Voice of Experience: Karen Fang, Managing Director and Head of Cross Asset Solutions & Strategies, Global Banking & Markets Division, Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Karen FengWelcome to The Glass Hammer’s Celebration of Asian Heritage Month! All month long we will be profiling successful women here in the US who have Asian heritage as well as spotlighting some amazing women in Asia and discussing what it means to work there.

“I have been very lucky in my sixteen-year career to have always been involved with the things that I am passionate about,” said Karen Fang, Managing Director and Head of Cross Asset Solutions & Strategies, Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

Career in Banking

Originally from China, Fang attended college at the University of Tokyo in Japan, where she gained a lot of exposure to the world of Investment Banking and Capital Markets as an Economics major. “My fascination with Finance began when I was a sophomore in college and had multiple internships at different investment banks.” said Fang. She spent the majority of her time interning at Merrill Lynch, and ultimately decided to accept an offer as a derivatives structurer from Merrill Lynch in Tokyo after graduating in 1998.

“Because I was trilingual, I was fortunate enough to be transferred to the London office to work on our cross-border structured products business and then eventually relocated to New York,” explained Fang. She worked for a couple of different firms including Goldman Sachs before returning to Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York where she is now the Head of Cross Asset Solutions & Strategies in the Global Banking & Markets division. According to Fang, learning as much as possible about every single asset class, whether it is fixed income, equities, or commodities, as well as the various client industries, to be able to truly understand clients’ strategic issues before responding with effective solutions, is one of the most challenging and rewarding aspects of her role.

“Using technical knowledge to provide C-Suite clients with a complex set of solutions, help them navigate our firm, and deliver the firm’s strengths is very fulfilling,” explained Fang. “I am proud of running a business –and managing a team –that is truly cross asset and cross industry. Given that the banking industry is going through a major transformation as a result of the new regulatory environment post financial crisis, our business model is changing very rapidly,” said Fang, “and a major focus for our team right now is to figure out how to optimize our balance sheet in a way that creates a win-win situation for the clients and our firm.”

This creates a lot of opportunities for Fang and her team to think outside the box and get innovative. “We shine when the problems are complex and the solutions require collaboration of multiple divisions and teams,” she said.

Women in Banking: Embrace Being Different

One of the biggest obstacles that Fang identified for women in banking is the limited amount of networking opportunities that can help foster relationship building and career development. “We need more senior level women leaders in sales and trading, and banking,” said Fang. She applauded the efforts of the industry as a whole to become more diverse, she cited many efforts that Bank of America Merrill Lynch put in over the years to increase Diversity & Inclusion and noted the positive changes that she has witnessed throughout her career in the industry. “Things are very different now, not just in policy, but on people’s minds and in their day to day behavior. More diversity is good for our business.”

“You don’t have to act like a man in order to thrive in a male-dominated industry,” she advised. This is something that Fang wishes she had realized earlier on in her career. “Many women that I coach and mentor have this notion that emulating the behavior of a man will help them go farther in their career, when in fact, that may not be true,” said Fang.

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Avoiding Leadership Burnout: How We Can Pass the Torch to the Next Generation

iStock_000015479593XSmallNneka Orji

Are you no longer motivated by the work you were once very passionate about? Are you experiencing shortness of breath? Has managing your work-life balance become an impossible task? According to psychologist Sherrie Bourg Carter, if you answered yes to the above questions, you are likely to be on the road to burnout or already burned out.

Dr. Bourg Carter groups the signs of burnout into three main categories: physical, psychological and behavioral. Heart palpitations, increased anxiety and reduced appetite as a result of high stress environments are all signs that we might have pushed passed our physical limit.

Why is this important in the women’s leadership discussion?

Harvard researchers found that women in highly stressful jobs are at a 40 percent increased risk of heart disease. Arianna Huffington recently cited a study which found that women in stressful jobs were at 60 percent greater risk of Type 2 diabetes compared to their peers in less stressful professions. This correlation was not found in men, only women – not positive news for our female talent pipeline.

