Aoifinn Devitt: Our next guest started her journey in the world of investment with an internship at JP Morgan at the age of 15. Let’s hear what she learned throughout her career about the hierarchy in corporate America and how she vowed to not become discouraged, but to keep climbing despite it.
24. Judy Chambers: Foreign.
Aoifinn Devitt: I’m Aoifinn Devitt, and welcome to the 50 Faces podcast, a podcast committed to revealing the richness and diversity of the world of investment by focusing on its people and their stories. I’m joined today by Judy Chambers, who is managing principal of Makita Investment Group, an investment consulting firm. She’s had a long career in investment consulting and prior to that, investment banking. Based in New York City, she is chairman of the advisory board of the Twigo foundation and and sits on the board of the Community Service Society of New York. Welcome, Judy. Thank you for joining me today.
24. Judy Chambers: Thank you for having me, Aoifinn. This is fantastic. I really appreciate it.
Aoifinn Devitt: Let’s start with your career journey. How did it start and did it take any unusual turns along the way?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I don’t know if I’ve taken any unusual turns. I’ve actually been extremely fortunate to have had a number of cheerleaders and great people and organizations behind me who’ve always given me a lot of guidance and exposure. So I’m a. What’s called A Better Chance alum. A Better Chance as an organization based in New York City. And via that organization, I got an internship at the age of 15 at JP Morgan. A better Chance set up my interviews and everything for me. And so I’ll never forget it was Black Friday the day after Thanksgiving. I was a 10th grader, and, and I went down to J.P. morgan, and this is the, you know, J.P. morgan before a lot of all of the mergers and all that other stuff. And so I went down for an interview for an internship, and I was lucky enough to maintain that internship for four summers. So it took me through the rest of high school and then throughout college at Duke. And then the only year that I did not work there through college was when I had to do my public policy internship for my major. And so because I had that great experience on my resume in banking after college, I was hired by. It was nations bank at that time. Right now it’s bank of America as they’ve gone through mergers. And I worked there for four years, and then that really prepared me to pursue an mba. So I went to Kellogg at Northwestern University. And then, you know, during business school, I wanted to get into investment banking, and that’s what I was completely focused on. So I was an intern at Lehman Brothers. Then I got hired by Lehman Brothers full time. And then after working there for a number of years and quite honestly had gotten displaced, I was looking to do something new. And then I ended up meeting Alan Emkin, who at the time was the founder of PCA. And he hired me to open up PCA’s only East coast office and PCA’s Pension Consulting Alliance. And so I focused on private markets. And in 2019, PCA merged with Makita Investment Group. So I kind of have had a pretty steady track, so to speak, relative to a lot of other people. So I feel really fortunate about that.
Aoifinn Devitt: That’s an extraordinary story. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone having an internship at a bank. Age 15.
24. Judy Chambers: Amazing. I don’t think I was legally supposed to be there at 15. I think I was supposed to be 16, but you know, I had skipped a year in school. So I was the right year academically, but just not age wise.
Aoifinn Devitt: And back then, were you studying STEM subjects? Did you know you wanted to go into finance in some ways? Were you studying economics or how did that come up for you?
24. Judy Chambers: Yeah, I think I knew I wanted to go to go into finance because of my experience at JP Morgan. So again, I was very fortunate to have gotten the exposure to finance at a very early stage. And so in going into college I was a public policy and Spanish major, but I took a lot of economic classes. So again, I just think I was always on that track, which, you know, most kids aren’t at a very early age. They change their majors a number of times, which they absolutely should. But I think because I’d gotten that exposure and it really kind of fit my personality, I just pursued that the entire time.
Aoifinn Devitt: And I know we’ll talk about this later when we speak about your work with Twigo, but now going back to your current role in investment consulting. Role, you obviously sit side by side with allocators. How much of your time do you spend sourcing and diligencing independent women and minority owned firms?
24. Judy Chambers: I focus on private markets, so private equity, private credit, infrastructure investments and so forth. And I actually spend a decent amount of time sourcing and diligencing. I’ll call it emerging managers, defined as managers on their first, second and third time funds as well as women owned and minority owned funds. Certainly over the years that has become more of a focus for our clients. So it certainly has become more of a focus for us. But you know, there I have seen some really good developments in that area. I think there’s a lot more that needs to be done and can be done, but the managers in the space are stronger than ever. They’re all super smart people. That’s never a question. They all are coming out of larger shops, they have great experience, they’ve been in finance for a number of years. But I think compared to, you know, 13 years ago when I started on the consulting side, I think their level of sophistication is higher. I think they’re really learning from the people who have come before them. And so when they’re starting in the marketplace, they are a lot more institutionalized than say they were 10 or 13 years ago, which I think is always a great thing. So yeah, it’s been a nice development in the marketplace, but again, there’s so much more to be done.
