Bob McCann, CEO of UBS Wealth Management Americas, shares his insights on philanthropy and business in Ireland and America

It’s clear that McCann refuses to see institutions, from Wall Street to the American government to the Catholic Church, as faceless and uncontrollable beings to be blamed for America’s challenges. He believes that good leadership by individuals in positions of power can overcome the most daunting of issues on large and small scales. Some of this philosophy comes from his two years under the mentorship of David Komansky, former chairman and CEO of Merrill Lynch who grew up in a family of Russian Jewish immigrants and Irish Catholics. “There was a time in my life when I was trying to decide what direction to go. I was 33 years old. I’d been a trader up until that point in my life, and I loved it, I loved the action, I loved the markets. I had taken on some management responsibilities. I was a producing manager, and my definition of managing at the time was that I yelled louder than other people on the trading floor. Komansky worked with me over a two-year period and he helped me cross the bridge from being a producer, but one largely responsible for myself, to being a leader and an executive and being responsible for other people, and the joy and frustration that can come from that… I lost my temper on the trading floor, and he said, ‘Leadership is a privilege, not your right.’ I think all of us have to remember that people don’t have to follow, so we need to treat people in a way that they want to follow, and to create a vision for them to want to follow. Then we also need to explain to them where they tie into that.

“One thing that we have to fix, and we have to fix this quickly: big institutions have failed us. It isn’t just companies. Government leaders have failed, sports stars have failed. I’m Roman Catholic; the Catholic Church has failed people. Wall Street, big banks – organizations that are an important part of the cultural fabric –  have failed people. Whether it’s how the pope leads or how the president leads, when people are given positions of responsibility and influence, whether you are a professional athlete or you’re running a business … People turned their children over to the church and the church violated that trust. People put their money in banks and we violated their trust as an industry, and we’ve got to fix that. We’ve got to do the right thing.”

For McCann, doing the right thing in his industry means empowering clients to reengage in their financial planning and restoring their confidence in investments. His vision for working towards this goal is personal, and probably at odds with how many consumers imagine the priorities of investment agencies. “I think the biggest thing we can do is taking the time to really get to know our clients and understand them,” he says. “Clients don’t want to be sold products. Clients want somebody who can sit with them in a room and get to know them inside and out, talk with them and figure out their hopes, their dreams, their fears. And then work with them to come up with a game plan for them as to how they’re going to live their life and how they’re going to invest their money. You know, many decisions in life have a financial element. Life isn’t all about money, but let’s not be naive. To make many of the big decisions in life that you want to make, you have to be aware and understand what your financial position is. … the mistake that you make as an industry is when we sell people things. I’ve always felt that products are just the building blocks that we use. What we’re really trying to do for a client is get them in a position where they understand what they have, they understand the risk of everything they own, that there’s a game plan with the client, with the client involved with the financial advisors to execute it.

​
Nster.com