While burnout is not a female-only experience, high achieving women tend to have more expectations placed on them at work, home and in their communities. Already in high pressure jobs, the additional pressure women experience means that they struggle to balance demands and tend to burnout. Captivate Network also showed that women are less likely to address the factors leading to burnout compared to their male counterparts: “[m]en are 25% more likely to take breaks throughout the day for personal activities, 7% more likely to take a walk, 5% more likely to go out to lunch, and 35% more likely to take breaks ‘just to relax.’”

Why should leaders of our organisations take burnout seriously?

On an individual level, the impact of burnout can be devastating. Even more concerning, however, is the significant impact leadership burnout can have on organisations and economies. One of the key consequences of burnout is reduced engagement and in extreme cases, constant dread of going to work. Gallup’s 2013 State of the Global Workplace found that only 13 percent of the global workforce was either “not engaged” or “actively disengaged.” Actively disengaged employees cost economies $450-$550 billion in the US and £52-£70 billion in the UK annually. Of course burnout is not the only contributor to this drain on economies, but if individuals and organisations can mitigate the risk of disengagement by avoiding burnout, it is worth addressing.

Passing the torch to the next generation

By exhibiting the behaviours that lead to burnout, female leaders are setting the wrong example for the next generation. Working to the point where health is sacrificed sends the message that to succeed young women need to “work harder” rather than “work smarter.” The danger in female leaders burning out is twofold; firstly, fewer women remain in leadership positions and therefore fewer role models are available, and the second issue is that young women reflect the behaviours they see in their female role models, including those who exhibit signs of burnout.

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Stereotyping in Silicon Valley Explains the Lack of Women at the Top

iStock_000007740531XSmallBy Michelle Hendelman

A report released last year by the AAUW asked a very simple and direct question about women in STEM: Why So Few? A question this straightforward should have a clear answer, yet when it comes to women in technology the answers are numerous and complex, and tend to lead to even deeper questions such as:

What is preventing women from reaching the C-Suite in Silicon Valley? (6 percent represents the number of female CEOs at the top 100 technology companies)

How can we attract more women to technology careers? (5.7 percent represents the number of women in high tech occupations in the US)

Why do many women leave the technology field mid-career? (50 percent represents the number of women in STEM who leave the field in favor of a different profession within the first 12 years of their career)

Now, new light is being shed on the fact that women in technology continue to face gender bias, which could be the underlying factor contributing to the scarce representation of women in high technology.

New Research Indicates Stereotyping Still an Issue for Women in Tech
The culture of Silicon Valley is touted by insiders as a true meritocracy, where innovation trumps gender, race, or economic status. However, new research suggests that stereotypes –especially against women –are still creating barriers for women in technology. The paper, written by professors Ernesto Reuben of Columbia Business School, Paola Sapienza of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern and Luigi Zingales of the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago, presents the findings of a lab experiment in which managers assess, and ultimately hire, people who have been tasked with completing math problems.

Despite the fact that men and women historically performed equally well on the assigned math problems, the managers were twice as likely to hire a man over a woman when only one attribute of the applicants was made known: appearance.

Furthermore, the experiment revealed that managers were still more likely to choose a man over a woman even when they had more information about each applicant’s ability. Perhaps the most alarming revelation from the study came when two-thirds of managers selected male applicants even when they did not perform as well on the math problem as a woman.

The researchers determined that these managers were unable to see beyond their implicit bias based on the overarching stereotype that women are not as skilled at math as men, regardless of how well women performed in that isolated situation.

Do the results of this lab experiment explain the meritocracy myth plaguing the technology industry?

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Movers and Shakers: Lei Chen, Vice President and Head of Enterprise Growth Risk and Information Management, American Express

Lei Chen Lei Chen, Vice President and Head of Enterprise Growth Risk and Information Management for American Express, is very passionate about talent development. This is why she makes it a priority to be actively involved in many of the mentoring, leadership training, and networking programs available to executives at American Express.

“One of the things I am most proud of in my career at American Express is my involvement with the Executive Women’s Interest Network,” said Chen, who led the employee network, and has been instrumental in building it up as a critical platform to help advance and retain women talent through various activities including workshops, guest speaker series, roundtable discussions, mentoring programs and networking events.