Aoifinn Devitt: And when you look, say from a client side at some of those clients who have emerging manager programs, I spoke recently with somebody who’s developing that at a hospital plan. Often we see them start perhaps at the public plans. What do you see in terms of the take up among institutional clients of either emerging manager programs or a desire to have more diversity in their manager base?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I think people are focusing on it more and more now and I think as a result the programs themselves are developing. I think initially there was an interest, people didn’t quite know what to do, so they just kind of allocated some dollar amount of their portfolio. And quite honestly, I don’t know how much rhyme or reason was behind the number that was selected, but they put aside X amount earmarked for these programs. And I think that was great because you have to start somewhere. What I think is happening now is people are saying, okay, we did this initially, it’s working out for us, but now we have the challenge of changing or tweaking or call it transforming the programs because the managers have transformed and there are a lot more managers in the marketplace. So whereas initially you may have started a program where you were allocating, and I’m going to use an example, let’s say 25 to $50 million to a manager, and that’s wonder, but now that manager has grown and so now you need to figure out if the manager is produced for you and you’ve got a good partnership there, how do you maintain that relationship? And you’re not going to really be able to do that in the best way by still just writing that same 25 or $50 million check. And so I think the challenge for institutional investors right now is they need to think about how do they move to the next step with these programs. So if you originally had a 200 million or a $500 million program, and again, you may have selected that dollar amount pretty arbitrarily, now you really have to think about how do you make a program that’s going to continue to support the managers that you’ve supported from day one, and then how do you also incorporate the newer managers that are coming into the marketplace? Because it’s really gotten so much more competitive now, which I think is wonderful. There are a lot more players in the market space today than there ever have been, which is absolutely fantastic. But now if you still have this old program, you can’t really tap into that new talent. So you really have to figure out what is the best way for your program to either graduate the managers that you invested with from the beginning and making them a full time allocation in your portfolio. So not just in your emerging manager bucket, but these are one of your core managers in your portfolio because you have conviction behind these managers. And then how are you bringing in newer managers today and how do you keep that allocation growing over time? And so that’s something that I think the investors really need to be spending a lot of time on right now.
Aoifinn Devitt: That’s a really great point. And I think another point that I’ve seen, I’ve seen some emerging managers do this, and it takes a certain amount of guts to do this, is because emerging managers might typically get a farm team or a smaller allocation and not a kind of a mainstream core allocation. I’ve seen some emerging managers say, we don’t want to be in your emerging managers program. We want to stand up for a core allocation. We believe we deserve a core allocation, we’re of the right caliber and we don’t want to be seen as a farm team allocation. And they’ve done that and it has worked. It has meant they’ve turned away some smaller dollar amounts, but they have from the very beginning gone for the core allocation. As I said, it’s probably, it takes guts. That strategy won’t always work, but maybe that’s also one step.
24. Judy Chambers: I think you’re absolutely right. That is a fantastic point. And so I think that’s the perfect example where an emerging manager program can sometimes hinder a manager because again, because of the size of the allocation or because of the bucket that you may be putting the manager in, they’re not able to grow at the same rate that they should be growing at. So that, that is definitely a major concern. And yes, I always Tell managers when you’re marketing yourself to an institutional investor, you need to do your homework and figure out where do you best fit in the portfolio. So yes, you may be defined as an emerging manager because of, you know, your fund one, two or three or a diverse manager because you’re minority owned or woman owned. But again, you should be fighting to get a full time place in the portfolio. You should never just limit yourself to kind of what’s what may be seen as the easiest thing to do. So you have to be able to maneuver yourself and really market yourself strategically with each institutional investor to figure out where is the best place that you might be able to fit into their portfolios.
Aoifinn Devitt: I’d like to move to talk about your work at Twigo, your chair of the advisory board there. Not everybody here will know what the Twigo foundation is. Can you just first just tell us what Twigo foundation is and what you’ve learned about the experience of young graduates that have gone through that program?
24. Judy Chambers: Sure. It’s the Robert Twigo foundation that was started, I believe we are in our 31st year. The organization was started to really change the face of Wall street and to make Wall street more diverse. Robert and Sue Twigo noticed that there wasn’t a lot of diversity, but they were meeting a lot of great, great, smart, aggressive people who they felt would make truly make a change on Wall Street. So they started this foundation whereby students are interviewed as they are applying to business school to become a Twigo Fellow. They get a fabulous mentor during the process. Once they’re selected, they’re given assistance with getting jobs and they’re really given, call it a lifetime of mentorship via the organization and all of various companies and mentors that are sponsors of the organization to really help Wall street and asset management in particular to change over time to be more inclusive, to be more diverse. And so it’s been a fantastic program. Many of the most successful managers in asset management. I focus on private equity. There are a lot of people who are Twigo alum who are owning their own private equity firms or they’re in senior management positions at the investment banks and other asset management firms. So it’s really been a phenomenal organization over time. And it’s kind of interesting because two years ago, or maybe it was last year at the board meeting, a couple of people mentioned, hey, you know, what’s our projectory as an organization? And we’re doing a great job. So is there a time that Twigo will become obsolete and Then when you look now at kind of a lot of the things that have gone on in society just over this past year, it’s showing you that there’s still a huge role for tweco. The fight has not finished. And so the organization is still really well positioned to continue to ensure that diverse people get educated. The students are going to the top 20 business schools in the country, and they’re going into positions in finance and technology and investment consulting. And they’re really trying to make a difference in the industry. So that’s a little bit on Twigo, the organization itself, in terms of what are the graduates doing? Again, as I mentioned, most of these graduates are just off the charts phenomenal people. And they really just wanted the opportunity to get into business school, to get into finance, to get into asset management. And so the organization again, just continues to really support the students, again with mentorship, having a networking circle, being able to pick up the phone and call someone at a different organization to say, hey, I want to learn more about what you do and how you do it and how you’ve been successful. So, again, I think Bob and Sue Tweago have just done a phenomenal job. Nancy Sims runs the organization today. She’s the president. And so people know that they can reach out to her at any time and that the organization is going to be there for them.
