WEBVTT - Man Group's CEO Says Stop Asking People Where They Went to School 0:00:10.600 --> 0:00:13.520 I'm David Merritt and I'm Francin Laqua and this is 0:00:13.560 --> 0:00:16.160 in the City, Bloomberg's podcast, connecting you to the stories 0:00:16.200 --> 0:00:18.360 and the voices at the heart of the City of London. 0:00:18.880 --> 0:00:21.560 This week a conversation with Luke Ellis, chief executive offer 0:00:21.600 --> 0:00:25.320 of Man Group, the world's largest publicly listed hedge fund firm. Luke, 0:00:25.400 --> 0:00:26.960 thank you so much for coming in. It's great to 0:00:27.000 --> 0:00:29.720 be here. So you're one of the most famous hedge 0:00:29.720 --> 0:00:33.199 fund chief executive not the hedge fundie, but actually you 0:00:33.240 --> 0:00:36.840 have quite an interesting career path. I'm not sure whether 0:00:36.920 --> 0:00:41.680 famous is a never been a goal and I guess, 0:00:41.680 --> 0:00:44.760 but look at it, given the public profile of Man, 0:00:45.360 --> 0:00:48.640 it comes with the job. And you know, I think 0:00:48.720 --> 0:00:51.400 we should as a firm take a leadership position on 0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:55.240 stuff because that's the position we have as an ability 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:57.640 to do that type of thing. My career, well, I 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:01.480 was one of those people who from a very very 0:01:01.480 --> 0:01:06.840 early age sort of love numbers and love patterns. And 0:01:08.280 --> 0:01:11.640 I was having a conversation with my grandfather about horse 0:01:11.760 --> 0:01:14.360 race betting when I might have been five or six 0:01:15.000 --> 0:01:17.880 and sort of worked out that the bookies were making 0:01:17.920 --> 0:01:19.880 money all the time and said I'd like to do that, 0:01:20.319 --> 0:01:22.160 and he said, well, we'd like to say, go and 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:24.679 work in the city. So I just that was the point. 0:01:24.760 --> 0:01:26.200 I knew I wanted to work in the city, but 0:01:26.200 --> 0:01:28.280 I didn't really know what the different jobs were. And 0:01:28.680 --> 0:01:30.800 of course I'm old enough that this is pre internet, 0:01:30.920 --> 0:01:34.560 so you know, I took the first job I could 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:37.959 find working in the city, and things went from which 0:01:38.800 --> 0:01:41.399 it was within the mirror. It was as a graduate trainee. 0:01:41.880 --> 0:01:46.800 You know. Our introductory speech was from the Japanese head 0:01:46.840 --> 0:01:49.520 of the office who said, the Bank of England tells 0:01:49.560 --> 0:01:52.120 me we need more white faces in the office. You're 0:01:52.200 --> 0:01:54.280 my white faces. And then he walked out, you were 0:01:54.280 --> 0:01:56.440 a diverse higher. So we were a diverse high. Now 0:01:56.840 --> 0:01:59.680 I'm not going to claim that I have suffered in 0:01:59.760 --> 0:02:03.360 diversey at all, but but it's just an interesting perspective 0:02:03.440 --> 0:02:07.640 of the journey we've all come on, and that's fascinating. 0:02:07.680 --> 0:02:10.360 And of course, back in that moment, Nomura in Japan 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.839 was sort of a very dominant force in world finance. 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:18.919 It sounds amazing when you look back and think so 0:02:18.960 --> 0:02:23.760 at the time, with one quarters profit, Namura could have 0:02:23.800 --> 0:02:28.320 bought Merrill, Lynch or Goldmen sex cash and when there 0:02:28.320 --> 0:02:30.960 there used to be an amazingly profitable business. Now I 0:02:31.000 --> 0:02:34.480 will admit I took the job without knowing it was 0:02:34.520 --> 0:02:37.959 a Japanese firm. Was there were three jobs that you 0:02:38.000 --> 0:02:41.400 didn't know it was a japan didn't know there were Again, 0:02:41.480 --> 0:02:43.840 it's like amazing this you couldn't look it up on 0:02:43.880 --> 0:02:46.440 the internet. Suppose no, you couldn't. So so I went 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:49.920 into the careers office, which was a room full of books, 0:02:50.440 --> 0:02:52.160 and said I wanted to work in the city. And 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:54.440 they