1. Please tell us about your involvement with the UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School?

I have had the privilege of being a member of the Dean’s Advisory Board for ten years. During that time, the Smurfit School has grown in global ranking, reputation and student diversity. The Smurfit School has strengthened its relationships with Global Companies through the Dean’s Advisory Board and its Executive Education programmes. BNY Mellon has significant European business including a large presence in Ireland. For this reason BNY Mellon maintains close relationships with Smurfit and other top tier Irish and European Universities.

2. Please tell us about BNY Mellon?

BNY Mellon was founded in 1784 by Alexander Hamilton, U.S. Treasury Secretary and today is the Global Investments Company to the World dedicated to helping institutions, corporations, and individuals manage and service assets. We are involved in two business lines, Investment Servicing and Investment/Wealth Management. Our client base is global and includes Banks, Broker Dealers & Investment Advisors, Corporations & Governments, Insurance Companies, Investment Managers and Alternative Asset Managers. We have offices in 34 countries including Ireland.

3. What is BNY Mellon’s Thought Leadership strategy?

BNY Mellon is a client centric organization focused on five strategic client segments. We are known in the Financial Services industry as a thought leader. We seek to provide our clients with strategic insight in our areas of strength and expertise. Recent thought leadership papers include “The Future of Wholesale Funding”; “Collateral Solutions for Changing Markets”; “Mastering Flows, Strengthening Markets”; “Capital Market Technology: Needed for Today’s Surviving and Tomorrow’s Thriving”; and, more recently, “Return on Equality,” which explores the market potential of advancing gender equality. In short, thought leadership is an investment on behalf of our clients and a key differentiator for our firm.

4. BNY Mellon hosted four UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School Alumni thought leadership events, New York, London, Dublin & Hong Kong for the Alumni. What did you discuss at these events?

The Smurfit School and BNY Mellon partnered on a number Thought Leadership Events the past year. These breakfast events gave us the opportunity to meet Smurfit alumni globally. Given the significant number of alumni involved in fintech, banking, finance and investment management we discussed new ideas and trends in financial services and technology.

The events largely involved a presentation of one of our thought leadership papers followed by a roundtable discussion. The Smurfit alumni were engaged around strategic insights and thought leadership with BNY senior executives. We generally received positive feedback and a global perspective. Many of the alumni felt they could use the research in their careers in banking and investment management. An example was the initial margin segregation rules affecting the over-the-counter derivatives market discussed in our paper Collateral Solutions for Changing Markets.

5. What are some of your observations from these events?

My overall impressions were very positive.

The Smurfit School alumni are clearly engaged in the various cultures and global cities in which they live and work. In short, they are global executives. Their chosen careers varied from banking, investment management, sovereign wealth, financial technology, management consulting, regulatory and insurance. Interestingly, many of the companies these executives work for are BNY Mellon institutional clients or partners and they are focused on many of the issues we discussed in our thought leadership papers.

6. What is your view on the importance of academic institutions’ close alignment with business?

BNY Mellon values its relationships with academic institutions around the world. I believe that it is important to stay close to emerging talent, new trends and ideas in financial services. UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School engages with business leaders around the world as does BNY Mellon. Great companies want to be close to emerging talent, ideas and thought leadership.

7. What is new and exciting at BNY Mellon?

BNY Mellon’s global innovation centers are creating exciting opportunities for collaboration with clients. These centers empower our employees to think and work in new ways. The centers (which include London, New York, Silicon Valley, Pittsburgh & Sinagpore) focus on emerging technologies, big data, digital and allowing collaboration with fintechs and clients that operate within BNY Mellon’s digital ecosystem – NEXEN.

We are invested in innovation, client collaboration and talent development across our entire company. It is an exciting time to be working in financial services.

8. What career advice would you give our graduating class of 2017 in the current global economic climate?

Whether students plan to work for global companies in biotech, pharma or financial services or in the fintech labs of Silicon Valley, Berlin or Dublin I would encourage graduates to follow their passion and to remain flexible and positive. Technology is changing everything.

July 2017