Aoifinn Devitt: That’s so interesting. It’s shocking to me to think that they might have thought their work was done. If anything, it seems to me that we need to scale this on a very large scale. Because what I’m hearing often is that the pipeline is the problem, that there just aren’t enough students in the pipeline. And maybe if you can scale Twigo, make it global and do it, I’m sure it’s a challenging thing to do, but that might improve the pipeline. Do you see, of those programs in place, say, networking circles, mentorship, internships, affinity groups, what do you think has been the most powerful in your view?
24. Judy Chambers: I think it’s been a combination of things. I want to quickly go back to your pipeline comment, because I thought that was a great comment. There are a lot of people in the pipeline, and I think it’s really an issue of people need to change how they’re looking for other people. So it’s not an issue necessarily of the pipeline is so small, it’s not where it should be. But it has certainly grown over time. But people need to change the way how they’re recruiting. They need to change where they’re going to get people they need to change, you know, how are they interviewing people throughout the process? Everyone has a comfort level with interviewing someone who went to their own school. Right. So that’s kind of the affinity group angle, and that’s fine. But you don’t always necessarily have to interview someone from your same school that looks just like you. You’ve got to think differently and look at people’s careers. And so someone may not have had the typical investment banking career, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not still going to be successful in finance or in asset management. So I think at the end of the day, it all comes down to changing your mindset, being more open and really appreciating the differences that people have and. And kind of how they’ve come through the system and thinking creatively of how, you know, yes, they may, may or may not check all the boxes that you’re used to having, but maybe you need to look at, you know, what are these boxes that you’re creating and ensuring that they are more inclusive and they’re bringing in people of different thought, different age groups, and different experiences and so forth.
Aoifinn Devitt: This sounds like some great initiatives there. When you look back at your own career, have there been any setbacks or challenges that you have learned lessons from?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, Yeah, I mean, I think everyone has always had some sort of setback, and I think for me, they’ve always enabled me to get out of my comfort zone because it’s very easy to become a little complacent about your own career at times. And I think most setbacks have always just helped me to say, okay, what am I doing? Am I taking enough risk? Am I looking at this the right way? Am I challenging myself to go out there and meet more people or think about how my skill set can be applied differently and so forth. So I’ve always looked at challenges as just ways to not necessarily recreate myself, but kind of reposition myself.
Aoifinn Devitt: And you mentioned the internship program at JP Morgan that took you through four years, and I’m sure you had some mentors or even sponsors there. Were there any key people throughout your life, not just your professional career, who influenced you and in what way?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, most definitely my mother was the biggest influence. She was always the person to say, you know what? Take the risk. Just do it. It’s not something that I personally did, but this is something that I want you to. And so I think that has really influenced me throughout my career to always say, okay, you don’t always have to do the safest thing, or here’s something that’s a little bit different, or here’s something that maybe your friends aren’t doing and you should look into it. And I think it’s also influenced me on kind of how I also look at managers, always trying to find other things about the manager or how can I help my client to also look at a manager differently. So I think, you know, just my mother, just along the way, was always the primary person to say, hey, go for it. No, don’t. Don’t be so scared. And I think that’s really key. And there have certainly been a lot of people throughout my career who have also been encouraging and said, hey, you know, I like the way that you think. It’s not the way that I think, but I like the way that you do it. And I think that’s always kind of been refreshing as well.
Aoifinn Devitt: It’s so uplifting to hear that that’s come from your mother, because I think perhaps one thing what might be said about women or girls is that they don’t take enough risk or have the right attitude to risk. So it’s great to hear that it’s been passed woman to woman that way. Looking at maybe any pieces of advice that you received besides that advice to take the risk, was there any advice that you received or any creed or motto that you live by now?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, it was interesting. When I worked at Lehman Brothers, there was a managing director that I worked with during my first year as an associate there. And, you know, she pulled me into her office one day and she said, you know, I want to. I would just want to give you some perspective on things. And I said, okay, great, no problem. And she said, you know, I want to make sure that you understand the hierarchy in corporate America. And I’m not saying that I agree with it, but I’m just saying this is what it is, and I don’t want you to not know what it is. And she said, you know, it basically goes white man, black man, white woman, black woman. And she’s like, you know, that’s how it’s been over time. Now, I want you to take that information and figure out how do you rejigger that and how do you keep climbing, even though this is the structure that society has set up. And I don’t want you to be naive when you come up against roadblocks, because again, this is the framework that’s out there, but just know that you can maneuver through it. It’s going to be hard, and it’s going to Be challenging, but I want you to keep working towards that. And so I think that was something that not many people kind of address openly. She was absolutely correct, by the way. You know, she was absolutely spot on. But you know, it is something that we have to continue to try to change over time because that’s what society has kind of put forth. And like she said, that doesn’t make it right, but you have to understand the dynamics of what you’re working with.
