Literally a week into me joining was one of our founders, Bob Hager. It was his retirement party. And so I got to hear a lot of stories about the firm, and it really allowed me to understand the culture and what had made the firm so successful today.
One of the things Bob talked was its people and it kept them up at night. The fact that his biggest asset walked out the door every night and he hoped that the people would come back in the morning.
We stressed the results for our clients as the first principle of our new firm. And I think that that has always been the first principle of the firm since then. We also wanted to make it a good place to work and a creative place.
It's the people, the culture, and really working with like-minded individuals who have a common objective, which centers around helping our clients.
All I have to remember is to put the clients’ interests first.
Yeah. But no, no. There's more than just clients’ interest. You have to put the employees’ interests [as well].
I've worked at different places in my career. Always had 1 or 2 mentors, people, that you can learn from, and working with. At PH&N Institutional, it's about 12 people that are just amazing. You can learn from them any day and everyday, people that are passionate, people that are motivated, curious, people that want to improve every single day.
So this is absolutely amazing. And it's a big motivation of waking up every morning and going to work, working with these people and still learning after 20, almost 25 years in the industry.
It's amazing how many times I'm out there. I'm fortunate enough to have my name on the door and people say, “Are you the Hager of Phillips, Hager & North? What a wonderful firm.” And that, to me, is the thing I'm proudest of.
As an organization, we're focused, we're deliberate, and, we know that we need to stay ahead of the curve to maintain our position and deliver to our clients what they need. And so to a question of, you know, how do we stay ahead of the markets, how do we ensure that we're relevant? I think the answer is staying close to clients and maximizing your ability to put your vast resources and to solve their problems.
I often think about the pension plans I work for, and I imagine my parents as plan members and how the importance of having those benefits stability into retirement is really critical for them and it helps bring it back home.
I'm actually pretty proud of what we do as a firm, not only as a firm, but also on a grassroots employee level, whether it's giving back through volunteering or fundraising.
We're proud to support women in asset management, and we value our partnerships with universities across the country.
The impact is the biggest thing for me. I mean, being a small part of the overall success of our client’s objectives is important for me and to see it first hand, it is something that keeps me going.
The culture of our firm is very much about, supporting each other and supporting the next generation and coming up, and learning and, you know, giving them opportunity for sure.
The thing that we hope for the hardest is that future generations of PH&Ners continue on with the same policies and priorities that we pursued all these years.
You know, we really work hard at providing an environment for which everyone can thrive, can grow. They have a ton of opportunities, and we work hard at retaining that great culture that we've had in place for decades. So it's a wonderful place to come into every day.