“I think it is so important to reach out and help others develop their potential,” added Chen, “and one of the most effective ways to do this is by gathering together, sharing our experiences, learning best practices, and paying it forward.”

Career at American Express
After graduating from Michigan State University with a Ph.D. in Statistics, Chen joined the Risk and Information Management group at American Express where she had the opportunity to develop expertise in almost all areas of Risk Management and across multiple business units.

Currently, Chen serves as Vice President and Head of Enterprise Growth Risk and Information Management where her primary role is to develop risk management strategies and drive growth in the area of non-traditional payment products.

“One of the most rewarding aspects of my job is that I am directly involved in redefining our company’s brand by making our products more accessible and inclusive,” said Chen. “Enterprise Growth group is like a start up inside of American Express. With the launch of Bluebird, a checking & debit alternative, we use emerging technologies to expand our customer segment beyond our premium base, and to enable “financial inclusion” for the underserved population by traditional financial services.”

One of the challenges Chen acknowledged is delivering the brand’s promise for world class customer experience, trust, and security while achieving industry best risk performance.

According to Chen, the leadership support she has received from American Express has played a key role in her personal career development. One of the most notable programs Chen was selected to participate in was the Compass 45 Leadership Program, of which she was a participant in 2006. This was a twelve month program designed to help high potential and high performing leaders further develop their leadership skills through focused training and working on real projects that solve real business problems within the company.

“In addition to strengthening my leadership skills, I built strong connections and network among my peers,” explained Chen. She continued, “Before the program, I used to be a workaholic. Hearing and observing how my peers balanced their work and life, I had my ‘aha moment.’ I was inspired and realized that I can also have it all.”

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Our Internal Relationships Lead to Success

John Keyser (1)Guest Contribution by John Keyser

The better our relationships, the more effectively and efficiently we can achieve our desired outcomes.

The paradox is that the quality of our relationships is best established without a motive – not because this person can help me, but rather because I am genuinely interested in this person, I want to learn what she does, and perhaps how I can help her.

One of my very favorite books, The 100/0 Principle by Al Ritter proposes that a relationship should not be 50/50; we should offer our whole self to it. There should be no judgment, no qualification. This means, I want to be your colleague, teammate or friend regardless of what kind of car you drive or whether you can help me in my business.

Why is this important? When two people connect because of mutual respect and admiration, they form a genuine bond that opens the door to trust. They can share ideas and simply enjoy each other – not trying to one-up the other, just asking questions to understand and learn. By exchanging stories, they discover, hey, I have something that might help you. This is exactly what good business relationships are about. These conversations are way more important than emails, newsletters, videos or conference calls.

Too often, though, top executives spend the vast majority of their time together.

We must realize that the work of our company is done at all levels and out in the field, working with our clients and customers, and behind the scenes. Every member of our team is important and makes a difference.

We need to reach out to the people doing the work of the company! When we do, and we ask them for advice, feedback and help, we show humility and quiet confidence. These are very attractive qualities in a leader. This is how we build trust and inspire mutual success.

This is an area where men could learn from women. Women tend to connect with people regardless of whether they are in their immediate circle, and that is good for organizational culture and morale.

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McKinsey Launches New Centered Leadership Book by Barsh and Lavoie

BooksBy Jarod Cerf

In a recently published article, McKinsey & Company director emeritus, Joanna Barsh, noted how her fears of being ignored and judged, and the efforts she made to confront them, have served as the foundation of her work on Centered Leadership with co-author Johanne Lavoie.

“Layers down,” she writes, “I (re)find the message I misplace when life gets too eventful: Centered Leadership is not about attaining some higher state of perfection—it’s not about perfection at all. Deep down in the onion of what I really want, I find humanity—yours and mine. It’s my role—and my deepest desire—to transform in a way that encourages you.”

Although it may seem like a personal message, Barsh and Lavoie found that it resonated strongly with the leaders they encountered, three of whom were honored at the recent book launch at the McKinsey office in New York City.

