Carla Harris – Pearls of Career Wisdom (Capital Allocators, EP.267)

Carla Harris is a Senior Client Advisor at Morgan Stanley, the most recent of many posts in her 35-year career at the firm that included serving as Vice Chairman of Wealth Management, heading the Emerging Manager platform, and running deals for decades as an investment banker and capital markets professional. She is the author of three books about navigating careers and leadership, Expect to Win, Strategize to Win, and the upcoming Lead to Win, each of which contains lessons she dubs “Carla’s Pearls.” In the last few years, Carla added Board seats to her professional portfolio and currently serves on a host of Boards including SEO, Harvard University, Walmart, and MetLife. She’s also an accomplished gospel singer who has sold out shows in Carnegie Hall and the Apollo Theatre. Our conversation offers Carla’s pearls of wisdom in navigating a career from her earliest days on the Street. We cover her background, path to Wall Street, framing a personal narrative, learning what’s important to an organization, being authentic, taking career risks, and evolving multicultural opportunities in asset management. We then turn to lessons from Carla’s new book, from sitting in the Boardroom, and from a letter to her 25-year-old self. Learn More  Follow Ted on Twitter at @tseides or LinkedIn  Subscribe to the mailing list  Access Transcript with Premium Membership    Show Notes

Carla’s background

Early career lessons

Expecting to win

Adjectives of success

Learning from relationships

Being yourself

Client dynamics in banking

Engaging with ESG trends

“Pearls” from Carla’s book

Creating trust and leaders

Experiences from the boardroom

Growing communication abilities