Speaker 1: This is Mesters in Business with Very Results on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 1: This week on the podcast, I have another special guest.
Speaker 1: His name is Marcus Shaw. He has really a fascinating
Speaker 1: UM career and a focus these days. He really began
Speaker 1: as a traditional engineer slash finance person, working at IBM
Speaker 1: as a network engineer before he got his m b
Speaker 1: a at Duke and from there did the usual research
Speaker 1: and investment banking gigs throughout a lot of Wall Street
Speaker 1: before the opportunity came to help entrepreneurs develop and grow
Speaker 1: their businesses in places like Alabama and Tennessee, which ultimately
Speaker 1: led him uh to participate in the founding of of
Speaker 1: a new firm called Old Finance, which was created by
Speaker 1: really a group of um for lack of a better word,
Speaker 1: of finance royalty. It's Howard Marks of oak Tree Capital.
Speaker 1: It's Tony Wrestler of Aries, Mark Rowan of Apollo Global.
Speaker 1: These three gentlemen said, we're lacking the ability to tap
Speaker 1: into a very rich, diverse talent pool, including historically black
Speaker 1: colleges and universities, venture capital, private equity. Just we're not
Speaker 1: recruiting from those spaces, and so they stood up a
Speaker 1: firm called Old Finance, whose main purpose was to help
Speaker 1: alternative asset managers tap into that rich pool of potential
Speaker 1: hires UH. Marcus shaw works with them, and he's the
Speaker 1: CEO of Ald Finance. I found this to be really
Speaker 1: a fascinating conversation about how to access the most skilled
Speaker 1: UH partners and and employees, what can be done to
Speaker 1: shake up a relatively stayed industry that has lagged behind
Speaker 1: its peers in terms of recruiting and other things, and
Speaker 1: and really how to help have a major impact UH
Speaker 1: in the world's of finance. And I found this conversation
Speaker 1: to be fascinating and I think you will also, so,
Speaker 1: with no further ado, my interview with Marcus shaw Berry.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for inviting me. I'm excited to
Speaker 1: chat with you. So let's talk a little bit about
Speaker 1: Wall Street and diversity. Wall Street has been pretty bad
Speaker 1: at recruiting black talent. It's been a stated objective for decades.
Speaker 1: Why is finance so bad at this? Barry? I think
Speaker 1: there it's a complex question, UM that requires actually a
Speaker 1: complex solution and a multifacet solution. I would say the
Speaker 1: most general issue here is that folks don't have the
Speaker 1: networks and the access to careers in finance from across
Speaker 1: the country. Right, So, if you grow up in New York, yeah,
Speaker 1: you'll probably know some people that worked in the industry,
Speaker 1: and you may have some relationships, you may go to
Speaker 1: school with somebody, your parent may work there. And that's
Speaker 1: whether you're white or black, all right. Um. But if
Speaker 1: you don't, if you grow up in a market where
Speaker 1: there's not an investment bank, there's nothing other than a
Speaker 1: branch bank for one of the multidimensional financials, then you're
Speaker 1: not really going to have an understanding of what that
Speaker 1: career looks like at a young age. And so as
Speaker 1: you get ready to go to college and you start
Speaker 1: thinking about what your career good look like, it's gonna
Speaker 1: be primarily academic for you. Um. And so I think
Speaker 1: that's always a challenge that they're not a ton of people.
Speaker 1: They're in the seats they're getting access to, in this case,
Speaker 1: black students from across the country. They're giving them a
Speaker 1: look at this is what a career could look like
Speaker 1: for you, This is what an opportunity could look like
Speaker 1: for you. Here's what the real with possibilities is. And
Speaker 1: this primarily is how you get there. Here's a path
Speaker 1: to get there. Um, that's the biggest challenge. So, so
Speaker 1: tell us about all Finance, what is its mission and
Speaker 1: why is this a better masse trap than the way
Speaker 1: things have been done before. So All Finance is focused
Speaker 1: on building diversity in the alternative investment industry. Alternatives being
Speaker 1: venture capital, private equity, anything else, private credit, real estate investing,
Speaker 1: hedge funds, um everything kind of outside of traditional stock
Speaker 1: and bond investment. Right the things that are more private
Speaker 1: market driven often and so our goal is increased diversity
Speaker 1: in that space by working with partnerships at historically black
Speaker 1: colleges and universities, by providing students from HBCUs opportunities to
Speaker 1: have co curricular programming understanding you know exactly what you
Speaker 1: need to know to be successful in that role. Also
Speaker 1: to provide mentors ship for students so that they're not
Speaker 1: operating in a vacuum, so that when they have questions
Speaker 1: there are people in the business, people that have experienced
Speaker 1: in the business that they can talk to. And also
Speaker 1: by working and partnering with schools to provide um financial
Speaker 1: support to help increase capacity not only for students, but
Speaker 1: also for the institutions themselves. So let's talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about how old Finance was initially funded and created.
Speaker 1: You have Howard Marks of oak Tree Capital, Um, Mark
Speaker 1: Rowan of Apollo, Tony Wrestler of of Aries. These are
Speaker 1: like three heavy hitters at giant legendary firms. That's a
Speaker 1: heavy group to to work with. What led them to say,
Speaker 1: we need help accessing black talent and we're not getting
Speaker 1: it from anywhere else, we have to do it ourselves.
Speaker 1: What I think all three gentlemen, and you know Howard,
Speaker 1: Mark and Tony all recognized is that relationships help drive value,
Speaker 1: and so you've got to have relationships with the schools
Speaker 1: and the places where there is a lot of black talent.
Speaker 1: And I think they saw HBC used as an opportunity
Speaker 1: for that. I think what's important, though, and what's key,
Speaker 1: is that we found ourselves at a very interesting point
Speaker 1: in time in the wake of George Floyd, in the
Speaker 1: middle of COVID, and so I think everybody around the world,
Speaker 1: business leaders from across multiple industries, we're trying to think
Speaker 1: about how can we make the world a better place,
Speaker 1: How can we address um racial equity in a way
Speaker 1: that's specific to the businesses that we operate in and
Speaker 1: I think that's the key, right. This was not just
Speaker 1: about you know, going out and being philanthropic, right and
Speaker 1: making one time gifts. This was about how can you
Speaker 1: be UM strategic in building partnerships over the long term
Speaker 1: they're going to have a systemic impact in the industry
Speaker 1: in which you operate. And that's where I really think
Speaker 1: that that the three firms led by again Howard Tonian
Speaker 1: Mark really found something that was special and something that was,
Speaker 1: you know, a better solution to a question that Wall
Speaker 1: Street has been dealing with for years. So so is
Speaker 1: it safe to say that Wall Street in general, but
Speaker 1: alternatives like private equity and venture capital, we're not recruiting
Speaker 1: at historically black colleges and universities. Was that void out
Speaker 1: there forever? I think that it was not systemic, right,
Speaker 1: There was no systemic recruiting UM at HBCUs in a
Speaker 1: way that was going to be sustainable, right, And I
Speaker 1: think that a lot of that was driven by needing
Speaker 1: to take some time and figure out how do we
Speaker 1: engage with these universities. We know we've got talent there,
Speaker 1: We've got density of talent, which is the important thing UM,
Speaker 1: And so I think giving us time to reflect on
Speaker 1: what had happened over the past few years. Was a
Speaker 1: really strong case for let's go let's be direct and intentional.
Speaker 1: Let's work with presidents at these universities, Let's work with
Speaker 1: the deans, Let's work with the students to develop a
Speaker 1: strategy together that's going to rise the tide for everybody.