As Barsh explained in introducing the speakers for the night, among them former President of Ecuador, Dr. Jamil Mahuad, Wall Street Journal Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Rebecca Blumenstein, McKinsey’s New York Office Director, Ramesh Srinivasen, and moderator Lavoie: “Centered Leadership has taught me how to connect to incredible individuals, and I have grown in leaps and bounds because of them.”

Leading from the Center
While Lavoie acknowledged that all three speakers were interviewed for their ability to inspire and to energize, she highlighted President Mahuad in particular for finding a new purpose to his life when confronted with what seemed a nearly insurmountable challenge. “I was always touched by the deep sense of meaning you have in your life,” she noted, “And how you say that your purpose now is to alleviate human suffering—which is a big, bold statement.”

President Mahuad, who survived a brain hemorrhage during his presidential run in 1997, was left for days unable to move or interact with anything beyond his own thoughts. “After not having one second for myself,” he said, “suddenly I was paralyzed on my left side with twenty-four hours of time to myself and I couldn’t do anything but be with me. And I discovered that I didn’t like my company. And I thought: if I don’t want to be with me, then why would others?”

The answer, for President Mahuad, lay in setting aside the question of ‘why?’ and asking instead ‘what for?’ “I wouldn’t be able to have this conversation today without that stroke: it invited me to discover my human side and to be able to express it to others.”

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Voice of Experience: Elinor Hoover, Co-Head, Financial Strategy and Solutions Group and Vice Chairman of Capital Markets Origination, Citi

Elinor-L.-HooverWelcome to The Glass Hammer’s Celebration of Asian Heritage Month! All month long we will be profiling successful women here in the US who have Asian heritage as well as spotlighting some amazing women in Asia and discussing what it means to work there.

According to Elinor Hoover, Co-Head, Financial Strategy and Solutions Group and Vice Chairman of Capital Markets Origination at Citi, it is important to maintain contacts, nurture relationships, and build networks from the moment you begin your professional career.

“When you are starting out in your career, you might be so focused on building up your technical skills that you fail to recognize the value of establishing relationships that can serve as key factors in your career development and advancement,” she added.

“This networking extends beyond your colleagues and communities,” said Hoover. “You need to think about networking on a global level and understand how this is a component of driving business forward.”

Career in Banking

Hoover entered the financial services industry in the late eighties with an academic background in music, biophysics, and biochemistry. “I was not your typical business, economics or finance major, but I decided to go into investment banking,” said Hoover. “After working for a couple of years in the healthcare investment banking area at Credit Suisse First Boston, I accepted a position at The Blackstone Group, which was focused on M&A.”

When Hoover joined Blackstone, it was building its private equity business. At the same time, cross-border activity between Asia and the United States was really heating up. “I was interested in this opportunity by virtue of my heritage to spend some time in the Asia region,” explained Hoover, who went on to perform M&A advisory work with Blackstone in Tokyo for two years.

After she returned from her international assignment, Hoover earned her MBA from Harvard Business School and continued to follow her passion for banking in her next role within the Derivatives Products Group at Morgan Stanley. “I had investment banking experience, but I was not as familiar with the sales and trading aspect. Since my background was in mathematical based work, I decided that a structured products group would be a good fit,” said Hoover.

During this time, there was a strong interest in reorganizing the derivatives business and starting an effort around corporate clients, according to Hoover, who was selected to help launch that effort based on her previous experiences in corporate finance and derivatives. “I helped grow the business domestically in North America, and then globally,” Hoover noted.

In the early 2000s, Morgan Stanley launched another effort to integrate the derivatives business with the cash businesses. “Once this effort was underway, I was in charge of Fixed Income Capital Markets, and later became the Vice Chair of Capital Markets, where the goal was to integrate derivatives, equity, and debt in order to create a much more suitable offering to our clients,” Hoover said. This experience sparked her interest and passion for developing holistic product offerings, something she carried over to her current role at Citi.

A few years ago, Hoover began to look at Citi and recognized the company’s strength in capital markets, and its relationship management process, which was being implemented to elevate its client franchise. “After nearly 20 years at Morgan Stanley, I decided to join Citi,” said Hoover. “I saw this as a tremendous opportunity to join a firm with an established capital base and global reach.”