Aoifinn Devitt: Wow. Yeah. All I can say is wow. I don’t think I’ve ever heard it saying quite such a categorical way, but you’re absolutely right, it is true. And I actually saw that hierarchy, even in things as small as buying a car from a used car salesman. I think in that order, that’s the order at which one might pay a higher price for the same car. So basically that the black woman is paying the most and the white man is probably paying the least. So I think if we translate that into finance, it probably has similar implications for salary, actually, if you think about it that way. So how did you incorporate that or internalize that in some of your maybe your job changes or negotiations or even interactions? Can you remember any specific examples?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I think I just always, again, I always see it out there and I think if anything, it’s just been something in my mind where I just don’t become discouraged by it. I see a lot of people who do become discouraged by it. But I think if you know that this is what you’re dealing with, again, you just learn to be smarter and you learn to maneuver through it and you just ensure that, most importantly, it doesn’t hold you back.
Aoifinn Devitt: So true. Looking now at your investment career, what is it that you like most about the investment world?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I think I really do like working with clients and my clients or institutional investors. A lot of them are, you know, public pension plans and Taft Hartley’s and endowments and foundations. And so I think it’s just great to be able to bring them new ideas. It’s good to listen to what their goals and objectives are and come up with creative ways to meet those goals and kind of help them to think out of the box at the same time. And I don’t think in a lot of positions you are always able to do that, but certainly within investment management you are. And it’s, you know, kind of good. At the end of the day, say, hey, you know what? Mission accomplished. Your work is never done. There’s always so much more to do. But I think if you can, you know, make some improvements over time, you know, then you feel good about the job that you’re doing.
Aoifinn Devitt: That really resonates with me. I always think, especially with the public pension plans, there’s a great opportunity to make an impact because we are translating the complex into the more, I think, approachable or understandable. And I think we make an impact every time we do that. So I completely, completely understand where you’re coming from with that. And then my last question is, what advice would you have for your younger self? Maybe sounds like you were already quite prepared for the world, age 15, but maybe if you were to look back at your teenage self, anything, you know, now that you wish you had known.
24. Judy Chambers: Then, I don’t know. I don’t know how prepared I was at that time. You know, I would probably take more risks. I probably would not have played it as safe, but I also probably would tell myself to, you know, meet as many people as possible and learn as much as possible. There’s so many different dynamics within finance and asset management. And again, you know, when, you know, when I started in banking, I was completely happy being in banking, but didn’t really know much about anything else. And just over time, you learn more and more. So I think if people just can continue getting that exposure, and I certainly should have pushed myself more to get more exposure. And I think. And that was part of the. One of the good things, I guess, of going to business school is that you do get that exposure, not just in the classroom, but outside of the classroom, by interacting with people who all come from different walks of life, who all have different backgrounds. And so you learn about, hey, what is private equity? Or, you know, what is asset management versus what is commercial banking or what have you, or venture capital. And so I think I would have told myself to do more of that because, you know, it’s okay to not follow a steady path, and it’s okay to do new things, but you have to know what those new things are. And so, you know, that’s always part of the challenge of getting educated on things. So I do think I probably should have done a lot more of that sooner. But I do think other people today, certainly with the millennials and with technology, they are getting that education at a faster pace than I think we’ve probably ever seen.
Aoifinn Devitt: Yes, it’s true. And I think the one thing I suppose I always try to remind myself is it’s getting all that exposure can be a lot of hard work, and it shouldn’t always have to be, you pushing. It would be nice if someone was also pulling. And it seems that the Twiga foundation and other programs like that hopefully are not making it all one sided that they’re offering the opportunity, offering the exposure, offering the mentorship. It’s not always you having to go out and seek it. And I think if we can get that balance right, it just perhaps makes it more likely to happen. Well, Judy, thank you so much. It’s been a real pleasure speaking with you. You’ve given us a ton of food for thought. Thank you for joining us.
24. Judy Chambers: Oh, thank you for having me. I think this is a great thing that you’re doing with the podcast and it’s really fun.
Aoifinn Devitt: I’m Aoifinn Devitt. Thank you for listening to the 50 Faces podcast. If you liked what you heard and would like to tune in to hear more inspiring investors and their personal journeys, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts wherever you get your podcasts. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice and all views are personal and should not be attributed to the organizations and affiliations of the host or any guest.