said, there are the accounting jobs, and I'm like, no, no, 0:02:54.440 --> 0:02:56.280 I don't want to do accountants. And there were three 0:02:56.320 --> 0:02:59.720 books by three pamphlets about three jobs. I applied for 0:02:59.760 --> 0:03:02.799 the three jobs. The first one that offered me a job, 0:03:02.840 --> 0:03:07.120 I said, thank you very much. As I was sitting outside, 0:03:07.280 --> 0:03:11.280 having sort of signing the documents, having said yes please that, 0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:13.560 somebody said are you looking forward to the three months 0:03:13.560 --> 0:03:18.160 in Tokyo? And I slightly nonplus looked around, realized the 0:03:18.200 --> 0:03:21.760 decoration was a bit weird now you mentioned it. And anyway, 0:03:21.760 --> 0:03:23.600 I signed up to three months in Tokyo, which was 0:03:23.600 --> 0:03:26.240 a brilliant time. So Tokyo, then, you know, one of 0:03:26.240 --> 0:03:28.440 the big financial capit as well. It's still an important place, 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:31.200 but very different. Then. Tell us about arriving as a 0:03:31.240 --> 0:03:33.400 sort of trainee in Tokyo and what that felt like. 0:03:33.919 --> 0:03:37.680 That really was being othered. Japan still doesn't like immigration. 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:41.440 Back then, they had absolutely none. Back then they were 0:03:41.560 --> 0:03:45.320 masters of the world. And you know, the Japanese equality 0:03:45.320 --> 0:03:48.640 market was worth Remember we got to twenty seven percent 0:03:48.720 --> 0:03:51.840 or something amazing of the global index. And it was 0:03:51.840 --> 0:03:53.560 sort of in them build up to the bit where 0:03:53.600 --> 0:03:57.000 the Imperial Palace was worth more than California and real 0:03:57.120 --> 0:04:00.200 estate value. It was that sort of amazing time. I'm 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:06.240 in the mid eighties and yeah, we were tolerated rather 0:04:06.320 --> 0:04:10.080 than anything else. But it was a really interesting experience 0:04:10.640 --> 0:04:14.720 learned some Japanese, learned to understand the Japanese, which has 0:04:14.720 --> 0:04:18.599 been something that I've sort of leveraged off throughout my career, 0:04:18.680 --> 0:04:20.880 I guess. So, look, when you look back at that time, 0:04:21.279 --> 0:04:24.400 is it more surprising the change I guess in Japanese 0:04:24.440 --> 0:04:28.120 finance that we've experienced I've lost thirty years, thirty five years, 0:04:28.240 --> 0:04:31.160 or the change in the city of London. So the second, 0:04:31.480 --> 0:04:34.919 I mean, it was a classic bubble, and did I 0:04:35.000 --> 0:04:37.120 know when it was going to pop. No, But it 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:40.280 didn't take very long to work out this didn't make sense, right, 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:42.880 I mean, you know, there were all sorts of sort 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:46.159 of things about you know, but a pineapple cost more 0:04:46.200 --> 0:04:49.440 than whatever, not quite a car, but that sort of 0:04:49.480 --> 0:04:50.800 thing in the west. You know, it was all sort 0:04:50.800 --> 0:04:53.480 of like, Okay, this doesn't make any sense. And the 0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:56.760 fact that that burst is not that so much of 0:04:56.839 --> 0:05:00.640 a surprise. And many of the things that amazing about 0:05:00.720 --> 0:05:04.440 Japanese society is how little it's changed. Yeah, the city 0:05:04.680 --> 0:05:10.120 here was so radically different back then to now and 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:14.280 sort of obviously lots has changed in the UK, lots 0:05:14.279 --> 0:05:16.920 has changed in Europe, but that there's sort of I 0:05:16.960 --> 0:05:22.040 think the city back then had many of the worst 0:05:22.080 --> 0:05:26.480 aspects of the UK. And somebody was talking to me 0:05:26.520 --> 0:05:28.279 the other day about, you know, do you think there's 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:30.720 no racism in the city or no misogyny, and it's like, well, 0:05:30.720 --> 0:05:34.960 of course there is. But compared to a period where 0:05:34.960 --> 0:05:41.440 it was materially worse