Star Dealmakers Tapped as Managers

Wall Street's most accomplished dealmakers are increasingly taking on management responsibilities, becoming administrators and troubleshooters for their firms' overall M&A or corporate finance teams.

By tapping top rainmakers to run investment banking departments, banks accomplish two important goals, notes Financial News: First, such assignments can extend the number of years that a star remains on board. Second, banks leverage the deep experience and highly developed interpersonal skills these senior bankers bring to the task of running their group's increasingly complex business.

One avatar of this trend is Chris Carter, long a top banker at Morgan Stanley. Earlier this month, the 57-year-old Carter reportedly agreed to become Morgan's global head of capital markets, augmenting his role as a vice-chairman of institutional securities. His new post entails "an internal role as an administrator and conflict resolver," reports Financial News. His other, continuing role focuses on winning advisory business.

Heads of investment banking tend to fit one of two distinct molds, Jay Gaines, president and chief executive of executive search firm Jay Gaines & Company, told eFinancialCareers.

They can be successful bankers who also happen to possess traits that make for a strong manager, such as a broad, enterprise perspective, an ability to balance individual with team and firm-wide goals, an eye for the long term, and leadership credibility. Gaines cites Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack, who began his career in fixed-income sales, as an example of this type of leader.

Or, they can be people who were not investment bankers but proved their leadership and company values while climbing the ranks managing other units within the firm.

"Either category can work well. The criteria that both models demonstrate would be seasoning and success," says Gaines. "Rainmaking empowers, but it's the demonstration of leadership and firm values that gets them into management. Others just get rich and famous rainmaking."