Skip to main content
MENU
Subscribe
  • Subscribe
  • Account
  • LOGIN
  • Topics
    • Alternatives
    • Consultants
    • Coronavirus
    • Courts
    • Defined Contribution
    • ESG
    • ETFs
    • Hedge Funds
    • Industry Voices
    • Investing
    • Money Management
    • Opinion
    • Partner Content
    • Pension Funds
    • Private Equity
    • Real Estate
    • Russia-Ukraine War
    • SECURE Act 2.0
    • Special Reports
    • White Papers
  • Rankings & Awards
    • 1,000 Largest Retirement Plans
    • Top-Performing Managers
    • Largest Money Managers
    • DC Money Managers
    • DC Record Keepers
    • Largest Hedge Fund Managers
    • World's Largest Retirement Funds
    • Best Places to Work in Money Management
    • Excellence & Innovation Awards
    • Eddy Awards
  • ETFs
    • Latest ETF News
    • Fund Screener
    • Education Center
    • Equities
    • Fixed Income
    • Commodities
    • Actively Managed
    • Alternatives
    • ESG Rated
  • ESG
    • Latest ESG News
    • The Institutional Investor’s Guide to ESG Investing
    • Climate Change: The Inescapable Opportunity
    • Impact Investing
    • 2022 ESG Investing Conference
    • ESG Rated ETFs
  • Defined Contribution
    • Latest DC News
    • DC Money Manager Rankings
    • DC Record Keeper Rankings
    • Innovations in DC
    • Trends in DC: Focus on Retirement Income
    • 2022 Defined Contribution East Conference
    • 2022 DC Investment Lineup Conference
  • Searches & Hires
    • Latest Searches & Hires News
    • Searches & Hires Database
    • RFPs
  • Performance Data
    • P&I Research Center
    • Earnings Tracker
    • Endowment Returns Tracker
    • Corporate Pension Contribution Tracker
    • Pension Fund Returns Tracker
    • Pension Risk Transfer Database
    • Future of Investments Research Series
    • Charts & Infographics
    • Polls
  • Careers
  • Events
    • View All Conferences
    • View All Webinars
    • 2022 Innovation Investing Conference
    • 2022 Defined Contribution East Conference
    • 2022 ESG Investing Conference
    • 2022 DC Investment Lineup Conference
    • 2022 Alternatives Investing Conference
Breadcrumb
  1. Home
  2. Print
October 03, 2005 01:00 AM

Executives at transition firms in job-changing frenzy

Gregory Crawford
  • Tweet
  • Share
  • Share
  • Email
  • More
    Reprints Print

    The game of musical chairs in transition management is on.

    Nearly a dozen professionals have changed jobs so far this year, a sign to many industry executives that transition management is undergoing rapid change, with new firms entering the business and other firms restructuring or exiting entirely.

    "We've seen a lot of new entrants into transition management," said Mark Keleher, president of Mellon Transition Management Services, San Francisco. "Certainly on the broker-dealer side, this is one of the few areas on Wall Street that's growing. Many firms have decided they'd like to enter the transition management space and they're hiring different teams and you're seeing entire teams move en masse to new firms."

    Personnel changes

    Among the personnel changes during the last six months or so:

    • Charles Shaffer and William Stush joined Merrill Lynch & Co. from Deutsche Bank, both in New York.

    • Michael Gardner was hired by Institutional Direct Inc., a unit of Bear Stearns & Co. Inc., New York, from Russell Investment Group, Tacoma, Wash., to build a transition management business, and a team of three transition management officials joined Institutional Direct from Bank of New York.

    • Jeff Blanchard joined JPMorgan Chase Bank, New York, to help build that firm's transition management business. He had left Northern Trust Corp., Chicago, in 2004.

    • Sharon Egilinsky, global co-head of transition management at Citigroup, New York, left the firm to pursue "an entrepreneurial opportunity," according to a Citigroup memo. No additional details were available.

    • Kristi Michem joined Barclays Global Investors, San Francisco, from Goldman Sachs & Co., New York, to run BGI's transition management business. The position had been open for two years.

    Kevin Byrne, vice president at JPMorgan Chase, said firms committed to transition management are adding people, while firms not committed are not filling vacant positions.

    But some transition management executives said broker-dealers are trying to take advantage of a window of opportunity as more plan sponsors use transition managers. "A lot of investment banks are trying to get a foothold in transition management," said Kevin Hardy, global director of transition management at Northern Trust. "They're seeing fantastic opportunity."

    He said the transition management business is split into two groups: investment banks that cannot act as a fiduciary to the client, and firms that can, such as custodians like Northern Trust.

    "There is a gray area (by plan sponsors as to which route to take) and while that exists, investment banks are saying ‘we'll seize this opportunity,'" Mr. Hardy said. "A lot of the hires have been on the sales side and, to me, that says they believe there's an opportunity."

    Disclosure questions

    For their part, broker-dealers claim that as registered investment advisers under the Investment Company Act of 1940, they can act as a fiduciary and charge that custodians doing transitions don't always disclose where their revenues are coming from or which firms they are trading with.

    "Custodians don't strip out the alternative revenue sources" from a transition, said the head of a broker-dealer transition department, who asked not to be named. "What do they disclose?

    "It's a single business between the investment banking broker-dealer and the investment arm," he added. "We're a 100% fiduciary when the client wants us to be" through the firm's investment management unit.

    Regardless of these arguments, the issue of plan sponsors requiring transition managers to be fiduciaries is forcing major changes in the industry.

