By Hinako Kijima, MIFFT2024
Crossing paths with the ‘Rock star’ in international finance
On June 11, I had the greatest honour and privilege of organizing and moderating an exchange session with the European Central Bank (ECB) President Madame Christine Lagarde at the ECB headquarters in Frankfurt, as part of the LBS Frankfurt & Paris Global Experience elective course. Students from the Masters in Finance (MiF) programme, Masters in Financial Analysis (MFA) programme, and Sloan programme had the unique opportunity to ask questions about the outlook of ECB’s monetary and macroprudential policies directly to the President.
As we shook hands, Madame Lagarde greeted me with a bright smile – “It’s nice to see you again”. Indeed, this wasn’t the first time I had the pleasure of meeting the wonder woman. Our paths first crossed at the G7 meetings in Japan last year, when I served as the liaison officer to the ECB delegation, representing the Bank of Japan (BOJ). Having had the opportunity to meet one’s ultimate role model is the greatest fortune one could ask for.
“I am going to be myself and therefore probably different”
In early July of 2019, an article in the Financial Times caught my eye: “Female forces are the economic future”. It was reporting the news of Madame Lagarde’s nomination to lead the ECB from November. This news was particularly meaningful to me because I was about to join the BOJ in October, and I knew that central banking and finance in general is predominantly a male-dominated sector. Since then, I started to follow Madame Lagarde’s public speeches and interviews. During her first press conference as the President of the ECB in December 2019, Madame Lagarde told the press: “I am going to be myself and therefore probably different” and “I’m neither a dove nor a hawk and my ambition is to be an owl that is often associated with a little bit of wisdom”. For a fledgling central banker watching the press conference from the far east, it was most refreshing and inspiring. That moment, it became clear what I wanted to be, and what I wanted to achieve.
Maybe I can too
The gender of the new ECB President was not the only reason why I felt encouraged and empowered by the news of Madame Lagarde’s appointment. It was also her background that was at times described as ‘unique’ or ‘unconventional’ for leading a central bank, being a lawyer by training, not an economist. I too did not have a conventional background for a central banker – I read political science for my undergraduate degree and obtained a master’s degree in education policy prior to joining the BOJ – two areas that I believed were crucial in bringing about change for the betterment of our societies. On top of that, I had spent nearly half of my life abroad, completing my secondary and tertiary education in the UK. So, I guess I always saw myself as an ‘outsider’ in the central banking world and in Japan, someone nobody could quite place. Thus, seeing Madame Lagarde making her way into the highest ranks of international finance and central banking gave me hope and the feeling that “maybe I can too”. This feeling supported and guided me throughout my early years in central banking.
True value of an outsider
During my time at the BOJ and my studies at LBS, I have begun to grasp the true value and brilliance of diversity and how an outsider can think and act outside the box in a way that benefits the team and to the organization. At LBS, we are assigned to a study group of 6 people with different backgrounds to work on the group assignments – one of the cornerstones of the LBS experience. Working in these groups was very enlightening for me, as it made me realize that with diversity and good teamwork, 1 x 6 does not equal 6, but can have a multiplier effect, achieving more than 100% of each individual combined. I believe that the true value of having an outsider is not only to benefit from the uniqueness of that outsider themself, but also to benefit from the outsider bringing out the hidden (or suppressed) uniqueness of other team members.
London Calling
So, my message here is a call for ‘outsiders’ to join the finance and central banking sector. Especially those of you who really want to make a change. As Robert Schiller stated in his book Finance and Good Society, “At its broadest level, finance is the science of goal architecture – of the structuring of the economic arrangements necessary to achieve a set of goals and of the stewardship of the assets needed for that achievement. Finance, at its best, does not merely manage risk, but also acts as the steward of society’s assets and an advocate of its deepest goals”.
I really hope our paths will cross somewhere someday.
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