than the national average, I would 0:05:41.520 --> 0:05:45.080 say the city is now at least as good as 0:05:45.080 --> 0:05:48.560 the natural average and probably better. What happened back then, again, 0:05:48.640 --> 0:05:52.000 is it tied to banking culture more than the city 0:05:52.040 --> 0:05:55.760 of London. It's very hard to get one's head around 0:05:55.839 --> 0:06:01.360 how unglobal finance was back then. And while I did 0:06:01.400 --> 0:06:04.360 a job going and working in Tokyo, that was so 0:06:04.400 --> 0:06:08.440 weird and unusual. And you know, most people working in 0:06:08.480 --> 0:06:14.280 the city of London would never have been outside Europe 0:06:14.400 --> 0:06:17.440 for work and not really been outside the City of 0:06:17.480 --> 0:06:20.480 London for work in most cases, you know, and what 0:06:20.560 --> 0:06:22.480 was going on in New York was very, very separate 0:06:22.520 --> 0:06:24.960 to what was going on in London. Yeah, because this 0:06:25.040 --> 0:06:28.120 is obviously before any of the big banks. As it 0:06:28.160 --> 0:06:30.240 goes in the next couple of weeks, I'm about to 0:06:30.240 --> 0:06:32.240 be sixty, so I'm you know, this was a long 0:06:32.279 --> 0:06:35.599 time ago, but it was pretty big bang just before that, 0:06:35.720 --> 0:06:38.719 and you know, it was it was a different thing, 0:06:38.800 --> 0:06:46.640 but it was a very insular, insular environment which had 0:06:46.680 --> 0:06:49.600 a mixture of a sort of, if you like, a 0:06:49.680 --> 0:06:55.000 posh part of UK society that that looked down on 0:06:55.720 --> 0:07:00.320 anything other than posh white men. And we used to 0:07:00.360 --> 0:07:05.560 have that thing about barrow boys, which somehows. I mean, 0:07:05.760 --> 0:07:09.960 actually that got that's one area which hasn't really got better. 0:07:10.680 --> 0:07:14.520 But but you know, back then, well there was an 0:07:14.560 --> 0:07:17.960 awful lot of drinking. That was a very different thing 0:07:17.960 --> 0:07:20.360 in the culture. Going for lunch time, right, yeah, I 0:07:20.360 --> 0:07:22.760 mean going going for four or five points at lunch 0:07:22.920 --> 0:07:25.880 was normal, not unusual, and still going back to your 0:07:25.920 --> 0:07:29.400 desk and working it was. I mean, it's amazing when 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:30.960 you look back at those things. It's a bit like 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:34.320 sort of obviously everybody smoked in the I mean not 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:37.320 every but all offices had people smoking everywhere and so on. 0:07:37.400 --> 0:07:43.800 But but it was really just the attitude about being 0:07:43.920 --> 0:07:48.440 unpleasant to you know, pick whatever, you know, if you 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.160 weren't a posh white male, the world was unpleasant to you. 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:54.920 And and Britain as a whole has changed obviously normously 0:07:54.960 --> 0:07:56.600 in those times. And do you think the city has 0:07:56.640 --> 0:08:02.120 moved along with British society or is still lagging behind? 0:08:02.200 --> 0:08:04.120 You said there are still some issues here. How do 0:08:04.120 --> 0:08:07.160 you see the landscape today in terms of how people 0:08:07.240 --> 0:08:11.000 deal with these very British problems about class and looking 0:08:11.040 --> 0:08:14.000 down notes on people with less money. I mean, it 0:08:14.240 --> 0:08:16.640 is how are we doing now here in the city. 0:08:16.960 --> 0:08:22.360 So I think it's gone from being materially worse than 0:08:22.440 --> 0:08:25.880 the UK to being at least as good, and I 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:29.880 would say probably better. In a number of aspects. So 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:32.840 there is one thing in the city which you know, 0:08:33.080 --> 0:08:35.880 by the nature of dealing with money all day, every day, 0:08:36.160 --> 0:08:39.640 it is pretty impossible to have a totally balanced attitude 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:42.440 to money, right, And it's not normal, right, it's not 0:08:42.480 --> 0:08:45.720 an average Yeah, you know, you move billions and trillions 0:08:45.760 --> 0:08:49.959 of dollars, pounds, yeend whatever, every day, every whatever. It's 0:08:50.000 --> 0:08:53.720 it's quite hard to to not say some things to 0:08:53.760 --> 0:08:56.800 do with money which sound weird in any other context. 