Winner of the Ops Business Person of the Year Charlie Marchesani, president of global technology and operations (GTO) at Broadridge Financial Solutions, talks about his business philosophy and industry trends that excite him.
(Editor’s Note: Financial Technologies Forum (FTF) recently held its gala event for the winners of its awards competition for post-trade securities operations, the 2017 FTF News Technology Innovation Awards. Among the top honors is the Ops Business Person of the Year award, which this year went to Charlie Marchesani, whose full title is corporate vice president, global technology and operations (GTO), and president, GTO, for Broadridge Financial Solutions. This award honors an executive-level individual who has advanced the cause of financial technology innovation from the business side of the aisle. At Broadridge, Marchesani oversees all aspects of the company’s GTO business. Four years ago, Broadridge expanded his remit and he now has responsibilities for international securities processing solutions and manages the company’s business process outsourcing solutions efforts. He took time out of his full schedule to take questions from FTF News.)
Charlie Marchesani, president of global technology and operations (GTO) at Broadridge Financial Solutions
Q: How would you describe your own business philosophy?
A: I organize my business to align with our customers’ business goals and objectives, with a focus and commitment to improving their experience and exceeding their expectations.
I also stress a team environment that embraces a high level of trust to enable us to have the right people empowered to do the right thing for our customers.
Q: There is an ongoing debate about where to focus management energy — on results or on process. What are your thoughts about that debate?
A: In order to drive the organization forward and drive value creation for our investors, customers and associates, I believe you need to focus on results — not just financial, but quality, customer satisfaction, associate engagement and growth, and strategic value creation.
In parallel, you need to establish a strong foundation of process and leadership to drive results.
I hold my team accountable for a variety of initiatives each year, including financial results, quality delivery, customer and associate engagement, and strategic initiatives that leverage process improvements to drive scale and margin while improving the customer experience.
Q: Speed in decision-making is critical in the highly competitive securities service and systems markets. How do you manage the speed issue in your decision-making process?
A: That’s a very interesting question.
We are focused on empowering our team at all levels to improve our communication and increase the velocity of our decision making.
We recently completed an organizational redesign focused on improving customer alignment and positioning our leaders closer to our customers to enable enhanced communication and increased speed and quality of decisions.
Q: How would you say that you have handled major external trends that challenge your business model?
A: I’m extremely happy to say that we have been able to leverage our unique network and industry-leading capabilities to provide world class solutions that allow our customers to handle key external trends, including the continued pressure on ROE [return on equity] and balance sheets, increased capital requirements driving shift of business activities, the expansion of electronic trading to new asset classes leading to additional pressures on revenue/margins, and the ongoing introduction of regulatory/market changes that increase cost of compliance.
Q: How important is market research/customer surveys versus direct interaction with customers in guiding an enterprise?
A: I believe both are important.
We emphasize direct interaction with our customers to enable our understanding of their initiatives and problems, with the goal of partnering with them on solutions which can meet their business needs and challenges.
We supplement that by overlaying market research to validate our plans and provide us insight into future trends and changes.
Q: What securities industry trends excite you for 2017 and beyond?
A: A trend that excites me the most is the adoption of solutions that mutualize capabilities and costs in relation to technology. This enables firms to focus on their key differentiating factors instead of processes.
We believe this is at the heart of our value proposition and provides Broadridge with an excellent opportunity to meet the challenges and needs of our clients and industry.
This will be further enhanced by applying innovative technologies like blockchain, machine learning and artificial intelligence, which we are embracing as thought leaders to drive the next generation of change for the industry.
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