Serving Clients with Innovative Solutions

Hoover views her current role at Citi as a culmination of her past professional experiences. “The effort is to be cutting-edge and innovative on corporate finance and risk management topics, and as a result offer holistic solutions to clients around important thematic issues,” explained Hoover.

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Millennials at Work: Rocking the Boat or Raising the Bar?

iStock_000021233733XSmallBy Michelle Hendelman

Millennials –the generation famously deemed by the New York Times as the “Go-Nowhere Generation” –are expected to make up 50 percent of the US workforce by 2020, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Aside from a shift in office demographics, what exactly does this influx of Millennials mean for business dynamics, company cultures, and organizational infrastructures?

According to Deloitte’s annual Millennial (Gen Y) survey, this generation is passionate, eager, and ambitious. However, the survey also revealed that half of the respondents don’t feel like they receive enough professional development at work, and the majority (roughly 70 percent) of them see themselves leaving the corporate world at some point in favor of working independently.

There is no question that Gen Y employees bring a different mind-set to the workplace, but what everyone is still trying to figure out is whether or not millennial attitudes are a welcome change or an unwanted burden. Either way, millennials represent the pipeline of future leaders. This means that companies are starting to adjust their practices and policies to adapt to millennials’ demands and expectations.

For example, just last year Goldman Sachs started encouraging junior bankers to take weekends off in an effort to reduce the demands on entry-level employees. While this move negates the traditional idea of junior bankers putting in long hours that almost always include late nights and weekends, it does respond directly to the fact that millennials –of both genders – actually place a high premium on work-life balance.

Does catering to this generation make millennials entitled and lazy –as some suggest –or is it simply a case of companies making a concerted effort to retain young talent before losing them to major competitors or a fledging startup?

What Millennials Want
Deloitte’s Millennial survey of 7,800 individuals in 26 countries is one of the most recent iterations of research dedicated to revealing millennial ideals in order to provide managers with insights and tools for successfully attracting, developing and retaining up and coming Gen Y talent.

According to Deloitte, millennials want to make a difference, and they believe that businesses can positively impact society. However, the report states, “Millennials see a large gap between the potential of business to address the challenges facing society and the actual impact it is having.” This suggests that millennials have a more holistic view of success, appreciating the value of making a difference through their work in addition to ensuring their own financial health.

They also are drawn to organizations that foster innovation, but feel as though traditional business processes are not designed to promote creative thinking and outside-the-box solutions. “They believe the biggest barriers of innovation were management attitude (63 percent), operational structures and procedures (61 percent), and employee skills, attitudes, and diversity (39 percent),” according to Deloitte.

Finally, millennials crave engagement at work in the form of manager feedback, collaboration with their colleagues, and professional development. A recent report published by Network for Good indicated that engaged employees are happier and more productive. While this theory likely transcends generational differences, millennials appear to value engagement much more than their predecessors. According to Network for Good, “If Millennials feel consistently appreciated, engaged, and heard, they feel valued and become happier, more productive, and stimulated.”

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Asian-American Women and the Bamboo Ceiling

iStock_000003482002XSmallBy Kayla Turo

In celebration of Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month, we took a look at how we can increase the number of Asian-American women in top jobs in the Fortune 500 and financial services firms.

You probably already know Indra Nooyi, CEO of PepsiCo, and Andrea Jung (former CEO of Avon), President, CEO and a director of Grameen America.

Perhaps you may even know some of the prominent Asian women working in Asian markets who rank highly in global business, but where is the next generation of Asian-American female leaders and what does their path to the top look like?

Status Update: where are we in middle, senior and board seats?
According to Catalyst, Asian women represented 4,037,000 people in the US labor force in 2012. This is an increase of over 1 million women in just two years. Moreover, of these over-4 million Asian women in 2012’s US labor force, approximately 46 percent held management and other professional positions (making up 3.4 percent of all management and business professionals).