0:08:57.320 --> 0:09:01.720 But I think the general thing of the culture has 0:09:01.840 --> 0:09:05.960 really come a huge long way, and there's lots more 0:09:06.000 --> 0:09:10.360 we can do, absolutely, but you know, and but there's 0:09:10.360 --> 0:09:12.200 lots more we can do in society if you sort 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:13.960 of mean, but I think we're you know it is 0:09:14.160 --> 0:09:17.920 it is a healthy place to day and you know, 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:21.360 sort of yes, but we should all keep working on 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:23.840 trying to make it an even better place if we 0:09:23.880 --> 0:09:27.560 can open to as many people as possible, because that 0:09:28.040 --> 0:09:31.480 the whole point about the city is it is an 0:09:32.280 --> 0:09:36.120 intellectual boiling pot, right. I mean, it's about getting as 0:09:36.200 --> 0:09:43.079 much IQ together into yes, an individual, but then into 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:45.640 a room and then into a building and then into 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:47.760 the whole city. And you know, it's it is the 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:51.760 dynamics of having all of this IQ bumping into each other. 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:56.600 But you need diverse thinking in order to make that, 0:09:57.840 --> 0:10:00.760 you know, a benefit. It's it's that you know. It's 0:10:00.760 --> 0:10:02.839 like one of the favorite expressions in the city is 0:10:02.880 --> 0:10:06.160 where there's no the only thing that's a free like 0:10:06.200 --> 0:10:09.840 a free lunch is diversity is diversification. Right in a portfolio, 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:14.080 you know, you diversify and that gets you improve returns, 0:10:14.160 --> 0:10:19.439 less risk. Every type of thing in finances about diversification, 0:10:20.280 --> 0:10:22.800 and it applies just as much in people. If you 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:26.880 have ten people who are incredibly smart, but all have 0:10:27.000 --> 0:10:31.120 exactly the same background in different forms, they're not going 0:10:31.160 --> 0:10:35.000 to be much cleverer than one person. Maybe they'll be 0:10:35.000 --> 0:10:36.600 better than one, but they're not going to be better 0:10:36.600 --> 0:10:38.680 than five people, or probably not better than two. You 0:10:38.720 --> 0:10:42.280 get people who've got a different perspective. The collective is 0:10:42.360 --> 0:10:44.920 much smarter because that's how you get away from group think. 0:10:45.000 --> 0:10:48.000 But how do you and you've really championed right diversity 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:51.520 in the workforce through indicease and initiatives at Man, how 0:10:51.559 --> 0:10:57.840 difficult is it to recruit diversly? Recruiting diversely for people 0:10:57.960 --> 0:11:03.040 coming in at the graduate at master's level, it's not 0:11:03.120 --> 0:11:06.120 that hard, right you have to you have to have 0:11:06.200 --> 0:11:09.320 an attitude shift, and once you have an attitude shift, 0:11:09.360 --> 0:11:13.040 it's really not that hard. At that level, there is 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:15.200 a lot of people. And if you start by not 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:18.880 saying what school did you go to and what college 0:11:18.880 --> 0:11:22.200 at Oxford are you at, but try and actually look 0:11:22.240 --> 0:11:25.920 at the individual persons capabilities and achievements and so on. 0:11:26.600 --> 0:11:30.520 You know, yeah, I think it's easy to hire in 0:11:30.600 --> 0:11:35.040 at the graduate level in a truly diverse way. That 0:11:35.200 --> 0:11:38.960 the challenges as you move up through the organization that 0:11:39.960 --> 0:11:44.720 you know, so our senior leadership, so that's sort of 0:11:45.679 --> 0:11:47.760 one level down from me and one level below that. 0:11:47.880 --> 0:11:50.120 So it's a it's a big