    "One of the key issues that has evolved since 2003 is the concept of the fiduciary and the transition manager taking on a fiduciary role in the transition," explained Bo Abesamis, senior vice president at Callan Associates, San Francisco.

    He said given this development, "there's pressure on broker-dealers to come up with a business model that will fit into this new reality" and that pressure is causing some people to change firms.

    "I think the changes that we're seeing — aside from the natural progression of people jumping ship after five years in an organization — are people aligning their interest with entities that are moving or creating a business model adjusted to the new reality."

    In addition, with a limited talent pool to choose from, some firms are offering sizable compensation packages to lure transition management experts, industry players said.

    "There are very few experienced people in this business," said Ross McLellan, managing director of the global markets unit at State Street Corp., Boston. "Firms are really trying to find anyone they can get who has relationships and can get business. People are being overpaid to try and move over and start a business."

    Recommended for You
    Read the print edition of P&I
    Read the print edition of P&I
    How low is low? Projections say it's not low enough
    How low is low? Projections say it's not low enough
    FINRA honors Wharton's Olivia Mitchell with Ketchum Prize
    FINRA honors Wharton's Olivia Mitchell with Ketchum Prize
    Alternatives: Investing Across the Spectrum
    Sponsored Content: Alternatives: Investing Across the Spectrum

    Reader Poll

    May 9, 2022
    SEE MORE POLLS >
    Sponsored
    White Papers
    Are Factors a Thing of the Past?
    Q2 2022 Credit Outlook: Carry On
    Leverage does not equal risk
    Is there a mid-cap gap in your DC plan?
    Out of the Shadows: The Revolution in Shadow Accounting
    The pivotal role of fixed income markets in the ESG revolution
    View More
    Sponsored Content
    Partner Content
    The Industrialization of ESG Investment
    For institutional investors, ETFs can make meeting liquidity needs easier
    Gold: the most effective commodity investment
    2021 Investment Outlook | Investing Beyond the Pandemic: A Reset for Portfolios
    Ten ways retirement plan professionals add value to plan sponsors
    Gold: an efficient hedge
    View More
    E-MAIL NEWSLETTERS

    Sign up and get the best of News delivered straight to your email inbox, free of charge. Choose your news – we will deliver.

    Subscribe Today
    May 9, 2022 page one

    Get access to the news, research and analysis of events affecting the retirement and institutional money management businesses from a worldwide network of reporters and editors.

    Subscribe
    Connect With Us
    • RSS
    • Twitter
    • Facebook
    • LinkedIn

    Our Mission

    To consistently deliver news, research and analysis to the executives who manage the flow of funds in the institutional investment market.

    About Us

    Main Office
    685 Third Avenue
    Tenth Floor
    New York, NY 10017-4036

    Chicago Office
    130 E. Randolph St.
    Suite 3200
    Chicago, IL 60601

    Contact Us

    Careers at Crain

    About Pensions & Investments

     

    Advertising
    • Media Kit
    • P&I Content Solutions
    • P&I Careers | Post a Job
    • Reprints & Permissions
    Resources
    • Subscribe
    • Newsletters
    • FAQ
    • P&I Research Center
    • Site map
    • Staff Directory
    Legal
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Request
    Pensions & Investments
    Copyright © 1996-2022. Crain Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
    • Topics
      • Alternatives
      • Consultants
      • Coronavirus
      • Courts
      • Defined Contribution
      • ESG
      • ETFs
      • Hedge Funds
      • Industry Voices
      • Investing
      • Money Management
      • Opinion
      • Partner Content
      • Pension Funds
      • Private Equity
      • Real Estate
      • Russia-Ukraine War
      • SECURE Act 2.0
      • Special Reports
      • White Papers
    • Rankings & Awards
      • 1,000 Largest Retirement Plans
      • Top-Performing Managers
      • Largest Money Managers
      • DC Money Managers
      • DC Record Keepers
      • Largest Hedge Fund Managers
      • World's Largest Retirement Funds
      • Best Places to Work in Money Management
      • Excellence & Innovation Awards
      • Eddy Awards
    • ETFs
      • Latest ETF News
      • Fund Screener
      • Education Center
      • Equities
      • Fixed Income
      • Commodities
      • Actively Managed
      • Alternatives
      • ESG Rated
    • ESG
      • Latest ESG News
      • The Institutional Investor’s Guide to ESG Investing
      • Climate Change: The Inescapable Opportunity
      • Impact Investing
      • 2022 ESG Investing Conference
      • ESG Rated ETFs
    • Defined Contribution
      • Latest DC News
      • DC Money Manager Rankings
      • DC Record Keeper Rankings
      • Innovations in DC
      • Trends in DC: Focus on Retirement Income
      • 2022 Defined Contribution East Conference
      • 2022 DC Investment Lineup Conference
    • Searches & Hires
      • Latest Searches & Hires News
      • Searches & Hires Database
      • RFPs
    • Performance Data
      • P&I Research Center
      • Earnings Tracker
      • Endowment Returns Tracker
      • Corporate Pension Contribution Tracker
      • Pension Fund Returns Tracker
      • Pension Risk Transfer Database
      • Future of Investments Research Series
      • Charts & Infographics
      • Polls
    • Careers
    • Events
      • View All Conferences
      • View All Webinars
      • 2022 Innovation Investing Conference
      • 2022 Defined Contribution East Conference
      • 2022 ESG Investing Conference
      • 2022 DC Investment Lineup Conference
      • 2022 Alternatives Investing Conference