Speaker 1: So I want to get into the details of what
Speaker 1: you guys actually do with students. But before I get there,
Speaker 1: you mentioned Tony, Howard and Mark what led them to say, Hey,
Speaker 1: let's stand up some entity so we can set up
Speaker 1: an institution to correct, uh, just a recruiting shortfall we've
Speaker 1: had for years and years Like that's an unusual group
Speaker 1: of guys to get together and say, let's see if
Speaker 1: we can dent the universe a little bit. Yeah. Um, So,
Speaker 1: I think there are two factors, number one, and I
Speaker 1: think they both reflect strong leadership at the Firm's Number one,
Speaker 1: you had, you know, somewhat of a ground swell from
Speaker 1: within the firm, certainly a leadership that said we need
Speaker 1: to figure out a way to do something. And I think,
Speaker 1: as great leaders do, I think Howard and Tony and
Speaker 1: Mark were receptive to that and Also it was perfect
Speaker 1: timing because they were thinking, how can we drive impact?
Speaker 1: How can we uh impact and effect change in our
Speaker 1: own way. And so it starts off with senior leaders
Speaker 1: at the firm, and you know, these heads of industry
Speaker 1: working together to figure out what can we do. Then
Speaker 1: you bring the relationships together. So Howard and Marcantoni have
Speaker 1: known each other, but also many of their senior leaders
Speaker 1: have known each other as well. And so the main
Speaker 1: thing that you have to do is say, we want
Speaker 1: to take down any competitive barriers in which we operate
Speaker 1: during our standard business, and we recognize that what we're
Speaker 1: trying to solve for is bigger than our individual company.
Speaker 1: It's really about the industry. And if you can get
Speaker 1: to that point, which they did very quickly, I mind you,
Speaker 1: then you can instantly start to put together something as
Speaker 1: powerful as all Finance. And that happened, um, And it
Speaker 1: happened fairly quickly, but I think it took a lot
Speaker 1: of time and a lot of vulnerability and a lot
Speaker 1: of transparency UM. And I think that's really symbolic of
Speaker 1: of what all Finance represents. So now let's drill down
Speaker 1: a little bit and talk about what you exactly do
Speaker 1: with students. Do you guys provide coaching or mentorship? What
Speaker 1: do you do to help kids who probably aren't all
Speaker 1: that familiar with what private credit is and put them
Speaker 1: on a career path into alternative investments. So there's a
Speaker 1: framework that I use. I use it with entrepreneurs, I
Speaker 1: use it with with talent anywhere I see it. First,
Speaker 1: you identify really good talent, right, kids that have an
Speaker 1: interest in investing, although they may not know the nuance
Speaker 1: of what investing asset class that they're most interested in,
Speaker 1: or you know, they're young. They may not have the
Speaker 1: experience of understanding multicycles in the market, but they haven't
Speaker 1: interest in investing. They have academic strength, right, some some
Speaker 1: real intellectual rigor and horsepower. And so you look at
Speaker 1: kids that perform well no matter what they do. I'm
Speaker 1: you know, the kid could be a philosophy major, that
Speaker 1: could be a finance major, but are they doing well
Speaker 1: in the pursuit that they're following um And then we
Speaker 1: look for for students that are coachable, right, Coachable. Coachable
Speaker 1: is key. It's an apprentice model business. You know, there's
Speaker 1: nobody that comes into this business and comes in right
Speaker 1: out of college. As a partner. Even if they've got
Speaker 1: all the resources in the world, nobody's going to come
Speaker 1: in as a partner. By and large, most people start
Speaker 1: this business as an analyst and they work with associates,
Speaker 1: and those associates work with vps and principles and managing
Speaker 1: directors and so forth. So you need people that are
Speaker 1: gonna be willing to work through the apprenticeship model, that
Speaker 1: are willing to come in, you know, well compensated, a
Speaker 1: great network of people that they're going to be around,
Speaker 1: but they're still gonna have to listen and be coached
Speaker 1: up um in order to benefit the team and the company.
Speaker 1: And so we look for those things. People that have
Speaker 1: an interest in vesting, people that have intellectual horsepower, and
Speaker 1: people that are coachable. That's that's really intriguing. So it's
Speaker 1: not so much specific qualifications that are needed as qualities
Speaker 1: that will allow the students you select to succeed going forward. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think, by and large, I mean I would say
Speaker 1: that those qualities, you know, we recognize them through qualifications, right,
Speaker 1: So I look for people who have strong g p
Speaker 1: a s and people they're taking some rigorous coursework, even
Speaker 1: if that courseworks not in finance. I look for people
Speaker 1: that have done extracurricular work or you know, manage their
Speaker 1: own little portfolio, or have stock ideas or business ideas
Speaker 1: that they want to pitch. And then I look for
Speaker 1: people who also have references that say, you know what,
Speaker 1: this young man, this young woman has been really coachable
Speaker 1: in the time that I've had them in school. So,
Speaker 1: generally speaking, alternative assets, that's a tough gig to get into,
Speaker 1: regardless of where you go to school. Private equity, venture capital,
Speaker 1: hedge funds, real estate, down the whole list, not not easy.
Speaker 1: How much harder is it to get into that space
Speaker 1: if you're coming from an HBCU. I think it can
Speaker 1: be difficult um and and not because of anything that's
Speaker 1: attributed to the student themselves. I think it can be
Speaker 1: difficult because no matter where you're coming from, you need
Speaker 1: to know somebody to get into this business. And so
Speaker 1: the first key is how can you create networks that
Speaker 1: allow HBCU students to have mentors, to have advocates that
Speaker 1: are in the industry that learn and know them well,
Speaker 1: know their strengths, know their weaknesses, no you know their
Speaker 1: ambition and their aspirations, and can speak to that and
Speaker 1: help guide them to certain careers inside of alternatives where
Speaker 1: they can be successful. Really intriguing. Let's talk a little
Speaker 1: bit about some of the work you've done. UH start
Speaker 1: with CEO of the Company Lab. What what was COLLABS
Speaker 1: mission and why Tennessee. My wife and I decided to
Speaker 1: move to Tennessee back in two thousand and sixteen. She
Speaker 1: joined a practice down there, and we had family in Tennessee,
Speaker 1: and it was really a unique opportunity to to move around.
Speaker 1: We've moved around a bunch and and have enjoyed all
Speaker 1: the different places that we lived in the country. Chattanooga
Speaker 1: is a fascinating city UM really steeped in some rich history,
Speaker 1: but also a city that faces some challenges as they
Speaker 1: grow UM from a very small city to a more
Speaker 1: significant city in the U. S economy. UM I. When
Speaker 1: I moved down there, I was still working with MLT
Speaker 1: and then an opportunity came up to take a pretty
Speaker 1: significant role within the community UM as the CEO of
Speaker 1: the Company Lab. The Company Lab was the entrepreneurship and
Speaker 1: Economic Development Center UM before Chattanooga and the surrounding areas
Speaker 1: which include North Georgia, North Alabama, and Southeast Tennessee. It
Speaker 1: was incredible to really focus on local opportunities for entrepreneurs,
Speaker 1: for investors, for economic development, and really see how the
Speaker 1: fabric of a city, UH with you know about a
Speaker 1: couple of hundred thousand people can develop when you have
Speaker 1: people that are really dedicated to fostering that growth. It
Speaker 1: was just like a private public partnership. Tell us a
Speaker 1: little bit about the structure of that. It was a
Speaker 1: private public partnership UM. It was set up as a
Speaker 1: nonprofit that had funding coming some funding coming from the States,
Speaker 1: some funding coming from foundations UM, and then some funding
Speaker 1: coming from corporate entities that also found economic development in
Speaker 1: the region very important. What what some of the economic
Speaker 1: UM sectors within within that area? What is Chattanooga known for? So,
Speaker 1: Chattanooga is known for a couple of things, right, key brands.
Speaker 1: Number one, Coca Cola Bottling is the the UM company
Speaker 1: that really helped to jump start the city. And so
Speaker 1: Jack Lupton was kind of the patriarch of of that
Speaker 1: company UM and sold that company back to Coca Cola
Speaker 1: in the mid nineties. They were two separate companies at
Speaker 1: the So the yes, there were a number of bottling
Speaker 1: UM companies that would bottle Coca Cola product and distributed
Speaker 1: it throughout the country or throughout the region, and UM
Speaker 1: the one in Chattanooga, Coca Cola Bottling was one of
Speaker 1: the larger ones UM in the mid century. Again, it
Speaker 1: was sold back to Coca Cola as they consolidated those
Speaker 1: businesses UM and left a pretty strong economic footprint in Chattanooga. UM.