cohorted sort of a 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:54.400 couple of hundred people. And we are in the current 0:11:54.559 --> 0:12:00.800 sort of high twenty percent for gender diversity there and 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:04.280 as I say, compared to where the city would have 0:12:04.280 --> 0:12:06.800 been once upon a time, you know, that's amazing, but 0:12:06.920 --> 0:12:10.240 in reality it's still high twenties. It's not forties. It's 0:12:10.240 --> 0:12:11.760 not even as high as where we are at the 0:12:11.800 --> 0:12:17.600 overall firm, and it's hard moving the dial and sort 0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:21.000 of even as you dig into that, you know, funny enough, 0:12:21.040 --> 0:12:26.000 in the people talent side of our business. We have 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.360 more senior female leaders than we do in the investment 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:32.360 side of the business, and you sort of think, ah, 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:36.160 but of course the average person leading one of our 0:12:36.200 --> 0:12:39.320 investment teams has been doing it for thirty years, you know, 0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:41.840 And so that that that bit of the funnel that 0:12:41.920 --> 0:12:45.800 came in means it's easy to do the right things 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:50.520 about sort of senior positions, but it's hard to move 0:12:50.559 --> 0:12:53.120 the dial a long way? Is that the only reason? Though? Time? 0:12:53.240 --> 0:12:56.760 Or are that other barriers still meaning women aren't progressing 0:12:56.840 --> 0:13:00.360 up to the top ranks of big city firms. Still 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:06.079 some cultural hurdles that we need to unpack. So I mean, 0:13:06.120 --> 0:13:10.080 like I'm I'm definitely sure that the dominant thing is 0:13:10.160 --> 0:13:15.000 the pipeline problem. But you know, it's not just how 0:13:15.040 --> 0:13:17.840 it was thirty years you know, fifteen years ago, people 0:13:17.960 --> 0:13:23.079 still used to celebrate the shouty, aggressive trading floor idea, 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:26.359 right that was that, you know, and still frankly, you see, 0:13:26.840 --> 0:13:29.200 you know what, the BBC did a program about the 0:13:29.240 --> 0:13:33.280 city and it's you know, still got shouting dealing floors 0:13:33.320 --> 0:13:37.760 and you know, a sort of machismo and you know 0:13:37.800 --> 0:13:42.559 it sort of heroes women who are more machismo than 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:45.760 you know, and that puts lots of people off, put 0:13:45.840 --> 0:13:48.040 lots of people off in the past. I mean, if 0:13:48.080 --> 0:13:51.400 you come on our dealing floor, you know, we trade 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:56.800 you know a lot and sting none but I mean 0:13:56.840 --> 0:14:00.200 like none that the people complain it's too loud. But 0:14:00.320 --> 0:14:03.040 that's just people talking well part from me. We have 0:14:03.160 --> 0:14:06.400 the same in the newsroom. Yeah, it's not a prerequisite 0:14:06.400 --> 0:14:08.839 for success having that kind of you know, not at all. 0:14:08.920 --> 0:14:12.679 And the and yeah, but but the the first is 0:14:13.000 --> 0:14:15.880 broadening the pipeline of people coming in. The second is 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:21.120 then making sure that you don't sort of celebrate the 0:14:21.160 --> 0:14:23.880 wrong type of culture. And that's where management comes in. 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:27.520 And you know, that is where the good leaders are 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:30.480 making a real difference and someplaces not so much. And 0:14:31.000 --> 0:14:33.720 you know, we could think of the coming back from COVID, 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:36.640 and some firms tried to make us sort of look 0:14:36.680 --> 0:14:38.480 at us. You know, we're the first ones back in 0:14:38.520 --> 0:14:40.440 the office. We've told everybody they have to be at 0:14:40.480 --> 0:14:42.960 their desk every day and you're like, okay, but I 0:14:43.040 --> 0:14:46.160 didn't do that because it's a dumb way to manage people. 