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renda Trenowden is the Head of UK & Ireland within the Bank of New York Mellon’s Global Client Management Group with global responsibility for a number of the firm’s Platinum clients. Brenda sits on the European Operating Committee and also on the Steering Group for the internal Women’s Bowstring Network. Brenda joined BNY Mellon in 2011 from Lloyds Banking Group where she was the Managing Director and Global Head of Banks within the Financial Institutions Group. Over the past 22 years, Brenda has established a strong track record in building international businesses and teams, and managing complex client relationships across the globe. She has lived and worked in North America, Europe and Asia and has worked for some of the world’s largest financial institutions. Brenda graduated with an honours Bachelor of Commerce degree from Queen’s University in Canada and has a Chartered Financial Analyst designation. She is a member of the Worshipful Company of International Bankers, a Director of Herstmonceux Castle Enterprises and of the UK Support Foundation for the Asian University for Women. She is also on the Board of the City Women’s Network and on the Global Council of Queen’s University School of Business.
How and why did you choose your career path? When I was in high school, I didn’t set out to have the international career that I have, and I didn’t plan to be in Financial Services or Banking. I grew up in Nova Scotia and had always planned to go to Law School and settle down and have a family there. However, I was very openminded and opportunistic with both my education and my career. I had a series of great mentors and mind-opening experiences that led me to go away to business school in Ontario, to join and later become the President of the International Association for Students in Economics and Commerce (AIESEC) and as a result I took an AIESEC internship in Hong Kong when I graduated. Going away to university opened my mind to the possibilities outside Nova Scotia. Going to Hong Kong whet my appetite for travel and international business, and I think I was just more in tune with the opportunities that came up in the future which led me to a career in Emerging Markets and postings in London, Dhaka, Singapore and Paris.
What was the best piece of career advice you received? The best piece of advice that I’ve had is that in a big organisation, your number 1 job is always to make your boss look good; if you don’t understand this or can’t live with it, your career won’t progress in that role.
What has been your biggest challenge to success in your career?
What do you see as the powerful emerging trend in professional life at the moment?
My biggest challenge to success in my career has been to take more control of things and to proactively push myself forward. For many years I took a job, worked hard and expected to be promoted and suitably rewarded for my efforts. While I have done well, I have often been disappointed when my hard work has not been recognised in the way that I expected or the promotion has not always come as quickly as I would have liked. What I understand now is that no one is going to look out for me, promote me or manage my career other than me.
In my experience, one of the most challenging trends in professional life at the moment is information overload. The huge amount of information available through 24/7 news services, social media, emails, websites and technology in general means that people are becoming overwhelmed and constantly feeling the need to work longer hours to stay on top of it all (or in fact to never turn off). In 2010, Eric Schmitt said ‘Every 2 days we create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilisation up until 2003.’ We need to learn to harness the technology rather than to let it shackle us.
Managing teams and working in large organisations over the past few years, I have observed that women are often a bit slower to realise this than men. I think men are often much more aware of organisational dynamics. They find sponsors more easily and they seem to be more comfortable listing their achievements and promoting themselves to senior management. Women have to learn to do this as well.
What was your career tipping point? My career tipping point was making a major change from equity broking to a senior management role in corporate banking. Up to that point I had spent my whole career on a trading floor which was a very different environment to working for a large corporate bank. I learned a lot about managing people who were unlike me and motivated by different things. I learned about governance, risk, and management best practices. Most importantly, I developed organisational awareness and learned a lot about politics in a large institution. I didn’t have any experience in banking or in managing senior bankers, but I did have a lot of experience managing client relationships with sophisticated investors and also in managing brokers. A senior member of the bank took a chance on me and gave me a lot of responsibility and it was a steep learning curve. It worked out well and my career really developed from there.
What should women be doing more of to succeed in their career? Women should be more confident and learn to promote themselves, women should actively seek out sponsors, and most importantly women should reach down and pull up, encourage, inspire, and support other women.
What should women be doing less of in their career? Women should stop trying to be like men, women should stop being so hard on themselves - they are their own worst critics, and they should stop feeling so guilty about having careers and making sacrifices at home.
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What number one thing should women speak out about regarding careers? Women should speak out about the challenges they have faced in their careers (both personal and professional) and how they have overcome them. They should talk about their successes and how they achieved them, and they should be role models to inspire and encourage other women.
How important is peer networking for women in leadership? Peer networking is absolutely critical for women in leadership. For various reasons, many women do not take the time to build professional networks. Women value relationships and are usually good connectors, but they may take a long time to build a small number of deep relationships. Men often build broader and more shallow relationships which give them a broader pool of people to call upon when needed. Women may also be reluctant to hang around after work for a drink as the burden of getting home for the nanny or to make dinner more often falls on the woman, whereas men realise that it’s part of the job and networks are built through these informal gatherings. These networks will provide information flow, insight, influence, collaboration, and potentially mentoring and sponsorship.
How important is mentoring for women in leadership? Mentoring is important but sponsorship is critical. The difference is that a mentor will give you advice and feedback, but a sponsor will advocate on your behalf. Various studies have been done which show that women tend to have more mentors and men have more sponsors.
Happiness, well being or better childcare provision? Happiness is always a top priority for me. That being said, I couldn’t have one without the other two - if I wasn’t confident that my children were well
cared for or if there were well-being issues, I wouldn’t be happy.
What is important to for achieving greater impact in your career - award ceremonies or mastermind groups? Award ceremonies are important, but for me personally it would be mastermind groups. Once again, the two go hand in hand – one lays the groundwork for success and the other celebrates it.
One to watch ? Richard Branson – he’s created a fantastic brand, as a regular customer of Virgin Atlantic, the service is second to none, and his employees really seem to enjoy working for him.
Your ideal circle of 6 for dinner? Queen Elizabeth I, Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, Warren Buffet, Ayn Rand, W. Somerset Maugham
Must read book? A must-read book that I recommend to everyone is The Four-Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferris. It makes you ask yourself what is it that you want out of work and out of life and why?
Must have career tool? My must-have career tool for me is my iPad. I get all of my newspaper subscriptions on it, I have all of my briefing notes for clients meetings and business trips on it, research and reports, presentations, etc. I also use it for both personal and business emails, for social media, reference books, for my grocery shopping, personal lists, etc.
What is the must do social media activity for greater impact in your career? I have yet to work out what the must do social media activity is for greater impact in my career. I am on LinkedIn and have a lot of contacts, but I don’t really use it other than to keep in touch if I don’t have someone’s email. I use Facebook for my friends and family, and I am just starting to use Twitter. We have implemented an internal version of social media like Facebook in our company which has yet to fully take off, but I think that it will replace email once people start to use it. In the meantime, I still use text and email.
Advice to your 8 year old self? it would be similar to the advice that I give my children - find out what you are really passionate about and follow that passion, don’t try to be something that you are not to please other people, treat others as you would like to be treated, don’t be complacent - you need to work hard to be successful in all that you do, and remember to smile and have fun.