Leaders’ Views: Maria Driver & Maurice Franks, Co-Heads of PCFM Sales, Deutsche Numis
Maria Driver & Maurice Franks, Co-Heads of Private Client Fund Management Sales, Deutsche Numis
For this series, we will be speaking with leaders from around the business about their role, career trajectory and team goals for the coming months. We kick off with our Co-Heads of the PCFM team, Maria Driver and Maurice Franks.
Can you tell us what your day-to-day roles involve?
Maria: We head up the Private Client Fund Management (PCFM) sales desk, which means we look after two client bases: corporates and investors.
Maurice: For our corporate clients, we provide access to discretionary wealth managers, pension funds and smaller regional institutions across the UK, while for our investor clients, we act as a dedicated sales desk into the wealth management market, providing research, analyst access and deal flow.
How did you end up choosing to work in this area, and at Deutsche Numis in particular?
Maria: After finishing my law degree, I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to go into law after all, and the world of finance always appealed to me! Initially joining the investor relations team gave me a great introduction to various parts of the business and when an opportunity came up to move on to the PCFM team, this felt like a natural transition.
Maurice: My degree was in politics, but I was always interested to explore a role that combined communications and finance. So when the role at Numis within the PCFM sales team was offered, it seemed like a perfect combination.
How do you collaborate as Co-Heads of the team?
Maurice: We have worked together for about 12 years, so we know each other extremely well! We complement each other as we share a similar work ethic and this is demonstrated in the way our business model and our team have developed and grown under our leadership.
Maria: We work hard to foster an entrepreneurial culture within the team, so are always open to one another’s ideas and recommendations. As Co-Heads, we lean into each other’s strengths and have complete trust in one another. As a result, we are very honest with each other!
What do you think drives the success of your team?
Maurice: In a word – collaboration. There are five of us in the team and we are all extremely passionate about what we do, as we know that we are all driving towards the same goal of delivering the best possible service for corporates and investors.
Maria: A key team focus is that our offering must be both tangible and transparent for our clients. As a result, we’ve carved out a real niche for ourselves and the team has a respected reputation in the market.
What are your top priorities for the team over the coming months?
Maria: We are always looking to grow our business. Given Deutsche Bank’s global research coverage and our clients investing more overseas, we have the unique opportunity to deepen research access for existing and new investor clients.
Maurice: We have seen excellent traction on this so far and we aim to make Deutsche Bank the global ‘go to’ provider for all of our clients’ research needs. We also plan to expand the top-quality analyst access that we provided under Numis, whereby investors could meet with our research analysts to get their in-depth insights into companies of interest.
Maria: We can also now leverage Deutsche Bank’s corporate connections to continue to grow our corporate client list.
Where do you see employee opportunities now that we are part of a larger organisation?
Maurice: Being part of Deutsche Bank allows us to engage with a wide variety of stakeholders worldwide and continually expand our networks. In this way, we can deepen our knowledge of different business areas, as well as international events, which feeds into personal development.
Finally, do you have any plans for the summer?
Maria: I’m so excited, as we’ll be taking the children to Disney World in Florida.
Maurice: Funnily enough, my family have had the same idea, so we may bump into each other there!
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Maria Driver & Maurice Franks, Co-Heads of Private Client Fund Management Sales, Deutsche Numis
For this series, we will be speaking with leaders from around the business about their role, career trajectory and team goals for the coming months. We kick off with our Co-Heads of the PCFM team, Maria Driver and Maurice Franks.
Can you tell us what your day-to-day roles involve?
Maria: We head up the Private Client Fund Management (PCFM) sales desk, which means we look after two client bases: corporates and investors.
Maurice: For our corporate clients, we provide access to discretionary wealth managers, pension funds and smaller regional institutions across the UK, while for our investor clients, we act as a dedicated sales desk into the wealth management market, providing research, analyst access and deal flow.
How did you end up choosing to work in this area, and at Deutsche Numis in particular?
Maria: After finishing my law degree, I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to go into law after all, and the world of finance always appealed to me! Initially joining the investor relations team gave me a great introduction to various parts of the business and when an opportunity came up to move on to the PCFM team, this felt like a natural transition.
Maurice: My degree was in politics, but I was always interested to explore a role that combined communications and finance. So when the role at Numis within the PCFM sales team was offered, it seemed like a perfect combination.
How do you collaborate as Co-Heads of the team?
Maurice: We have worked together for about 12 years, so we know each other extremely well! We complement each other as we share a similar work ethic and this is demonstrated in the way our business model and our team have developed and grown under our leadership.
Maria: We work hard to foster an entrepreneurial culture within the team, so are always open to one another’s ideas and recommendations. As Co-Heads, we lean into each other’s strengths and have complete trust in one another. As a result, we are very honest with each other!
What do you think drives the success of your team?
Maurice: In a word – collaboration. There are five of us in the team and we are all extremely passionate about what we do, as we know that we are all driving towards the same goal of delivering the best possible service for corporates and investors.
Maria: A key team focus is that our offering must be both tangible and transparent for our clients. As a result, we’ve carved out a real niche for ourselves and the team has a respected reputation in the market.
What are your top priorities for the team over the coming months?
Maria: We are always looking to grow our business. Given Deutsche Bank’s global research coverage and our clients investing more overseas, we have the unique opportunity to deepen research access for existing and new investor clients.
Maurice: We have seen excellent traction on this so far and we aim to make Deutsche Bank the global ‘go to’ provider for all of our clients’ research needs. We also plan to expand the top-quality analyst access that we provided under Numis, whereby investors could meet with our research analysts to get their in-depth insights into companies of interest.
Maria: We can also now leverage Deutsche Bank’s corporate connections to continue to grow our corporate client list.
Where do you see employee opportunities now that we are part of a larger organisation?
Maurice: Being part of Deutsche Bank allows us to engage with a wide variety of stakeholders worldwide and continually expand our networks. In this way, we can deepen our knowledge of different business areas, as well as international events, which feeds into personal development.
Finally, do you have any plans for the summer?
Maria: I’m so excited, as we’ll be taking the children to Disney World in Florida.
Maurice: Funnily enough, my family have had the same idea, so we may bump into each other there!