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Despite the upheaval in the financial industry over the last 12 months, money managers around the world remained surprisingly optimistic about their business, according to a new survey.

None of the managers stated they needed to make material changes in their investment process. More European, Asian and South African firms felt the need to modify their process in light of the turmoil than did their counterparts in the U.S., according to FS Associates, Inc., the West Orange, N.J.-based financial and investment consulting firm that conducted the survey, which was released at the end of 2008.

Among the 80 respondents, most were privately held, traditional long-only firms with a minimum US$500 million in assets across the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia (excluding Australia) and South Africa.

While the managers were overwhelmingly optimistic, Fernand Schoppig, president of FS Associates, said he wasn't sure that optimism would become a trend or merely reflected their current attitudes.

Gregory Hazlett, the firm’s senior adviser, said, “By nature, investment managers are entrepreneurs with a winning attitude. They believe they are survivors and they can provide superior products.”

Only 17% of the firms admitted that the level of uncertainty could potentially affect staffing and operations. While European managers were more open about their concerns, Asian managers didn’t think market uncertaintywould affect how managers conduct their daily work.

Mr. Schoppig said because the survey — purposely designed to quickly grab manager's current thinking about their business — comprised 15 multiple-choice questions on broad topics, many issues remained unanswered.

“It’s not a deep dive,” James E. Masur, chief operating officer and chief financial officer of Babson Capital Management LLC, Boston, said of the survey, which he completed. “But if you demand anybody in this business to spend hours these days, it’s not going to happen.” He added very few surveys focused on the emotional side of money managers or the DNA of the companies.

Despite the recent layoffs in the money management business, almost one-half of the responding firms said they didn’t expect any significant headcount changes. While only 9% of firms said they reduced their work force in 2008, 26% said they planned to add staff.

Mr. Hazlett said that perhaps the full effect on the bottom line has not become apparent because of the lagging characteristics of investment management revenue.

More surprising answers appeared when money managers were asked about strategic directions in different parts of their business. Again, in contrast to the current cost-cutting trend, the majority of managers said they would decide to add more investment professionals if they were to increase headcount, but only 11% of the firms would increase staff in the area of risk management.

On the flip side, if firms were to decrease headcount, 60% of the firms in the U.S. and Canada said they would cut the compliance and risk management staff. None of the European or Asian managers would cut any staff in that area.

“Maybe money managers are not happy with the existing models of risk control,” said Mr. Hazlett.

On the global level, potential job-cutting would happen in the back office. According to the survey results, 74% of the firms expressed their willingness to lay off operational and administrative employees.

Babson Capital's Mr. Masur said, “People usually cut the back office to be more cost-efficient in a downturn, but it’s really hard to tell why there are not many supporters for risk management as there’s no common view on the definition of risk management.”

Generally, Mr. Schoppig said he’s convinced that “the investment management industry a year from today won’t look so different."