0:14:46.720 --> 0:14:50.040 And you know, if you want to get the best 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:53.160 out of people telling them they all have to conform 0:14:53.320 --> 0:14:58.680 to some rule you learn forty years ago. It's pretty dumb, honestly. 0:14:59.560 --> 0:15:01.920 And so you know, what we try to do is 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:07.040 to find the working process that gets the best out 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:09.640 of each person. And so we've got people who are 0:15:09.640 --> 0:15:12.480 in the office five days a week from early to late, 0:15:12.520 --> 0:15:16.360 and we've got people who are you know, dotted all 0:15:16.400 --> 0:15:19.840 over the country and frankly the continent, don't come to 0:15:19.880 --> 0:15:22.520 the office very much. But that's how we get the 0:15:22.520 --> 0:15:24.840 best out of those people. Look, is that out of 0:15:24.880 --> 0:15:28.040 personal experience. So you left the city right at some point? 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:30.120 Why why did you leave? And why did you come back? 0:15:30.960 --> 0:15:33.280 First point of earning money is so you can afford 0:15:33.320 --> 0:15:36.480 to live, and that is incredibly important, and we know 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:39.600 there's an enormous number of people in this country and 0:15:39.680 --> 0:15:43.320 beyond who are struggling with just that every day, and 0:15:43.400 --> 0:15:46.800 especially now at the moment you get get there. The 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.240 second stage is in order to have enough that you 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:54.320 can look after your family and savings. And then at 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:59.600 some point you have enough money that the money is 0:15:59.640 --> 0:16:04.600 supposed to create choices. And it's amazing how many people 0:16:04.640 --> 0:16:06.760 get caught up in well, I just want more money, 0:16:06.880 --> 0:16:11.320 which is a choice, doesn't seem a terribly brilliant choice, 0:16:11.320 --> 0:16:13.400 but it's a choice. And there are some people where 0:16:13.560 --> 0:16:16.840 you have done amazing things because they're driven purely by 0:16:16.960 --> 0:16:20.080 finance as a motive. Again, one of the reputations of 0:16:20.120 --> 0:16:22.720 the city is people only come into the city to 0:16:22.920 --> 0:16:25.680 make money, you know, But that's the thing of the eighties, right, 0:16:25.720 --> 0:16:29.520 It's not the world today. People come to work in 0:16:29.560 --> 0:16:32.640 the city. People succeed in the city because they love 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:36.440 the intellectual challenge of what is like a brilliant if 0:16:36.480 --> 0:16:41.360 you've got a brain that likes complicated puzzles. Finances amazing, right, 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:44.160 and it's always changing. And that's I mean, that's what 0:16:45.240 --> 0:16:49.160 got me excited. I was in a lucky enough position 0:16:49.320 --> 0:16:54.240 to have made enough money that I had choices, and 0:16:54.360 --> 0:16:56.880 I reached a point where I wasn't enjoying what I 0:16:57.040 --> 0:17:01.320 was doing, and so I stopped to do And I 0:17:01.360 --> 0:17:03.760 didn't know. I mean, I stopped, and honestly I did 0:17:05.080 --> 0:17:06.679 if you'd asked me to guess. I didn't think I 0:17:06.680 --> 0:17:09.439 would ever come back to the city. I didn't think 0:17:09.440 --> 0:17:11.240 I come back to a full time work. But I 0:17:11.240 --> 0:17:13.800 don't know. I just I stopped because I had a choice. 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:16.840 I had an option. You know, essentially my kid's life 0:17:16.840 --> 0:17:20.199 for my life was funded. And so was that hard decision? 