Speaker 1: Chattanooga was also the home of Moonpie and Little Devi right,
Speaker 1: and a number of consumer products that are very familiar
Speaker 1: brands that we know about but did not know that
Speaker 1: they were from Chattanooga UM. And so what I saw
Speaker 1: in Chattanooga was a rich history around entrepreneurship that necessarily
Speaker 1: hadn't found its way into the modern day. Right. We
Speaker 1: didn't see a lot of great companies coming out of
Speaker 1: Chattanooga in the late nineties during the tech bubble and
Speaker 1: and and so forth. So what did you accomplish when
Speaker 1: you were there? Do you feel like you move the
Speaker 1: needle little, Well, we moved the needle tremendously. UM. You know,
Speaker 1: there were some companies that were there when I took
Speaker 1: the seat, companies like Bellhop that's a tremendous company UM
Speaker 1: and kind of operates in the uber of moving right,
Speaker 1: so you a fantastic moving company and a fantastic culture.
Speaker 1: UM there was a company, Freight Waves that has done
Speaker 1: fantastic work. People kind of equated to the Bloomberg of trucking. UM.
Speaker 1: And so they've got a freight way Freight Waves, freight
Speaker 1: Waves Freight with W. A. V. E. S Um and
Speaker 1: Craig Fuller, who's the founder and CEO. Down there's a
Speaker 1: good friend but also a really strong business person who's
Speaker 1: done some great work. We brought Steve Case and Rise
Speaker 1: to the rest of Chattanooga and UM Freight Waves was
Speaker 1: actually the investment that they made in Chattanooga and has
Speaker 1: done great work. The company has grown, They've employed hundreds
Speaker 1: of people at meaningful salaries. And that's what it takes
Speaker 1: to move the needle in a place like Chattanooga. And
Speaker 1: there are hundreds of cities like that around the child.
Speaker 1: So how do you go from Tennessee to Alabama and
Speaker 1: Montgomery Tech last, So, as I was leaving Collab in Tennessee,
Speaker 1: I saw what was going on in Montgomery, and I
Speaker 1: saw that Montgomery had great leadership. The mayor down there,
Speaker 1: Stephen Reid, has done a fantastic job in Montgomery. I
Speaker 1: also saw that they had some really unique assets. They've
Speaker 1: got UM, a fantastic Air Force installation down there, They've
Speaker 1: got the state capital there in Montgomery, that got a
Speaker 1: really diverse population. And so what I really did was
Speaker 1: take the thesis that we were working with in Chattanooga
Speaker 1: and adjusted so that it applied to Montgomery. UM. And
Speaker 1: so in a couple of years down there, we've been
Speaker 1: able to bring some really incredible companies to Montgomery to
Speaker 1: see the type of value that they have there. But
Speaker 1: we've also, in this most recent cohort UM and the
Speaker 1: team down there's an incredible job helped grow companies that
Speaker 1: are there in Montgomery, focusing on tech solutions and tech
Speaker 1: services to help them expand and recognize assets even outside
Speaker 1: of the region. So you mentioned tech. I tend to
Speaker 1: think of the West Coast as the you know, the
Speaker 1: center of tech in the US. The northeast is the
Speaker 1: center of finance. The southeast. How should we think about
Speaker 1: that in terms of the business sectors that they should
Speaker 1: be known for. So I think there are a couple
Speaker 1: of things. UM Number one, manufacturing has been strong in
Speaker 1: the Southeast for a number of years, a lot of
Speaker 1: car companies read a lot of car companies UM. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of pro business environment UM for companies with
Speaker 1: with big labor forces in the Southeast, you're able to
Speaker 1: operate UM at a more efficient standard of living in
Speaker 1: terms of cost, and so you see a lot of
Speaker 1: car manufacturers operating down there. Also transportation and logistics, Chattanooga
Speaker 1: UM was probably one of the biggest hubs for transportation
Speaker 1: logistics in the country. Anything that's coming through the Southeast
Speaker 1: via truck is coming through either one or seventy five
Speaker 1: or twenty four. All of that comes through Chattanooga, and
Speaker 1: so that was something that we saw. You've got companies
Speaker 1: like US Express and Covenant that operate in chatted and
Speaker 1: FedEx or UPS have a big logistics center. So FedEx
Speaker 1: is out in Memphis, in Memphis, CNSE so on the
Speaker 1: other side of the state. But those trucks, again will
Speaker 1: all come through through Chattanooga. And so when you think
Speaker 1: about you know the South, thing you think about industries
Speaker 1: that are moving UM, it continues to be manufacturing and logistics. Also,
Speaker 1: healthcare is really popping up. Nashville in Atlanta are two
Speaker 1: very large health care hubs. UM. Some of that is
Speaker 1: due unfortunately to demand right where you have health outcomes
Speaker 1: that are probably a little more severe UM and some
Speaker 1: of the southeastern states in the United States, and so
Speaker 1: you need strong healthcare to meet the needs of the population.
Speaker 1: It's interesting we're talking about different parts of the country. UM.
Speaker 1: A lot of the bigger firms want to see the
Speaker 1: end of remote work or hybrid work. But I would
Speaker 1: imagine that that creates opportunity ease for parts of the
Speaker 1: country like Chattanooga and Nashville and Montgomery, where there are
Speaker 1: a lot of big companies that may not be located there,
Speaker 1: but they want to tap the pool of talent that's there.
Speaker 1: So we've seen that, and in talking with leaders in
Speaker 1: in a number of cities UM throughout the South and
Speaker 1: and even throughout other areas in the middle of the
Speaker 1: country UM that have not tremendous not traditionally had the
Speaker 1: type of talent there or the draw to those cities. UM.
Speaker 1: You definitely saw a surge of people, I would say
Speaker 1: during the COVID period that we're moving to cities where
Speaker 1: there was a lower cost of living but a strong
Speaker 1: quality of living and they could work remote. And so
Speaker 1: I think there's been a benefit to those cities UM,
Speaker 1: and that you're getting people that are moving. You know,
Speaker 1: Nashville had a ton of people that were moving to Nashville,
Speaker 1: primarily from California, UM, and that really strengthened the work
Speaker 1: or the labor force in Nashville. What you do see
Speaker 1: on the other side of the coin, though, is that
Speaker 1: for companies that are there locally, it can be a
Speaker 1: detriment because you have people that are there in the
Speaker 1: city and may take jobs outside of the region instead
Speaker 1: of taking jobs there in the region. And so there's
Speaker 1: a delicate balance right to the impact UM, particularly for
Speaker 1: small to mid size markets where you have a labor
Speaker 1: force that's needed in the market that's finding opportunities outside
Speaker 1: of the market, even if they continue to live. Let's
Speaker 1: spend a little time going over some of your history.
Speaker 1: Your your families from Mississippi. But you grew up a
Speaker 1: little bit of a military Brad tell us tell us
Speaker 1: about those experiences. Yes, so, my my dad's actually from Mississippi.
Speaker 1: My mom was from North Carolina. My dad was a
Speaker 1: naval officer who retired shortly before I was born. So
Speaker 1: I spent most of my time growing up in Maryland,
Speaker 1: right outside of d C. So you didn't do the
Speaker 1: whole army. Brad didn't do that. But I did hang
Speaker 1: out on military basis a lot. So all my friends
Speaker 1: would change every three years when the PCs. Right, So
Speaker 1: I had kind of the ob sit side of the travel,
Speaker 1: which is being the friend that was always left behind. Right.
Speaker 1: That's that's really Uh, that's really intriguing. What what did
Speaker 1: your dad, dad retire from doing? What was his So
Speaker 1: my dad, my dad had two careers in his life.
Speaker 1: He grew up in Mississippi, his picking cotton believe it
Speaker 1: or not when he was seven years Oldways born in
Speaker 1: nine seven years old. Right, we talked about skipping generations. Um.