However, of all Executive director positions available within Fortune 500 companies, Asian-American women only comprised of 3.3% as of 2013. Board representation are harder numbers to distill since reporting is sparse and grouped in a binary way- women white and women of color, which Catalyst reports as 3.2% of Board seats in the Fortune 500.

What are the obstacles?
According to Jane Hyun, Fortune 500 coach and author of Breaking the Bamboo Ceiling, Asian-American women can experience a “double-bind” that results from being both Asian and a woman.

Hyun believes, however, that Asian-American female professionals can effectively leverage their identities to create a win-win situation for them and the organizations they work for.

Hyun commented, “Asian women have cultural capabilities that organizations cannot afford to ignore, such as language, cultural know-how, and relationship building skills that must be leveraged effectively.”

Interestingly, according to the key findings from the Center for Talent Innovation’s 2011 study, “Asians in America: Unleashing the Potential of the ‘Model Minority’,” Asians are more ambitious than other groups and they struggled more than any other cultural group with the idea of “being themselves” at work.

Western Society vs. Eastern Values: Worlds Collide
“If you grow up in a traditional Asian home, you may get messages about how a ‘good daughter’ needs to behave that may be at odds with the corporate workplace,” explained Hyun. She continued, “Asian values include deference to authority, humility, hard work, harmony, and sacrificing for the future.”

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Movers and Shakers: May Tong, Vice President, Portfolio Management, Multi-Asset Strategies and Solutions, Voya Investment Management (formerly known as ING U.S. Investment Management)

women salesWelcome to The Glass Hammer’s Celebration of Asian Heritage Month! All month long we will be profiling successful women here in the US who have Asian heritage as well as spotlighting some amazing women in Asia and discussing what it means to work there.

“Seek broad experiences,” advised May Tong. “Use these experiences to establish what your passions are and which path you want to take in your career. Then, go for it full steam ahead,” added Tong.

Capitalizing on Career Opportunities

Tong graduated from Boston College where she studied Accounting and Finance. Upon graduating, she accepted a position in the Quantitative Advisors group at Merrill Lynch Investment Management, where she would be responsible for managing index funds and enhanced index funds. “This was such a valuable experience for me, both professionally and personally,” said Tong, “because I learned every detail about how to manage a fund and I was fortunate enough to work with really great managers who ultimately became mentors to me in my career.”

Three months prior to the Merrill Lynch and BlackRock merger, one of Tong’s most influential managers at Merrill had moved on to Voya Investment Management to start up the Quant Portfolio Management team and brought her aboard to join his team shortly after. “He took me under his wing, guided me, and gave me the autonomy to help him build out the quantitative portfolio management group,” said Tong.

The financial crisis of 2008 resulted in some internal restructuring at Voya Investment Management, which ultimately opened more doors for Tong and led to career-changing opportunities. “I was forced to think about my future career path and the direction I wanted to take,” Tong noted. “This made me realize that while having skill and expertise in one particular area is a good thing, I wanted to gain a broader perspective of the industry.”

At this juncture, Tong decided to earn her Executive MBA from Columbia and was sponsored by Voya Investment Management. “It helped me grow and increased my value to my company,” remarked Tong.

In 2010, an opportunity presented itself within the Multi Asset Strategies & Solutions (MASS) group and Tong took advantage of the chance to expand her depth and breadth by managing asset classes as opposed to funds. “It was a steep learning curve, but also an incredible learning opportunity, “said Tong, “and now I have been working with the MASS team for almost three years.”

According to Tong, her ability to make this career move, and thrive in a different environment, was made possible by the strong leadership and support she experienced from her managers. “I cannot express enough how valuable it is to have good managers who give you the space and support to grow professionally,” stated Tong.

She also credits her success to the fact that she stepped outside her comfort zone and took her career in a different direction. “There are days I miss the black and white aspect of fund management, but I love the fast-paced and dynamic environment of the multi asset strategy team,” explained Tong.

Maintaining Equilibrium

According to Tong, maintaining a healthy balance between personal and professional endeavors throughout her career is something that she is proud of. “Finding that happy medium is certainly different for everyone,” said Tong, “but I have found what works for me and in turn I find that I am extremely satisfied in both my work and home life.”

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