0:17:20.240 --> 0:17:21.840 Did you agonize every about it or was it just 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:26.080 not really? Because you know, it's one of the conversations 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:29.320 I've had regularly over the last thirty or forty years 0:17:29.320 --> 0:17:31.840 with my wife of I worked really hard because I 0:17:31.880 --> 0:17:36.359 really enjoy it. But at the point, it's not good 0:17:36.400 --> 0:17:39.640 to go home and moan about I'm not to enjoy 0:17:39.760 --> 0:17:43.280 my work when like, you don't have to do it now. 0:17:43.440 --> 0:17:46.240 I mean again, it's entirely different if you've got to 0:17:46.240 --> 0:17:49.080 turn up at you know whatever, drive your truck every 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:53.320 day in order to pay for guests and food. But 0:17:53.400 --> 0:17:55.280 I you know, once you're in a position where you 0:17:55.640 --> 0:17:58.400 it's you don't need the money in order to live 0:17:58.440 --> 0:18:02.760 a nice life. You know, of moaning about your work 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:08.840 seems really dumb. So what load you back? So I 0:18:08.960 --> 0:18:14.040 came back for what was a new for me and 0:18:14.160 --> 0:18:18.160 look really interesting intellectual problem. So I got a built 0:18:18.160 --> 0:18:21.840 a business for JP Morgan. So I'd built a business 0:18:21.840 --> 0:18:24.720 for somebody else, I'd built a business. That was my 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:28.200 first go around, if you like, first career, second career 0:18:28.400 --> 0:18:32.000 was to build a business with a partner, so for ourselves, 0:18:32.920 --> 0:18:35.600 and I didn't have an urge to do either of 0:18:35.640 --> 0:18:42.720 those things again. And what drew me back was so 0:18:42.800 --> 0:18:46.200 it was the time where man merged with GLG, brought 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:50.480 GLG hover one wants to describe it. And I could 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:53.720 see that this was a very complicated mess that they 0:18:53.720 --> 0:18:58.640 were creating, and the thought of how do you turn 0:18:58.720 --> 0:19:02.919 around a mess somebody else has created. I'd never done that, 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:05.280 and it looked like a really interesting intellectual problem. And 0:19:05.359 --> 0:19:08.760 it's been a really interesting intellectual problem. And touchwood that's 0:19:08.800 --> 0:19:12.439 not necessarily you know, draws most people to cleaning up 0:19:12.480 --> 0:19:14.760 other people's mess. I mean, I'm fascinated by that, you 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:16.879 know what, and you just because you you could you 0:19:16.920 --> 0:19:19.199 see the opportunity through the mess of what you might 0:19:19.200 --> 0:19:22.080 be able to build at the end of it. No, honestly, 0:19:22.480 --> 0:19:25.160 I mean that part of what made it really interesting 0:19:25.880 --> 0:19:30.120 was I could see the problems and at the time 0:19:30.440 --> 0:19:33.240 it wasn't at all clear whether there was a path 0:19:33.280 --> 0:19:40.040 through the mess. But but that's a like complicated puzzles, 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:43.960 if you like, And this was a people and you know, 0:19:44.440 --> 0:19:47.560 finance and whatever puzzle, and that that was that was 0:19:47.760 --> 0:19:49.199 like a really I mean to me that that was 0:19:49.240 --> 0:19:51.800 like an irresistible but that's what brought me back. It 0:19:51.840 --> 0:19:57.560 was just an irresistible puzzle and fascinated by that. And 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:00.399 we often in the newsroom talk about you know, deutter 0:20:00.480 --> 0:20:03.040 Bang went through four chief executive critic sweet is the same? 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:06.919 Like what draws people to difficult jobs? Can you point to, 0:20:07.600 --> 0:20:11.400 I guess, characteristics in people that you want to hire 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:14.399 that make them succeed? It? Is it the intellect? Is 0:20:14.600 --> 0:20:18.280 the drive? Is it that fire in the belly? Like 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:23.879 what makes a good employee? The definition of believing indiversity 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:28.280 is that there isn't a thing that makes a good 0:20:28.280 --> 0:20:31.320 employee right that? That is exactly part of the bit 0:20:31.560 --> 0:20:35.240 is you can't look at everybody on the basis of 