24. Judy Chambers: Sam.
Aoifinn Devitt: Our next guest started her journey in the world of investment with an internship at JP Morgan at the age of 15. Let’s hear what she learned throughout her career about the hierarchy in corporate America and how she vowed to not become discouraged, but to keep climbing despite it.
24. Judy Chambers: Foreign.
Aoifinn Devitt: I’m Aoifinn Devitt, and welcome to the 50 Faces podcast, a podcast committed to revealing the richness and diversity of the world of investment by focusing on its people and their stories. I’m joined today by Judy Chambers, who is managing principal of Makita Investment Group, an investment consulting firm. She’s had a long career in investment consulting and prior to that, investment banking. Based in New York City, she is chairman of the advisory board of the Twigo foundation and and sits on the board of the Community Service Society of New York. Welcome, Judy. Thank you for joining me today.
24. Judy Chambers: Thank you for having me, Aoifinn. This is fantastic. I really appreciate it.
Aoifinn Devitt: Let’s start with your career journey. How did it start and did it take any unusual turns along the way?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I don’t know if I’ve taken any unusual turns. I’ve actually been extremely fortunate to have had a number of cheerleaders and great people and organizations behind me who’ve always given me a lot of guidance and exposure. So I’m a. What’s called A Better Chance alum. A Better Chance as an organization based in New York City. And via that organization, I got an internship at the age of 15 at JP Morgan. A better Chance set up my interviews and everything for me. And so I’ll never forget it was Black Friday the day after Thanksgiving. I was a 10th grader, and, and I went down to J.P. morgan, and this is the, you know, J.P. morgan before a lot of all of the mergers and all that other stuff. And so I went down for an interview for an internship, and I was lucky enough to maintain that internship for four summers. So it took me through the rest of high school and then throughout college at Duke. And then the only year that I did not work there through college was when I had to do my public policy internship for my major. And so because I had that great experience on my resume in banking after college, I was hired by. It was nations bank at that time. Right now it’s bank of America as they’ve gone through mergers. And I worked there for four years, and then that really prepared me to pursue an mba. So I went to Kellogg at Northwestern University. And then, you know, during business school, I wanted to get into investment banking, and that’s what I was completely focused on. So I was an intern at Lehman Brothers. Then I got hired by Lehman Brothers full time. And then after working there for a number of years and quite honestly had gotten displaced, I was looking to do something new. And then I ended up meeting Alan Emkin, who at the time was the founder of PCA. And he hired me to open up PCA’s only East coast office and PCA’s Pension Consulting Alliance. And so I focused on private markets. And in 2019, PCA merged with Makita Investment Group. So I kind of have had a pretty steady track, so to speak, relative to a lot of other people. So I feel really fortunate about that.
Aoifinn Devitt: That’s an extraordinary story. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone having an internship at a bank. Age 15.
24. Judy Chambers: Amazing. I don’t think I was legally supposed to be there at 15. I think I was supposed to be 16, but you know, I had skipped a year in school. So I was the right year academically, but just not age wise.
Aoifinn Devitt: And back then, were you studying STEM subjects? Did you know you wanted to go into finance in some ways? Were you studying economics or how did that come up for you?
24. Judy Chambers: Yeah, I think I knew I wanted to go to go into finance because of my experience at JP Morgan. So again, I was very fortunate to have gotten the exposure to finance at a very early stage. And so in going into college I was a public policy and Spanish major, but I took a lot of economic classes. So again, I just think I was always on that track, which, you know, most kids aren’t at a very early age. They change their majors a number of times, which they absolutely should. But I think because I’d gotten that exposure and it really kind of fit my personality, I just pursued that the entire time.
Aoifinn Devitt: And I know we’ll talk about this later when we speak about your work with Twigo, but now going back to your current role in investment consulting. Role, you obviously sit side by side with allocators. How much of your time do you spend sourcing and diligencing independent women and minority owned firms?
24. Judy Chambers: I focus on private markets, so private equity, private credit, infrastructure investments and so forth. And I actually spend a decent amount of time sourcing and diligencing. I’ll call it emerging managers, defined as managers on their first, second and third time funds as well as women owned and minority owned funds. Certainly over the years that has become more of a focus for our clients. So it certainly has become more of a focus for us. But you know, there I have seen some really good developments in that area. I think there’s a lot more that needs to be done and can be done, but the managers in the space are stronger than ever. They’re all super smart people. That’s never a question. They all are coming out of larger shops, they have great experience, they’ve been in finance for a number of years. But I think compared to, you know, 13 years ago when I started on the consulting side, I think their level of sophistication is higher. I think they’re really learning from the people who have come before them. And so when they’re starting in the marketplace, they are a lot more institutionalized than say they were 10 or 13 years ago, which I think is always a great thing. So yeah, it’s been a nice development in the marketplace, but again, there’s so much more to be done.
