✓ Knowledge ✓ Reason ✓ Purpose
Welcome to my site!
I am an experienced finance professional and general manager with legal, regulatory and business background in the UK and the EU.
My management philosophy can be summarised in three terms:
Knowledge – Reason – Purpose
Contact me!
This is not grandiloquent but rather simple. It is based on my experience including:
- General management of a country operation with 200+ people and €15 billion of assets
- Organisational restructuring and management of profound organisational change – concepts and implementation – people, processes, results
- Building and managing large asset portfolios including complex capital market transactions, project finance and other structured assets
- Steering and administration of asset management subsidiaries and SPVs – company directorship
- Legal structuring of transactions and products plus restructuring of assets
- Risk transfer mechanisms
- Derivatives trading and documentation
- Trans-cultural understanding – recognising differences and commonalities
- I have been from banking to asset management and back to banking. Along the ride through good and bad times, I have learned how important good structures and processes are. Finance sits in a particular and allegedly tight regulatory framework because the financial system is inherently fragile and this makes the imperative of structures and processes all the more important.
- I have also conceptualised and implemented significant restructuring measures achieving simplification, more logical processes (this is harder than it seems) and cost savings without leaving decorum in the dust (this should not be as hard as it seems).
- I am offering thoughts on the topics of general management, managing change, banking and asset management, regulation and restructuring. I have set this up as a place where I can reflect and write without the constraints of an organisation’s website or intranet and the noise of a public place like LinkedIn
VIDEANT – Why the name?
Senatus consultum ultimum or ‚SCU‘ was the last act of the Senate in times of emergency for the Roman republic. It bestowed all powers on two consuls who were reminded of their responsibility with the words „videant consules, ne quid res publica detrimenti capiat“ – „May the consuls take care that the republic shall not suffer any loss“. I have chosen this name because I believe that this also represents what good management should do. In today’s corporate world, there are a lot of rules and regulations – even more so in finance through ever more elaborate regulation. Often, these rules are imposed and not ingrained. You will find more of this under Regulatory Compliance and General & Change Management – structures and processes.
Why the bridge theme in the logo and on this site?
Good organisations are like bridges – connecting (i) people with tasks and roles, (ii) customers with products and services and (iii) divisions or departments with the organisation’s overall purpose. Few companies achieve all this but every organisation should try.
The bridge pictured at the top of this site really exists. It is the motorway bridge across the Rhine river in the flightpath of Dusseldorf International Airport and has also inspired the logo of VIDEANT.EU.