0:20:35.880 --> 0:20:38.680 are they the best person for this thing right now? 0:20:40.440 --> 0:20:47.240 The big leap in mindset is three years forward. You 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:49.520 could pick a longer die, but three years is sort 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:53.600 at my attention span. So three years forward is this 0:20:53.720 --> 0:20:56.400 team going to be better for that person being part 0:20:56.440 --> 0:21:02.400 of it? And because if you start, you know, okay, 0:21:02.680 --> 0:21:06.199 Fred's left, I need to replace Fred. Who are the 0:21:06.240 --> 0:21:08.640 candidates that I can hire today, who are the most 0:21:08.680 --> 0:21:11.879 suited for Fred's job today, and I say Fred on purpose, 0:21:12.400 --> 0:21:15.240 The answer is, you're going to hire somebody who looks 0:21:15.280 --> 0:21:18.560 and sounds like Fred. You're going to hire exactly in 0:21:18.600 --> 0:21:21.920 the image of the person who left. You do that, 0:21:22.560 --> 0:21:26.639 you're never going to improve the diversity of thinking in 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:29.520 the firm. If, on the other hand, you go, Okay, 0:21:29.840 --> 0:21:34.200 Fred's left, that's life. But we now have a chance 0:21:34.280 --> 0:21:39.359 to bring other skills into this team. You know, will 0:21:39.400 --> 0:21:43.240 accept a sort of some Jacob effect where we may 0:21:43.240 --> 0:21:46.960 not get the perfect fit for the immediate problem exactly today. 0:21:47.000 --> 0:21:50.320 But if three years from now we can bring somebody 0:21:50.320 --> 0:21:53.080 in that makes the team better, that, you know, you 0:21:53.200 --> 0:21:56.200 can get much more out of that than And so 0:21:56.240 --> 0:21:58.480 then you get to thinking about, Okay, I want somebody 0:21:58.520 --> 0:22:02.000 who thinks differently, who's got a different because they actually 0:22:02.040 --> 0:22:05.360 help the thought process. So you can pivot, in fact, 0:22:05.400 --> 0:22:08.840 the whole business or a whole team's work around that person. 0:22:08.840 --> 0:22:11.560 You've mentioned puzzles a few times, sort of fitting pieces together. 0:22:11.600 --> 0:22:13.720 But this kind of question of diversity in who you 0:22:13.760 --> 0:22:17.200 bring in and the skills, it's about reconfiguring the pieces, 0:22:17.280 --> 0:22:21.320 isn't it all around them, not necessarily fitting someone in? Yes, 0:22:21.680 --> 0:22:23.600 I mean, yeah, that's that's a very good way of 0:22:23.600 --> 0:22:26.520 saying it. And look at the sort of if you 0:22:26.600 --> 0:22:31.959 like the bit everybody sees the rumberg celebrates of our 0:22:32.040 --> 0:22:36.600 job is the financial puzzles. But as you get into 0:22:36.720 --> 0:22:41.560 a management and then a leadership position, really what you're 0:22:41.600 --> 0:22:45.679 dealing with is people puzzles, and it's you know, people 0:22:45.680 --> 0:22:49.160 are really interesting and complicated and so on and so yeah, 0:22:49.160 --> 0:22:53.440 it's about trying to fit those puzzles. So how do 0:22:53.480 --> 0:22:55.639 you get the best out of the team, How do 0:22:55.680 --> 0:22:57.840 you get the most going forward? And that sort of 0:22:57.840 --> 0:23:00.800 comes back to that. I definitely went off from one 0:23:00.840 --> 0:23:05.080 of your earlier questions. Why do we think it's important 0:23:05.160 --> 0:23:09.800 to embrace different working practices for different people in different ways, 0:23:09.960 --> 0:23:13.919 is because that's how you get that puzzle to be 0:23:14.040 --> 0:23:17.000 the best. People who feel good about what they're doing, 0:23:17.400 --> 0:23:20.840 People with a smile do better work. We've all had 0:23:20.840 --> 0:23:25.480 to do some report, something that you know you don't 0:23:25.480 --> 0:23:28.040 really want to do. It's amazing how long it can take, 0:23:28.440 --> 0:23:31.159 whereas if you're enjoying it, it's amazing how quickly this 0:23:31.320 --> 0:23:33.320 podcast is flying by. Right. I don't know what you mean. 0:23:33.400 --> 0:23:35.480 I love waking up at four am for some time 0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:39.040 London was the world capital of hedge funds, and whole 0:23:39.160 --> 0:23:41.919 areas of the city were given over to the funds 0:23:41.960 --> 0:23:45.160