulatory reporting and global liquidity risk management data sourcing (Bank of America)
  • AI governance advisory for small and mid-size businesses in the real estate and franchise sectors
Connect with JoshuaAI & Emerging Tech Practice