Speaker 1: He went into the Navy in nineteen and spent twenty
Speaker 1: seven years in the Navy. He retired and went to
Speaker 1: work at the Library of Congress and Personnel. Was able
Speaker 1: to get his undergrad master's PhD all through the g
Speaker 1: I bill while he was in the navy. Um. But
Speaker 1: I always say my father is a real hero of
Speaker 1: mine because he truly did skip three generations in one lifetime. Um,
Speaker 1: that's really impressive. Was was mom working? Was she mother?
Speaker 1: My mother was a fifty year school teacher and uh,
Speaker 1: public school in d C for fifty years, um, and
Speaker 1: really was an inspiration for the way I think about
Speaker 1: learn eLearning and understanding the value of education. So let's
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about education. You went to Sidwell
Speaker 1: Friends School. That that's some rarefied company, isn't it. It's
Speaker 1: some good people that have gone there. Yeah, who did
Speaker 1: you go to school with? Any famous names? Well, Marcus
Speaker 1: Shaw's one, um, But no I had. I had great
Speaker 1: great folks in my class. Bear Tune Day Thurston who
Speaker 1: may have heard of, author um and producer that spent
Speaker 1: time with the Daily Show, John bern Ball who's a
Speaker 1: great actor, Tommy Kale who was the director of Hamilton's
Speaker 1: and and some other big plays. But you know, everybody
Speaker 1: in our class was was phenomenal. Um. Also folks like
Speaker 1: Chelsea Clinton and later the Obama girls went to said well,
Speaker 1: so some rarefied air indeed, But um, a great group
Speaker 1: of students and a great group of friends. So so
Speaker 1: you go from there to get a mathematics degree from
Speaker 1: Morehouse College, then onto Georgia Tech for an electrical engineering
Speaker 1: degree with little football mixed in. Tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about your act ademic career in college. So when
Speaker 1: I went to more House. I was excited. I went
Speaker 1: down there with a few friends. It was a great
Speaker 1: mix to be able to go to a school like
Speaker 1: said well and then go to an hvc U. UM
Speaker 1: as esteemed as more House was. Was really a great
Speaker 1: opportunity for me to have a bunch of different experiences. UM.
Speaker 1: My story around playing football is probably my great interview story.
Speaker 1: I UH was playing cards with a bunch of guys
Speaker 1: right at the beginning of the school year, and UH
Speaker 1: made a bet that I could kick a fifty yard
Speaker 1: field goal. So we go out on the field. We
Speaker 1: jumped the fence, I line up, take about twenty steps
Speaker 1: back kick a field goal from fifty yards. One of
Speaker 1: the coaches comes out and yells at us to get
Speaker 1: off the field with trespassing. UM. As we're leaving, he
Speaker 1: tells me to come out to the walk on tryouts
Speaker 1: at the end of the week. How close did you
Speaker 1: come to a fifty yard field goal? Oh? I knocked
Speaker 1: it down. He made it, man. He he didn't want
Speaker 1: me to come out because I missed it. He wanted
Speaker 1: to come out because I made it. And UM, you know,
Speaker 1: I went on to play four years and more House
Speaker 1: and had some some strong accolades there, But really even
Speaker 1: that experience was about building great friends, um, that I
Speaker 1: played football with, and many of those gentlemen have going
Speaker 1: on to do incredible things as well. What why is
Speaker 1: it not surprising that a math nerd is also a
Speaker 1: place kicker. It seems to be like, um, the field
Speaker 1: goal seems to be one of the most mathematical parts
Speaker 1: of football. Well, it's pure geometry, right, So one point
Speaker 1: three seconds from the snapper to putting the ball down
Speaker 1: and getting the ball off the ground, the angle that
Speaker 1: has got to come up, you know, is is pretty
Speaker 1: significant in terms of your probability of making it. Um.
Speaker 1: So I already I looked at it as an exercise
Speaker 1: in physics, geometry, Um, you know a little bit of
Speaker 1: chemistry depending on on the texture of the football. So
Speaker 1: I thought I was a natural. That's really intriguing. And
Speaker 1: then you go on get your masters at Duke School
Speaker 1: of Business. Uh, what led you in that direction? Given
Speaker 1: the mathematics and electrical engineering undergraduate? So I went to
Speaker 1: IBM after my completing my undergrad degree at Georgia Tech
Speaker 1: and Electrical Engineering and had a great time there, learned
Speaker 1: a lot, but really wanted to understand the way that
Speaker 1: we were selling business right, understanding more about the business
Speaker 1: of IBM and how we thought about the products and
Speaker 1: services that I was delivering as an engineer. UM not
Speaker 1: to mention one of my you know, very good friends
Speaker 1: that played football with me, A more House, was a
Speaker 1: year ahead of me in business school. He said, you're
Speaker 1: pretty smart. You should check out business school. And uh,
Speaker 1: fortunately enough, I had a great school in Duke that
Speaker 1: was right there in Durham. My wife was in med
Speaker 1: school at U n C. And Uh, I didn't have
Speaker 1: to move to go to a great business school, which
Speaker 1: was really refreshing and it was a great experience and
Speaker 1: I learned a lot about business there and kicked off
Speaker 1: a new career from there. You end up going into
Speaker 1: a decade of equity research and investment banking at shops
Speaker 1: like Bank of America, Piedmont others. What led to that
Speaker 1: aspect of finance. So I always tell folks this is
Speaker 1: one of the great turning points in my life. When
Speaker 1: I went to business school, I was pretty confident that
Speaker 1: I was going to come out of business school and
Speaker 1: go back to IBM. I was gonna stay an engineer.
Speaker 1: I wanted to learn more about marketing and you know,
Speaker 1: some operations around technology. There was a point right before
Speaker 1: the start of my first year in business school, so
Speaker 1: this is two thousand three, I had an opportunity to
Speaker 1: go to a camp, two day camp at Goldman that
Speaker 1: was focused on providing insights in investment careers for people
Speaker 1: that did not have an investment background. And they, you know,
Speaker 1: they fly you up your smart kid, put you up
Speaker 1: in a nice hotel. And I met a woman who
Speaker 1: covered enterprise software at Goldman, and she gave me really
Speaker 1: great insight into how I could leverage the industry knowledge
Speaker 1: that I had developed at IBM. And so really it
Speaker 1: was one person on an off conversation, you know, down
Speaker 1: on Broad Street twenty plus years ago that led to
Speaker 1: my career. She said, Equity research is a great ace
Speaker 1: where if you know a lot about the business and
Speaker 1: you learn a lot about finance, you can be impactful,
Speaker 1: You can earn a good living, you can really understand
Speaker 1: the markets and meet great people. As opposed to the opposite,
Speaker 1: which is learning knowing a lot about finance and then
Speaker 1: having to learn a whole industry from the outside. It's
Speaker 1: a very different perspective than starting with the industry knowledge
Speaker 1: from the inside and and that perspective is something that
Speaker 1: I think we've got to learn to embrace more because
Speaker 1: you know, finances challenging, but it's not difficult, right. It
Speaker 1: requires putting in work and getting reps um in order
Speaker 1: to start to understand patterns and be able to anticipate
Speaker 1: things that you will see in the market or things
Speaker 1: that you'll see at a company. But really understanding that
Speaker 1: the core of industry is what makes a master of business, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's how you really start to hone the
Speaker 1: skills that you need in order to make a true
Speaker 1: alpha out there in the market as an investor. So
Speaker 1: tell us what you did at ups like Bank of America.