Aoifinn Devitt: And when you look, say from a client side at some of those clients who have emerging manager programs, I spoke recently with somebody who’s developing that at a hospital plan. Often we see them start perhaps at the public plans. What do you see in terms of the take up among institutional clients of either emerging manager programs or a desire to have more diversity in their manager base?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I think people are focusing on it more and more now and I think as a result the programs themselves are developing. I think initially there was an interest, people didn’t quite know what to do, so they just kind of allocated some dollar amount of their portfolio. And quite honestly, I don’t know how much rhyme or reason was behind the number that was selected, but they put aside X amount earmarked for these programs. And I think that was great because you have to start somewhere. What I think is happening now is people are saying, okay, we did this initially, it’s working out for us, but now we have the challenge of changing or tweaking or call it transforming the programs because the managers have transformed and there are a lot more managers in the marketplace. So whereas initially you may have started a program where you were allocating, and I’m going to use an example, let’s say 25 to $50 million to a manager, and that’s wonder, but now that manager has grown and so now you need to figure out if the manager is produced for you and you’ve got a good partnership there, how do you maintain that relationship? And you’re not going to really be able to do that in the best way by still just writing that same 25 or $50 million check. And so I think the challenge for institutional investors right now is they need to think about how do they move to the next step with these programs. So if you originally had a 200 million or a $500 million program, and again, you may have selected that dollar amount pretty arbitrarily, now you really have to think about how do you make a program that’s going to continue to support the managers that you’ve supported from day one, and then how do you also incorporate the newer managers that are coming into the marketplace? Because it’s really gotten so much more competitive now, which I think is wonderful. There are a lot more players in the market space today than there ever have been, which is absolutely fantastic. But now if you still have this old program, you can’t really tap into that new talent. So you really have to figure out what is the best way for your program to either graduate the managers that you invested with from the beginning and making them a full time allocation in your portfolio. So not just in your emerging manager bucket, but these are one of your core managers in your portfolio because you have conviction behind these managers. And then how are you bringing in newer managers today and how do you keep that allocation growing over time? And so that’s something that I think the investors really need to be spending a lot of time on right now.
Aoifinn Devitt: That’s a really great point. And I think another point that I’ve seen, I’ve seen some emerging managers do this, and it takes a certain amount of guts to do this, is because emerging managers might typically get a farm team or a smaller allocation and not a kind of a mainstream core allocation. I’ve seen some emerging managers say, we don’t want to be in your emerging managers program. We want to stand up for a core allocation. We believe we deserve a core allocation, we’re of the right caliber and we don’t want to be seen as a farm team allocation. And they’ve done that and it has worked. It has meant they’ve turned away some smaller dollar amounts, but they have from the very beginning gone for the core allocation. As I said, it’s probably, it takes guts. That strategy won’t always work, but maybe that’s also one step.
24. Judy Chambers: I think you’re absolutely right. That is a fantastic point. And so I think that’s the perfect example where an emerging manager program can sometimes hinder a manager because again, because of the size of the allocation or because of the bucket that you may be putting the manager in, they’re not able to grow at the same rate that they should be growing at. So that, that is definitely a major concern. And yes, I always Tell managers when you’re marketing yourself to an institutional investor, you need to do your homework and figure out where do you best fit in the portfolio. So yes, you may be defined as an emerging manager because of, you know, your fund one, two or three or a diverse manager because you’re minority owned or woman owned. But again, you should be fighting to get a full time place in the portfolio. You should never just limit yourself to kind of what’s what may be seen as the easiest thing to do. So you have to be able to maneuver yourself and really market yourself strategically with each institutional investor to figure out where is the best place that you might be able to fit into their portfolios.
Aoifinn Devitt: I’d like to move to talk about your work at Twigo, your chair of the advisory board there. Not everybody here will know what the Twigo foundation is. Can you just first just tell us what Twigo foundation is and what you’ve learned about the experience of young graduates that have gone through that program?
24. Judy Chambers: Sure. It’s the Robert Twigo foundation that was started, I believe we are in our 31st year. The organization was started to really change the face of Wall street and to make Wall street more diverse. Robert and Sue Twigo noticed that there wasn’t a lot of diversity, but they were meeting a lot of great, great, smart, aggressive people who they felt would make truly make a change on Wall Street. So they started this foundation whereby students are interviewed as they are applying to business school to become a Twigo Fellow. They get a fabulous mentor during the process. Once they’re selected, they’re given assistance with getting jobs and they’re really given, call it a lifetime of mentorship via the organization and all of various companies and mentors that are sponsors of the organization to really help Wall street and asset management in particular to change over time to be more inclusive, to be more diverse. And so it’s been a fantastic program. Many of the most successful managers in asset management. I focus on private equity. There are a lot of people who are Twigo alum who are owning their own private equity firms or they’re in senior management positions at the investment banks and other asset management firms. So it’s really been a phenomenal organization over time. And it’s kind of interesting because two years ago, or maybe it was last year at the board meeting, a couple of people mentioned, hey, you know, what’s our projectory as an organization? And we’re doing a great job. So is there a time that Twigo will become obsolete and Then when you look now at kind of a lot of the things that have gone on in society just over this past year, it’s showing you that there’s still a huge role for tweco. The fight has not finished. And so the organization is still really well positioned to continue to ensure that diverse people get educated. The students are going to the top 20 business schools in the country, and they’re going into positions in finance and technology and investment consulting. And they’re really trying to make a difference in the industry. So that’s a little bit on Twigo, the organization itself, in terms of what are the graduates doing? Again, as I mentioned, most of these graduates are just off the charts phenomenal people. And they really just wanted the opportunity to get into business school, to get into finance, to get into asset management. And so the organization again, just continues to really support the students, again with mentorship, having a networking circle, being able to pick up the phone and call someone at a different organization to say, hey, I want to learn more about what you do and how you do it and how you’ve been successful. So, again, I think Bob and Sue Tweago have just done a phenomenal job. Nancy Sims runs the organization today. She’s the president. And so people know that they can reach out to her at any time and that the organization is going to be there for them.
