"We have to change the lens we look through": Q&A with Nuveen's Margo Cook
Margo Cook, president of Nuveen Advisory Services and a recent visitor to Australia, speaks to Industry Moves about her role at one of the world's largest investment managers and what she feels needs to change in order for impact and responsible investing to become mainstream. We also discover how her father's reading habits helped shape her career and about her very first job in a town made famous by a legendary rock star.
Margo Cook, president of Nuveen Advisory Services and a recent visitor to Australia, speaks to Industry Moves about her role at one of the world's largest investment managers and what she feels needs to change in order for impact and responsible investing to become mainstream. We also discover how her father's reading habits helped shape her career and about her very first job in a town made famous by a legendary rock star.
Can you tell us a little bit about what your role as President of Nuveen Advisory Services entails?
My role is to oversee product, marketing, distribution and solutions. In other words, I look after the client side of the organisation. While Nuveen Chief Investment Officer Jose Minaya oversees the organisation's investment capabilities, I'm responsible for delivering those investment capabilities to our clients.
As the investment arm of TIAA, Nuveen is one of the largest investment managers in the world with U$930 billion in assets under management, a presence in 27 countries and managing a broad array of assets across diverse asset classes and investment styles, including standout capabilities in income, responsible investing and alternatives. My role is to ensure our clients understand our different capabilities and then to deliver those capabilities to clients in the way that they want to receive them.
I have an investment background, so it's a logical culmination in my career to move from managing client's assets where it's critical to understand what clients' objectives are to now delivering those capabilities to clients directly.
What or who was the impetus for your career in finance?
When I was young, my father read The Wall Street Journal and the newspaper was always sitting around the house. I remember picking it up and being fascinated by stories about companies that succeeded or didn't succeed, and what was happening in the markets. To me, it was a great education about why some companies prospered and others failed.
Later, when I was in college, I did an internship with an economist who worked for a construction company in London where he tracked interest rates and the local economy. What I realised in college was the major interconnectivity between how companies made decisions, the economy and the markets. It all came together for me as I worked for this economist. That's when I really decided what I wanted to do for my career.
Is there a milestone in your career so far that stands out?
Not one milestone as such, but what I have learned in this industry is it's a privilege and a responsibility to manage money for clients and that we are managing assets that have a purpose for someone, whether it is their pension plan, an endowment or an individual's savings.
I remember early in my career, I was very proud of the fact that one year we had beaten an index, but the returns were negative, and a union pension official said to me, "It's great that you beat the index, but we can't eat the index." It really stuck out to me that managing assets for clients has a real purpose to it, and there is a real responsibility.
I feel privileged to have had a 30 year plus career where we help people to achieve the things that they want to achieve in their life by helping to manage their assets in the right way.
With climate change a global concern, what more do you feel could be done for responsible and impact investing to become mainstream?
We have to change the lens that we look through. Today, success in investment strategy is sometimes looked at very simply as the rate of return, instead of looking through the lens of how is that investment impacting the environment, or what is its social impact.
How we measure success has to change."
How we measure success has to change. One thing we are doing very intentionally at Nuveen is managing the impacts of our investments. For instance, in our real estate business, we have a goal of lowering our energy intensity by 30% for the buildings in our portfolio by 2030.
If asset owners and asset managers shift collectively and look through the lens of the impact on the environment and not necessarily just the return, we'll think differently about what we are invested in and whether investments are successful. At Nuveen, we are trying to push that shift by measuring impact explicitly, so there is a holistic way of looking at the success of investments.
What changes have you seen in the appetite for responsible investing in the Asia Pacific region?
It varies by which country you are in. There is a strong understanding of impact investing and responsible investing in Australia. I would say Australia is leading the region in the discussion, followed by Japan, and then other countries are also beginning to follow. Over the last few years, Japan is a place where the discussion has become more relevant, led by one of the large pension plans there.
I would say there isn't a client a meeting I'm in anywhere in the region where the topic doesn't come up. It is a matter of to what degree there is interest. It varies from wanting to understand what it means to invest responsibly, all the way out to some pension funds saying "This is the dominant factor for us."
Where did you grow up and what was it like?
I grew up in a beach area of New Jersey called the Jersey Shore. I lived near a town called Asbury Park which Bruce Springsteen (I've seen him play many, many times!) made famous with his first album Greetings from Asbury Park. My first job was at a candy store on the boardwalk in Asbury Park. It's a fun area with lots of music and beautiful beaches and I felt very lucky to be able to grow up in an area like that.
What advice would you give to your younger self?
####"I sit on two non-profit boards today - the All Stars Project and the University of Rhode Island Foundation - and I know some very interesting people that I wouldn't have met in my industry"
I wish I had taken a role outside of the U.S. at some point in my career. Taking a role outside of your home country opens up your understanding of the world. I got a glimpse of that by doing the internship in London in college and it really changed my perspective. I think taking opportunities outside of your home country or outside of where you grew up is an important way to build your network but also really open up your understanding of how other cultures work. The second thing I do now, but wish I had done in earlier parts of my career, is be involved with non- profit organisations or in my community. Being involved with non-profit organisations gives you a few different perspectives. One is you get to try things with a non-profit that you won't get to try at work, so it's a way to build your career. The second thing is you get to meet some amazing people that you might not get to meet through your work environment. I sit on two non-profit boards today - the All Stars Project and the University of Rhode Island Foundation - and I know some very interesting people that I wouldn't have met in my industry. Thirdly, it is extremely rewarding to take the skills that you learn in your work environment and bring them into the non-profit environment.
If not in finance, where would you be?
I probably would be a lawyer. When I was about 12 or 13, I had a dream of being the first ever female supreme court judge in the U.S., but Sandra Day O'Connor beat me to it.
I am fascinated by the law and I think I would have worked in criminal law. I was interested in understanding the criminal justice system and making sure the rights of individuals were protected.