Speaker 1: What was your focus? So I covered telecom services at
Speaker 1: Bank of America UM. During my time at IBM, I
Speaker 1: had worked UM on several telecom networking projects and really
Speaker 1: understood the industry, things like spectrum and things like wireless
Speaker 1: that were coming of age at that time. I understood
Speaker 1: pretty deeply. And you know, through my understanding of finance,
Speaker 1: I was able to say, these are businesses that I
Speaker 1: think will do well, These are businesses that are positioned
Speaker 1: to do well, and once the market understands that the
Speaker 1: socks will perform. Um. I had a great mentors at
Speaker 1: at a Bank of America, a great team that I
Speaker 1: worked with and really set me up for a great
Speaker 1: start in in finance. So you have a little bit
Speaker 1: of a health scare when you're relatively young, and it
Speaker 1: changes your career trajectory. Tell us what led you to
Speaker 1: stepping off of the merry go round? Yeah, um, it's
Speaker 1: an incredible story and um one that I think also
Speaker 1: defines a lot of where my life has led. Um.
Speaker 1: So this is you know, I was at a firm
Speaker 1: in d C and UH covering tech, media, telecom, a
Speaker 1: bunch of regulated industries as well, and was having some
Speaker 1: chest pain and a bunch of traders had you know,
Speaker 1: what we call walking pneumonia. But it takes everything to
Speaker 1: get a trader off the desk, right, I mean, they'll
Speaker 1: the whole desk will get pneumonia before they leave. And um,
Speaker 1: I was pretty sure that's what I had And was
Speaker 1: coughing for a few days and had some pain in
Speaker 1: my chest. Go to the hospital, they take an x ray,
Speaker 1: They see that I've got some swelling and a little
Speaker 1: bit of cloudiness there in my lungs, and they give
Speaker 1: me a Z pack and antibiotic. They think that I
Speaker 1: might have had pneumonia. My wife, who's a physicious, as
Speaker 1: I shared with you before you know, comes to the
Speaker 1: hospital to the emergency room. She asked me what they said.
Speaker 1: I said, you know, as an equity research guy, I
Speaker 1: think I know it all. I've got pneumonia. You know,
Speaker 1: they saw it on the X ray. What I did.
Speaker 1: Let me see those those She's like, let me see
Speaker 1: what's going on exactly. She didn't buy it. Well, she
Speaker 1: didn't buy it because she's a doctor and she's very
Speaker 1: good at her job. Like I say all the time,
Speaker 1: I've got a great wife. But I've got the best
Speaker 1: doctor that anybody could have in their house. I had
Speaker 1: some leg pain earlier in the week, left side, left side,
Speaker 1: So we know what we know where this is going
Speaker 1: right there? You out thought it was a Charlie horse.
Speaker 1: I played a little basketball with buddies. This was right
Speaker 1: at the end of a Thanksgiving holiday and I got
Speaker 1: a group of buddies, lifelong friends. We always played basketball together,
Speaker 1: and I thought it was a Charlie horse pain and
Speaker 1: the leg went away. A couple of days later, I'm
Speaker 1: having this pain in my chest, and I take myself
Speaker 1: to the hospital. She goes, did you tell them about
Speaker 1: your leg? And I said no. She goes into the
Speaker 1: head of the emergency room's office. The guy comes back
Speaker 1: out and he says, how come you didn't tell me
Speaker 1: about your leg. I said, well, my leg doesn't hurt anymore.
Speaker 1: It's my chest. I got pneumonia. That's what that's raised.
Speaker 1: This is where equity research guys talk themselves into a hole.
Speaker 1: They think they know more than they do. I know
Speaker 1: a lot about telecom, I know no thing about healthcare,
Speaker 1: all right. Um, So the guy comes out and he says, well,
Speaker 1: we gotta do give you what we call a d dimer. Right,
Speaker 1: there's a test for blood clots essentially. Um, they do
Speaker 1: the tests. I am at this point the second sickest person,
Speaker 1: highest priority in the emergency. They rolled me in, They
Speaker 1: give me an m R I. They see the blood
Speaker 1: clots in my lungs, they see some remnants in my leg.
Speaker 1: I'm immediately, um, you know, brought into the hospital and
Speaker 1: and I'm there for several days. They give me blood thinner.
Speaker 1: They want to make sure that these clots don't pass
Speaker 1: or anything crazy like no, no, no, no, no, so
Speaker 1: what I had was was a blood clot, right, so
Speaker 1: I did not have a heart attack. Um, I'm in
Speaker 1: the Strokes Center there, the hospital in d C. And
Speaker 1: for me, it was really a point where you start
Speaker 1: thinking about your life in a different way. It had
Speaker 1: to be terrifying when your wife comes in and the
Speaker 1: head of the R e R says, stat, let's let's
Speaker 1: let's get this guy taking care of immediately. It is,
Speaker 1: but not as scary until you realize what's really happening,
Speaker 1: and that you know, there's things that they called widow makers,
Speaker 1: which are these bilateral blood clots that you get across
Speaker 1: the aortic valve. And I mean you just go away,
Speaker 1: you're done right. As somebody that's kind of steeped in mathematics, probabilities, investment,
Speaker 1: you always have you thinking about the future, and um,
Speaker 1: you know my great story from that is that I
Speaker 1: actually upgraded a stock Pandora media from the I see
Speaker 1: you in the hospital. Um, yeah, to which my wife responded,
Speaker 1: you know, if you die writing a research report, I'll
Speaker 1: kill you, right. Um. So this is where you start
Speaker 1: putting it together. You put a little bit of life together,
Speaker 1: and you start thinking like an investor. And you start
Speaker 1: investing in yourself and thinking about you know, how are
Speaker 1: you going to measure the return in your life? And
Speaker 1: for me, I've done well UM as an analyst. You know,
Speaker 1: we we we did well. And I said, I really
Speaker 1: want to find ways that I can impact and help
Speaker 1: others with with the years that I have left, because
Speaker 1: it could have gone away right then and there. So
Speaker 1: is that what led to Management Leadership for Tomorrow? And
Speaker 1: then old finance tell us about what took place when
Speaker 1: you get out of the hospital. Yeah, so I got
Speaker 1: out of the hospital. UM stuck around for a few
Speaker 1: more months at at the firm that I was working UM,
Speaker 1: and then decided to do some other things and and
Speaker 1: that included UM doing some work with small and medium
Speaker 1: sized businesses providing some outsourced CFO type of service UM
Speaker 1: to really understand how some of these small businesses worked.
Speaker 1: An organization that I looked at doing some work with
Speaker 1: with Management Leadership for Tomorrow and John Rice and the
Speaker 1: team and MLT do a great job. UM. They have
Speaker 1: absolutely moved the needle and changed the trajectory for thousands
Speaker 1: of UM, Black, Latino and Native American students. Over twenty
Speaker 1: plus years, uh knew John a little bit and knew
Speaker 1: about the work that he had done. I had written
Speaker 1: recommendations for or mintyes of mine into that program UM,
Speaker 1: and John asked me to come out and you know,
Speaker 1: can you help raise some money right running business development?
Speaker 1: And for me that was a step away from the
Speaker 1: industry UM. And what I recognized is I got tremendous
Speaker 1: fulfillment out of seeing young people that were, you know,
Speaker 1: ten twenty years younger than myself, but helping them get
Speaker 1: to the next level, helping give them the opportunities that
Speaker 1: that woman gave me from Goldman when she said here's
Speaker 1: the path you should think about taking. Quite quite interesting.
Speaker 1: I'm Barry Ritults. You're listening to Masters in Business on
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. We're talking to Marcus Shaw. He is the
Speaker 1: CEO of alt Finance, a firm which seeks to increase
Speaker 1: diversity across alternative asset management firms. So we've been talking
Speaker 1: earlier about UM, the lack of recruiting and the lack
Speaker 1: of diversity historically on Wall Street, but let's talk about
Speaker 1: the other side. You you often speak to gups of
Speaker 1: smart college kids and you asked them, Hey, what do
Speaker 1: you guys know about private equity or credit or venture capital?