Aoifinn Devitt: That’s so interesting. It’s shocking to me to think that they might have thought their work was done. If anything, it seems to me that we need to scale this on a very large scale. Because what I’m hearing often is that the pipeline is the problem, that there just aren’t enough students in the pipeline. And maybe if you can scale Twigo, make it global and do it, I’m sure it’s a challenging thing to do, but that might improve the pipeline. Do you see, of those programs in place, say, networking circles, mentorship, internships, affinity groups, what do you think has been the most powerful in your view?
24. Judy Chambers: I think it’s been a combination of things. I want to quickly go back to your pipeline comment, because I thought that was a great comment. There are a lot of people in the pipeline, and I think it’s really an issue of people need to change how they’re looking for other people. So it’s not an issue necessarily of the pipeline is so small, it’s not where it should be. But it has certainly grown over time. But people need to change the way how they’re recruiting. They need to change where they’re going to get people they need to change, you know, how are they interviewing people throughout the process? Everyone has a comfort level with interviewing someone who went to their own school. Right. So that’s kind of the affinity group angle, and that’s fine. But you don’t always necessarily have to interview someone from your same school that looks just like you. You’ve got to think differently and look at people’s careers. And so someone may not have had the typical investment banking career, but that doesn’t mean that they’re not still going to be successful in finance or in asset management. So I think at the end of the day, it all comes down to changing your mindset, being more open and really appreciating the differences that people have and. And kind of how they’ve come through the system and thinking creatively of how, you know, yes, they may, may or may not check all the boxes that you’re used to having, but maybe you need to look at, you know, what are these boxes that you’re creating and ensuring that they are more inclusive and they’re bringing in people of different thought, different age groups, and different experiences and so forth.
Aoifinn Devitt: This sounds like some great initiatives there. When you look back at your own career, have there been any setbacks or challenges that you have learned lessons from?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, Yeah, I mean, I think everyone has always had some sort of setback, and I think for me, they’ve always enabled me to get out of my comfort zone because it’s very easy to become a little complacent about your own career at times. And I think most setbacks have always just helped me to say, okay, what am I doing? Am I taking enough risk? Am I looking at this the right way? Am I challenging myself to go out there and meet more people or think about how my skill set can be applied differently and so forth. So I’ve always looked at challenges as just ways to not necessarily recreate myself, but kind of reposition myself.
Aoifinn Devitt: And you mentioned the internship program at JP Morgan that took you through four years, and I’m sure you had some mentors or even sponsors there. Were there any key people throughout your life, not just your professional career, who influenced you and in what way?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, most definitely my mother was the biggest influence. She was always the person to say, you know what? Take the risk. Just do it. It’s not something that I personally did, but this is something that I want you to. And so I think that has really influenced me throughout my career to always say, okay, you don’t always have to do the safest thing, or here’s something that’s a little bit different, or here’s something that maybe your friends aren’t doing and you should look into it. And I think it’s also influenced me on kind of how I also look at managers, always trying to find other things about the manager or how can I help my client to also look at a manager differently. So I think, you know, just my mother, just along the way, was always the primary person to say, hey, go for it. No, don’t. Don’t be so scared. And I think that’s really key. And there have certainly been a lot of people throughout my career who have also been encouraging and said, hey, you know, I like the way that you think. It’s not the way that I think, but I like the way that you do it. And I think that’s always kind of been refreshing as well.
Aoifinn Devitt: It’s so uplifting to hear that that’s come from your mother, because I think perhaps one thing what might be said about women or girls is that they don’t take enough risk or have the right attitude to risk. So it’s great to hear that it’s been passed woman to woman that way. Looking at maybe any pieces of advice that you received besides that advice to take the risk, was there any advice that you received or any creed or motto that you live by now?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, it was interesting. When I worked at Lehman Brothers, there was a managing director that I worked with during my first year as an associate there. And, you know, she pulled me into her office one day and she said, you know, I want to. I would just want to give you some perspective on things. And I said, okay, great, no problem. And she said, you know, I want to make sure that you understand the hierarchy in corporate America. And I’m not saying that I agree with it, but I’m just saying this is what it is, and I don’t want you to not know what it is. And she said, you know, it basically goes white man, black man, white woman, black woman. And she’s like, you know, that’s how it’s been over time. Now, I want you to take that information and figure out how do you rejigger that and how do you keep climbing, even though this is the structure that society has set up. And I don’t want you to be naive when you come up against roadblocks, because again, this is the framework that’s out there, but just know that you can maneuver through it. It’s going to be hard, and it’s going to Be challenging, but I want you to keep working towards that. And so I think that was something that not many people kind of address openly. She was absolutely correct, by the way. You know, she was absolutely spot on. But you know, it is something that we have to continue to try to change over time because that’s what society has kind of put forth. And like she said, that doesn’t make it right, but you have to understand the dynamics of what you’re working with.
