She’s making it rain. Sharon Miller is the head of small business at Bank of America, which means she oversees the billions of dollars flowing to founders across the country. She was also named one of the most powerful women to watch by American Banker, and trust us, our eyes are peeled.

We talked to the Texas native about how she’s helping female founders during the pandemic, what to prepare before a pitch meeting, and why timing the market isn’t always the best call.

So, what’s your job?
I am president of small business for Bank of America, and I also have responsibility for our auto lending as well as our specialized lending groups.

What does your day-to-day look like?
Through the pandemic, we were spending a great deal of time helping clients through the payroll protection program. In fact, [we gave] over 495k loans distributed through PPP for over 38 billion in capital during the crisis. Now we are in the mode of recovery, and we just relaunched the women’s business owner spotlight to understand how business owners are feeling. What’s their outlook for revenue, and what lessons were learned during the crisis?

What trends are you seeing among women in business?
There’s a lot of things on women’s minds around additional stress. I’m a woman; I have 2 children. I know we have kids coming home and working from home. What I hear from other women and other moms [is] that they had the brunt of the responsibility. In fact, 50% of women told us they’ve made plans to change their approach to wellness. So thinking of themselves first, whether it’s stepping away, reading a book, or whatever that person would identify with to take care of their health and wellness.

Did you launch specific programs to help female entrepreneurs last year?
This is after the pandemic, but something we did find [was] that [for] women entrepreneurs, there wasn’t one site to find capital, so we launched our Access to Capital directory for women entrepreneurs, and that’s a fantastic resource for funding. The other thing is, the Bank of America Institute for Women’s Entrepreneurship has a partnership with Cornell University where we’ve helped 50,000 [people]. We opened that up during the pandemic because there was such a demand for this educational content.

What’s your advice for women looking to get a business loan?
I think women in general want to be prepared. We want to know all the answers, to make sure we have all the different areas and elements laid out. I advise women to come in before they’re starting the business to talk to us about, “This is what I’m thinking. What do I need?” because it’s important to talk to an expert early, whether that be our banker, a CPA, attorney, [or] whoever is in that professional sphere of influence for that entrepreneur.

How do we figure out how much capital to request?
You’ve got to have a business plan. What are you attempting to build or distribute? If you’re [selling] goods, how are you going to do that? What is your experience with that type of business? Have a plan and blueprint that you can talk to a banker about. Then as you get the business going, it’s important [to] demonstrate you’re producing revenues that can cover costs and that you can begin to expand. It’s an approach of, “What stage are you in in your business, and what are you thinking about doing?”

Since the economy is always fluctuating, is there ever a “right time” to start a business?
I talk to people all the time who start businesses, and I don’t think there’s a perfect time for anybody. You have to have the confidence, courage, and passion, because the successful business owners out there are doing it in spite of what’s happening. They’re going around problems, above problems, below, whatever they need to do because they’re so committed. That’s what I love about working with business owners. It’s such a contagious type of optimism.