Speaker 1: What what sort of answer do you get when you
Speaker 1: ask those college students those questions. So, the most interesting
Speaker 1: thing that I've seen in assessing college students and talking
Speaker 1: to them is that students generally have very little knowledge
Speaker 1: of the companies that are operating in the private equity,
Speaker 1: private credit markets, real estate. They're knowing they know some
Speaker 1: of the venture capital firms, because I think venture capital
Speaker 1: has done a great job of pr over the past
Speaker 1: ten years or so. I mean, everybody wants to be
Speaker 1: a venture capitalist and an entrepreneur. Um. I always attribute
Speaker 1: that to a low interest rate environment where oh no,
Speaker 1: go back to the nineties and venture capitalists were rock stars.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right, right. Well, also, though you know
Speaker 1: a period there where you had the FED being a
Speaker 1: little accommodative, right. I think that by nature and by design,
Speaker 1: many of the firms that operate in in the private
Speaker 1: equity and private credit space don't want to be known.
Speaker 1: But our students know many of the holding companies, right,
Speaker 1: And that's what's really interesting. That they know the publicly
Speaker 1: traded companies, they know the private companies, but they don't
Speaker 1: know the holding companies for the private companies. You use
Speaker 1: the example and I think it's fascinating. Rihanna partnered with
Speaker 1: a private equity firm for her fashion line. The students
Speaker 1: know who Rihanna is and they know how wildly successful
Speaker 1: she's become, but they don't know who the financers are.
Speaker 1: That's right, and and how do you get them to
Speaker 1: look behind the curtain and or under the hood and
Speaker 1: see that that capital is what's driving the business. I
Speaker 1: think the key to that and we we we check
Speaker 1: for this when we're interviewing students for our program is
Speaker 1: intellectual curiosity, Right, That's the key to being an investor.
Speaker 1: Are you always thinking about peeling back another layer to
Speaker 1: the onion? You go in a store, you see a
Speaker 1: great product? Mm hmm. Where's that product made? Who's the
Speaker 1: company that owns that? If there's several different pieces to
Speaker 1: the product, how many where are they getting the components from?
Speaker 1: Where they sourcing them from? Who owns that company? Who
Speaker 1: finances those companies? That's the way we're teaching students to
Speaker 1: think because that brings about the type of intellectual curiosity
Speaker 1: that you need to have when ultimately you want to
Speaker 1: put some capital behind a company that you really like.
Speaker 1: So So let's go back to first principles. Why are
Speaker 1: companies interested in in diversity? What's in it for them?
Speaker 1: So I think they're There are a number of reasons
Speaker 1: why companies are and should be interested in diversity. UM.
Speaker 1: We have hundred million students out here UM coming through
Speaker 1: you know, K through twelve and university system that are
Speaker 1: operating at a higher level than we were twenty years ago.
Speaker 1: Students are very smart, independent of their color, their background,
Speaker 1: their religion, their central owner Asian right. What we know
Speaker 1: is is that students are being educated at tremendous levels today.
Speaker 1: There have so much more access that their intellectual curiosity
Speaker 1: is going to be UM really fueled by a lot
Speaker 1: more information that's delivered in a more equitable way. If
Speaker 1: I'm hiring for talent, I want access to all of that.
Speaker 1: I want to know the brightest kid from every corner
Speaker 1: of the country, boy, girl, gay, straight, black, white, it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. I want to know that student because that
Speaker 1: student can help me. That student can help me build
Speaker 1: and invest in find opportunities and generate alpha and bring
Speaker 1: more clients into my business. And so if I'm a
Speaker 1: senior leader at a company, I think that's the business operative, right,
Speaker 1: I've got to have the brightest talent. The talent that's
Speaker 1: most differentiated and intelligent is also helpful. I think the
Speaker 1: social part of this is that you know, a lot
Speaker 1: of these dollars are public dollars that that companies are managing.
Speaker 1: My mother again, a fifty year school teacher who put
Speaker 1: money into her retirement for fifty years. It would benefit
Speaker 1: her and it would benefit the other teachers and firefighters
Speaker 1: and police officers. To represent diverse communities, to have people
Speaker 1: who are investing their money look like them as well,
Speaker 1: really interesting. So this is more than just a checkbox
Speaker 1: on any list. Companies are actually looking to expand their
Speaker 1: diversity and inclusion practices because they see a genuine benefit
Speaker 1: to both their decision making process and their businesses. I
Speaker 1: think that's the obvious answer, um, and that's why with
Speaker 1: all finance, you know, this is a long term plan.
Speaker 1: We've got a tenure commitment from our three uh initial
Speaker 1: partner firms, and so this is not about checking the box.
Speaker 1: This is about changing the paradigm um for recruiting talent
Speaker 1: in this industry. So this industry has been notorously laggered
Speaker 1: when it comes to diversity, but there are lots of
Speaker 1: other industries. Technology has been accused of having a diversity issue,
Speaker 1: medicine law, pretty much wherever you look. The United States
Speaker 1: has its own history with some of its dark pockets.
Speaker 1: What other sectors could benefit from an organization like ALD Finance,
Speaker 1: ALD DOT. What else can we focus on? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think there are a number of sectors that could benefit
Speaker 1: from this strategy, even sectors like tech that have already
Speaker 1: developed some strategies. I think again, we're focused around education, exposure,
Speaker 1: and experience, the three elements that are going into preparing
Speaker 1: students for careers. This is not just about scholarships. Right.
Speaker 1: You give us in the scholarship, but then you don't
Speaker 1: really give them access to the people at your firm
Speaker 1: that are going to help that student not only get
Speaker 1: a job at that firm, but feel a sense of belonging,
Speaker 1: right once they get to that firm, so that they
Speaker 1: maximize their individual output. That's what you're trying to go for. Right.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you a story about a student. So we
Speaker 1: have a student in our program, and when you talk
Speaker 1: about counseling and coaching, it was a phenomenal story. A student,
Speaker 1: very bright student who had the ability to graduate in
Speaker 1: three years and worked last summer at at a fairly
Speaker 1: reputable consulting company. And I asked a student, I said,
Speaker 1: why are you in a hurry to graduate? You've got
Speaker 1: a students, got a pretty good scholarship package. Student comes
Speaker 1: from a background where you know, he's having to support
Speaker 1: families still at home. I mean, you know, a tough situation,
Speaker 1: and he wanted to get out in the workplace where
Speaker 1: he can earn I said, trust me, if you stay
Speaker 1: for your full four years, you'll have the opportunity through
Speaker 1: this program to get access to a career in alternatives.
Speaker 1: You have a great opportunity. Last summer you'll come out.
Speaker 1: You could make two x, even three X if you
Speaker 1: stay and pursue this opportun any alternatives. So the young
Speaker 1: man stayed, had multiple opportunities selected one. But here's here's
Speaker 1: the real power of the network. As he's making his
Speaker 1: decision to which role he's going to take, and you know,
Speaker 1: at one of three mega funds, he calls up his mentor,
Speaker 1: who is not at one of the firms that he
Speaker 1: has an offer from, and he says, well, what do
Speaker 1: you think I should do. In the course of that conversation,
Speaker 1: not only does he get guides from the mentor. The
Speaker 1: mentor connects him with another gentleman who used to work
Speaker 1: at one of the firms in the same group that
Speaker 1: he was going to. Now he has a decision that
Speaker 1: he's made that's been informed by two people that he
Speaker 1: did not know a year ago dinner table, and we
Speaker 1: will we will take those conversations for granted. If, especially
Speaker 1: someone grown up in a New York area where you
Speaker 1: know people who work in finance or people's parents were
Speaker 1: in finance, that network just doesn't develop elsewhere without focus
Speaker 1: exposure to it. That's right, that's really intriguing. So you
Speaker 1: were a Bank of America a decade ago, you let
Speaker 1: it uh, you had some important teams you worked with,
Speaker 1: and you led some groups. How do you see Wall
Speaker 1: Street having changed over the past ten or twenty years?
Speaker 1: Were the signs on the on the road that things
Speaker 1: were getting better? Were they ripe for moving the right direction?
Speaker 1: Or is Wall Street just calcified and needed to really
Speaker 1: be shaken up? Well, Barry, I think that question really
Speaker 1: highlights something that's that's amazing to me. Number One, that
Speaker 1: I've been in this business, you know, a long time
Speaker 1: goes by very fast, And Number two. How much things change,
Speaker 1: you know, in a fairly short amount of time. You know,
Speaker 1: when I started my career in finance, I was the
Speaker 1: only black person in in my group, in my division. Okay, Um,
Speaker 1: another young woman came shortly after. We had a great relationship.