Aoifinn Devitt: Wow. Yeah. All I can say is wow. I don’t think I’ve ever heard it saying quite such a categorical way, but you’re absolutely right, it is true. And I actually saw that hierarchy, even in things as small as buying a car from a used car salesman. I think in that order, that’s the order at which one might pay a higher price for the same car. So basically that the black woman is paying the most and the white man is probably paying the least. So I think if we translate that into finance, it probably has similar implications for salary, actually, if you think about it that way. So how did you incorporate that or internalize that in some of your maybe your job changes or negotiations or even interactions? Can you remember any specific examples?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I think I just always, again, I always see it out there and I think if anything, it’s just been something in my mind where I just don’t become discouraged by it. I see a lot of people who do become discouraged by it. But I think if you know that this is what you’re dealing with, again, you just learn to be smarter and you learn to maneuver through it and you just ensure that, most importantly, it doesn’t hold you back.
Aoifinn Devitt: So true. Looking now at your investment career, what is it that you like most about the investment world?
24. Judy Chambers: You know, I think I really do like working with clients and my clients or institutional investors. A lot of them are, you know, public pension plans and Taft Hartley’s and endowments and foundations. And so I think it’s just great to be able to bring them new ideas. It’s good to listen to what their goals and objectives are and come up with creative ways to meet those goals and kind of help them to think out of the box at the same time. And I don’t think in a lot of positions you are always able to do that, but certainly within investment management you are. And it’s, you know, kind of good. At the end of the day, say, hey, you know what? Mission accomplished. Your work is never done. There’s always so much more to do. But I think if you can, you know, make some improvements over time, you know, then you feel good about the job that you’re doing.
Aoifinn Devitt: That really resonates with me. I always think, especially with the public pension plans, there’s a great opportunity to make an impact because we are translating the complex into the more, I think, approachable or understandable. And I think we make an impact every time we do that. So I completely, completely understand where you’re coming from with that. And then my last question is, what advice would you have for your younger self? Maybe sounds like you were already quite prepared for the world, age 15, but maybe if you were to look back at your teenage self, anything, you know, now that you wish you had known.
24. Judy Chambers: Then, I don’t know. I don’t know how prepared I was at that time. You know, I would probably take more risks. I probably would not have played it as safe, but I also probably would tell myself to, you know, meet as many people as possible and learn as much as possible. There’s so many different dynamics within finance and asset management. And again, you know, when, you know, when I started in banking, I was completely happy being in banking, but didn’t really know much about anything else. And just over time, you learn more and more. So I think if people just can continue getting that exposure, and I certainly should have pushed myself more to get more exposure. And I think. And that was part of the. One of the good things, I guess, of going to business school is that you do get that exposure, not just in the classroom, but outside of the classroom, by interacting with people who all come from different walks of life, who all have different backgrounds. And so you learn about, hey, what is private equity? Or, you know, what is asset management versus what is commercial banking or what have you, or venture capital. And so I think I would have told myself to do more of that because, you know, it’s okay to not follow a steady path, and it’s okay to do new things, but you have to know what those new things are. And so, you know, that’s always part of the challenge of getting educated on things. So I do think I probably should have done a lot more of that sooner. But I do think other people today, certainly with the millennials and with technology, they are getting that education at a faster pace than I think we’ve probably ever seen.
Aoifinn Devitt: Yes, it’s true. And I think the one thing I suppose I always try to remind myself is it’s getting all that exposure can be a lot of hard work, and it shouldn’t always have to be, you pushing. It would be nice if someone was also pulling. And it seems that the Twiga foundation and other programs like that hopefully are not making it all one sided that they’re offering the opportunity, offering the exposure, offering the mentorship. It’s not always you having to go out and seek it. And I think if we can get that balance right, it just perhaps makes it more likely to happen. Well, Judy, thank you so much. It’s been a real pleasure speaking with you. You’ve given us a ton of food for thought. Thank you for joining us.
24. Judy Chambers: Oh, thank you for having me. I think this is a great thing that you’re doing with the podcast and it’s really fun.
Aoifinn Devitt: I’m Aoifinn Devitt. Thank you for listening to the 50 Faces podcast. If you liked what you heard and would like to tune in to hear more inspiring investors and their personal journeys, please subscribe on Apple Podcasts wherever you get your podcasts. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as investment advice and all views are personal and should not be attributed to the organizations and affiliations of the host or any guest.
24. Judy Chambers: Sam.
