As the fixed income industry evolves, so do the skills needed to succeed — and emotional intelligence is increasingly at the forefront of how buy-side firms are thinking about leadership development.
“It isn’t as hard as you think to find smart people, IQ wise,” said Matthew Sizemore, senior manager, fixed income trading at HighTower Advisors. “But being able to manage interpersonal relationships is really impactful over time. In our firm, we’re definitely leveraging more training around the human component of that, and how we manage internal relationships. In fixed income, educating internal stakeholders is sometimes the most difficult part of the job, so being able to teach anyone you bring on board the emotional side of it and how to relate to people, and what can be a complex matter, is going to be really important.”
That emphasis on emotional intelligence was echoed in the panel’s broader focus on adaptability, not just in navigating technology or markets, but in training and managing talent.
“I think developing the next generation of talent is similar to how you want to go about raising your kids to be creative,” said Ryan Hook, portfolio manager, Schwab Asset Management. “You want to provide enough guidance and support, but also have them try new things. As you wouldn’t send your six-year-old to try to learn to ride a bike in a busy street, in terms of trading talent, you wouldn’t also bring a junior trader and have them start trading distressed debt on day one. You want to provide mentorship, guidance, allow them to feel ownership. So, provide them enough rope so that they can learn from their mistakes — hopefully do so with certain guidelines, constraints — so that any mistake is not costly, but it’s a learning opportunity.”
That sense of ownership, paired with thoughtful mentorship, was framed as key to helping young talent grow with confidence.
“One of the best pieces of advice that I’ve ever received was, each day, try to do something that’ll make you feel uncomfortable,” Hook added.
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