Speaker 1: In fact, she's been a lifelong friend and I, you know,
Speaker 1: was a mentor to her. And um, was that something
Speaker 1: that was very consistent. You were the only black guy
Speaker 1: working at the other shops you worked at, or at
Speaker 1: least the only person in the department. Well, um, for
Speaker 1: a couple for a couple of firms that I also
Speaker 1: did work at a minority own firm UM down in
Speaker 1: North Carolina, And and that was it was refreshing. I mean,
Speaker 1: I actually, you know, some of the brightest people that
Speaker 1: I ever worked with, and much of my investment philosophy
Speaker 1: and the thesis the way I think about investing was
Speaker 1: developed there amongst an incredibly diverse group of investors who had,
Speaker 1: you know, tremendous experience and success. Really intriguing. So given
Speaker 1: that you were at some big firms early tens, you know,
Speaker 1: what what did you see? What was what was it
Speaker 1: that led Wall Street to finally being ripe to accept changes.
Speaker 1: I think there is an inevitable pressure from society that
Speaker 1: helps drive change. And I think Wall Street, while we
Speaker 1: talk about it in this compartmentalized concept of it's Wall Street,
Speaker 1: it's in New York, it's you know, the bull down
Speaker 1: on Wall Street, right, and it's it's the movies that
Speaker 1: we see in reality, the funds that Wall Street is managing,
Speaker 1: the capital that it's managing, it's coming from all over
Speaker 1: the country. It's coming from people that look like me,
Speaker 1: It's coming from people that look like you. It's coming
Speaker 1: from people that look like our parents and our children.
Speaker 1: So at the end of the day, and I think
Speaker 1: we saw this in two thousand and eight, I think
Speaker 1: we saw it again during COVID that the end of
Speaker 1: the day, these companies are accountable to the people, right
Speaker 1: and to the people that are their investors, their LPs
Speaker 1: and and entities that their LPs represent um in their clients.
Speaker 1: And so I think that what we've evolved into is
Speaker 1: a more human Wall Street that is more inclusive by nature.
Speaker 1: And I do believe that what we're seeing now right,
Speaker 1: we will continue to see because we'll have people that
Speaker 1: come throughout finance, but also people more senior that are
Speaker 1: at the table and helping make decisions on where and
Speaker 1: how we invest in people, and where are we how
Speaker 1: and where and how we invest in companies. So so
Speaker 1: that leads me to um a pretty straightforward question, which is, first,
Speaker 1: how do you measure your own success with all finance?
Speaker 1: And second, how do people like oak Tree, Apollo and aries.
Speaker 1: How did they ask you to track uh, your your progress?
Speaker 1: What metrics do they look at to say, hey, we're
Speaker 1: getting our our money's worth for standing up this company
Speaker 1: and giving them a decade long horizon. So I'll address
Speaker 1: the ladder first, right. Number one, we had our first
Speaker 1: CYC in September. We started our first cohort of our
Speaker 1: fellowship in January. We now have the second coort. I've
Speaker 1: got seventy five students from eight hbs you use. There
Speaker 1: are now building relationships, getting education, getting exposure and ultimately
Speaker 1: getting experience to the alternative investment industry. That is fascinating.
Speaker 1: We've got students in our program that have their first
Speaker 1: full time offer with alternative investment firms that will graduate
Speaker 1: in two thousand three and May. So we're already in
Speaker 1: a few months really hitting the cover off the ball. UM.
Speaker 1: That's the quantitative element. Right, those are the KPI s
Speaker 1: up on the dashboard that are saying, you know, how
Speaker 1: many students are are you getting to exposure to these jobs?
Speaker 1: How many students are getting these jobs? What I also measure,
Speaker 1: and this is who the conversation with students? How many
Speaker 1: students are building confidence, skills and relationships that will help
Speaker 1: improve their wealth and economic mobility as they grow. How
Speaker 1: many students are having a conversation around the learning session
Speaker 1: that we do on interest rates and they're calling mom
Speaker 1: or dad at home and saying, you know, what is
Speaker 1: your credit card? You know what sort of interest rate
Speaker 1: on your credit card? Did you refile your house? How
Speaker 1: should I think about my student loans? Right? That are
Speaker 1: really taking an active position and the way that they
Speaker 1: think about their personal finance, but also the way they
Speaker 1: think about investing. And I hear those conversations and have
Speaker 1: those conversations with students almost on a daily basis, and
Speaker 1: that's what fulfills me and lets me know we're moving
Speaker 1: in the right direction. When I look down the road
Speaker 1: in ten years, I believe that I will have hundreds
Speaker 1: of students that are actively working in alternative investments. But
Speaker 1: I'll have thousands that are knowledgeable and have relationships with
Speaker 1: people in this business and are better off for it.
Speaker 1: So we've been talking a lot about alt investments. Are
Speaker 1: there parallel entities to old finance for traditional asset management, investing, banking, stocks, bonds,
Speaker 1: I p o s, etcetera. It seems like there should
Speaker 1: be something similar to what you're doing for that space
Speaker 1: as well, which arguably is even bigger than alter finance.
Speaker 1: So I think there are some some organizations that have, um,
Speaker 1: you know, been active and in providing similar opportunities for
Speaker 1: students for traditional banking. Right. I mean when you think
Speaker 1: about what Reginald Lewis did you know almost thirty years
Speaker 1: ago um and and breaking grounds for for blacks and
Speaker 1: investment banking. Um, I think that we're doing some of
Speaker 1: that today in the alternative space. Remember when I have
Speaker 1: we had our first group of fellows. We had thirty
Speaker 1: three fellows in our first cohort. So this is January two,
Speaker 1: This is just you know a few months ago, right,
Speaker 1: And I asked the students, all right, how many of
Speaker 1: you know Morning Stanley Goldman City Group. Everybody raises their hand.
Speaker 1: They all know what they see, the commercials, they get
Speaker 1: the commercials on on the internet. I asked, how many
Speaker 1: of you know areas of Pollo oak Tree one student,
Speaker 1: so roughly three were sent. These students are brilliant, all
Speaker 1: high performers, all strong academic performers. I mean they will
Speaker 1: not fail to get a job. They could get a
Speaker 1: job doing anything. But they did not have the awareness
Speaker 1: of how the pathway to enter one of the most
Speaker 1: rewarding careers in investing. And that's that That's a key.
Speaker 1: And so when I look at other industries and what
Speaker 1: other organizations are doing, we are squarely focused on helping
Speaker 1: move the needle and the alternative investment space, places where
Speaker 1: people can help do deals, be long term owners. It's
Speaker 1: not about you know, the transactional element of investment banking,
Speaker 1: right be an owner, a direct owner of a brand
Speaker 1: that you know, but you never knew who the holding
Speaker 1: company was. I have seventy five students now that can
Speaker 1: answer that question of what's the pathway? How much larger
Speaker 1: can you expand this to be? So Barry, we will
Speaker 1: expand the fellowship program ultimately to be a round a
Speaker 1: hundred or a hundred and twenty students in you know,
Speaker 1: each year about fourty or so in each class. We
Speaker 1: are also partnering with the Warden School of University of
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania to develop an institute, the Warden Alt Finance Institute,
Speaker 1: which will be an online community and platform providing AGAIN
Speaker 1: curriculum and content and community as well as resources to
Speaker 1: help students at any HBCU gain access to AGAIN education,
Speaker 1: exposure and opportunities for experience in the space. And so
Speaker 1: through the institute will be able to scale some of
Speaker 1: the best parts of our fellowship, which is a real
Speaker 1: high touch part of our programming, but we'll be able
Speaker 1: to scale that to the students that are at HBC
Speaker 1: is that we don't partner with directly. Really really quite fascinating.
Speaker 1: I know I only have you for a couple of minutes.
Speaker 1: More So before I let you go, I want to
Speaker 1: ask uh the standard questions that I ask all of
Speaker 1: my guests, starting with what have you been streaming these days?
Speaker 1: What's been keeping you entertained a post lockdown? Yeah, so Barry,
Speaker 1: I would say, I tend to read a lot and
Speaker 1: follow a lot obviously in news channels, UM on finance,
Speaker 1: on podcasts. I mean, I love Howard marks the memo
Speaker 1: and I read his his memos that he puts out.
Speaker 1: But I love what he's doing in the podcast format
Speaker 1: that he's developed. But I listened to a lot of sports.
Speaker 1: I'm a huge Jalen and Jacoby fan. Um. I love
Speaker 1: what those guys are doing in terms of sports and
Speaker 1: entertainment and so, uh, you know, probably not as heady
Speaker 1: as some of the other answers you get, UM, but
Speaker 1: I I love sports talk radio. That's interesting. Tell us
Speaker 1: about some of your early mentors who helped shape your career.
Speaker 1: So you know a couple of the mentors that I had, Um,
Speaker 1: there was a woman named Stacy Gorn who hired me
Speaker 1: actually too IBM, And it's amazing to think this is
Speaker 1: over twenty years ago. Um. Stacy was a long term
Speaker 1: executive at IBM and has now moved to an resulting firm.
Speaker 1: But what she really helped me focus on early in
Speaker 1: my career was continuous improvement. Right. You think about it
Speaker 1: as an engineer a lot, right, kind of the causing
Speaker 1: principle right that Toyota used, but personal improvement of yourself? Right,
Speaker 1: how do you continue to develop as a person? If
Speaker 1: you're strong technically, how do you develop into a person
Speaker 1: that people feel comfortable managing? Others and feel comfortable being
Speaker 1: managed by um. And so as I developed into an
Speaker 1: executive and the CEO, I always reflect on those lessons
Speaker 1: that she gave me early on about being vulnerable and
Speaker 1: being coachable, even being coached up right. So having somebody
Speaker 1: that reports to you have the ability to coach you
Speaker 1: up on things where you can be more helpful for
Speaker 1: your organization. Uh. You mentioned books and you like to
Speaker 1: do a lot of reading. Tell us what some of
Speaker 1: your favorites are and what are you're reading now? Yeah? So, Um,
Speaker 1: you know a book that I go too often and
Speaker 1: I you know you read this, you know, probably once
Speaker 1: every couple of years, is uh Peter Burnsteins against the Gods?
Speaker 1: Um kind of. It's just it's it's fascinating to think
Speaker 1: about this concept of risk and how it's affected us
Speaker 1: since the very beginning of time, right, and then really
Speaker 1: how we have taken risk from something that was deified
Speaker 1: right kind of this religious concept and turned it into
Speaker 1: an economic tool that we can arbitrage for for personal gain. Unbelievable. Um,
Speaker 1: well written. I love the historical context and bringing it
Speaker 1: into the future. And so that's one um that I
Speaker 1: that I go too often I'll tell you a book
Speaker 1: that that I want to pick up and um, the
Speaker 1: title here, it's John Max's new book. And I thought
Speaker 1: it's interesting because you know, John is somebody, um that
Speaker 1: I don't know personally, but I've always respected kind of
Speaker 1: the way that he organized and ran businesses. And you know,
Speaker 1: it's a note that um, he's dealing. You know, I
Speaker 1: think has talked publicly about the aging process that he
Speaker 1: is going through himself. And uh, I found that particularly
Speaker 1: endearing because it's something that that I've dealt with in
Speaker 1: my family and to recognize that, you know, in this business,
Speaker 1: we're still human and we're not excluded from the human process.
Speaker 1: And so that's a book. John max new book is
Speaker 1: one that I certainly want to pick up up close
Speaker 1: and all. In life Lessons from a Wall Street Warrior
Speaker 1: is that is? That's a hell of a title. Hell
Speaker 1: of a guy. Um, what sort of advice would you
Speaker 1: give to a recent college grad? This is kind of
Speaker 1: a funny question because I asked this to everybody, but
Speaker 1: essentially I'm asking you a question, which is what old
Speaker 1: finance does. But I'll ask it anyway. What advice do
Speaker 1: you give to a recent college grad who was interested
Speaker 1: in a career in either investments or alternative finance. So
Speaker 1: there are two things that I tell all of our students. UM.
Speaker 1: Number one is a bigger picture and probably pretty simple.
Speaker 1: You've got to have intellectual curiosity. You can never run
Speaker 1: out of questions. I mean you you run incredible podcasts.
Speaker 1: You can never run out of questions. You've always got
Speaker 1: to have something that you're thinking about in terms of
Speaker 1: what's the next layer. How can I think about it
Speaker 1: in a different perspective, How can I put myself in
Speaker 1: somebody else's shoes and think about it? And how does
Speaker 1: that change the value of what I'm looking at right?
Speaker 1: I think it's that's critical to being successful as an investor.
Speaker 1: Number two is something that somebody shared with me and
Speaker 1: essentually John Rice, who runs m LT and is a
Speaker 1: partner and a great friend and and really one of
Speaker 1: the great leaders in the D and I space. Um,
Speaker 1: when you're young and you're bright, you've got to take
Speaker 1: risk early in your career, and in fact act not
Speaker 1: taking risk is actually the riskiest thing you can do.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit of a parable, right, but when
Speaker 1: you're young, you can recover from failure. You don't have
Speaker 1: that same luxury when you're older. It's so hard to
Speaker 1: appreciate that when you're you know, twenty or twenty one,
Speaker 1: when you're you're afraid of failure, When you're afraid of failure,
Speaker 1: when you should actually be seeking failure. Right. You should
Speaker 1: not be doing anything when you're twenty two or twenty
Speaker 1: or twenty one that you can't fail it right. Playing
Speaker 1: it safe is risky. It is risky. That's really interesting.
Speaker 1: And our final question, what do you know about the
Speaker 1: world of investing and old finance today? You wish you
Speaker 1: knew twenty or so years ago when you were really
Speaker 1: exploring the field in its early days. So the biggest
Speaker 1: thing I would say procedurally that that that I see
Speaker 1: in the investment hiring cycle is that you got be
Speaker 1: ready for the gig before you get it, which means
Speaker 1: that the recruiting process for alternative investments may start. Even
Speaker 1: if you're going to investment banking as an analyst, it
Speaker 1: may start before you actually start that job. There may
Speaker 1: be people that are reaching out to you trying to
Speaker 1: assess your interests in what you're gonna do after banking,
Speaker 1: and that was you know, I say one of the
Speaker 1: secrets of the industry that you know. I was well
Speaker 1: into my career before I knew that's how people were
Speaker 1: getting recruited into the industry. And so you gotta have
Speaker 1: your ear to the ground right. You got to know
Speaker 1: who's who, where the players are, who you should be
Speaker 1: expecting emails and calls from, and when you get those
Speaker 1: emails and calls, you gotta be ready for it. Really
Speaker 1: really interesting answer. We have been speaking to Marcus Shaw,
Speaker 1: CEO of ult Finance. If you enjoy this conversation, well,
Speaker 1: be sure and check out any of the previous four
Speaker 1: hundreds or so we've done over the past eight and
Speaker 1: a half years. You can find those at iTunes, Spotify, YouTube,
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcast from. We love your comments,
Speaker 1: feedback and suggestions right to us at m IB podcast
Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot net. Sign up for my daily reading
Speaker 1: list at rihults dot com. Follow me on Twitter at dhults.
Speaker 1: I would be remiss if I did not thank the
Speaker 1: crack team that helps put this conversation together each week.
Speaker 1: Justin Milner is my audio engineer. Attica val Bron is
Speaker 1: our project manager. Paris Wold is my producer. Sean Russo
Speaker 1: is my researcher. I'm Barry Rihults. You've been listening to
Speaker 1: Masters and Business on Bloomberg radioa