Lorelei Karstadt: Consultant at Alpha FMC

Tell me about Alpha FMC and your role within the firm.

Alpha FMC is the leading global consultancy to the asset and wealth management industry, boasting >90% of the world’s top 20 asset managers (by AUM) as clients. The firm is headquartered in the UK (LON:AFM is the stock ticker in case anyone is curious!) and made its Toronto debut in May of 2020. I had the unique opportunity to join as the 5th Toronto employee in April of 2021 – in the past 6 months, our headcount has quadrupled to a team of ~20. 

I am a Consultant and work on both US and Canadian clients as a result of our North America staffing model. My past projects have included a strategic private markets target operating model assessment (think private equity, credit, infrastructure, real estate) and the groundbreaking implementation of the first fully front-to-back asset servicing platform for an asset manager out of NYC. One of my favourite parts of my role at Alpha is my involvement in Canada recruiting. Employees at Alpha have the opportunity to run some part of the business e.g. marketing, legal, business development, recruiting, and I immediately jumped on the opportunity to get involved. Being able to oversee the experienced hire pipeline and connect with students for our graduate recruiting efforts provides me with a lot of joy and meaning on the job. 

Tell me about your journey from starting your undergrad at Queens to where you are now?

It’s been a wild ride! I had no idea what I wanted my career to look like when I first started at Queen’s… through trial and error through various internships spanning from Asset Management, Big-4 accounting/tax consulting, I eventually set my sights on Management Consulting as a result of its team/client-oriented nature and non-stop rollercoaster of learning curves. I joined Accenture’s Consulting Development Program out of school, ‘soft-aligned’ to the Financial Services industry as a result of my prior internships.  

1.5 years into my career at Accenture, a recruiter reached out on LinkedIn about this seemingly magical firm called Alpha FMC, still in its nascent stages in the Toronto market. The opportunity to continue my consulting career, while specializing in the Asset Management industry, AND within a start-up boutique environment was immediately attractive. It had been a goal of mine to eventually pivot to a smaller firm where I’d be able to have more ownership and freedom in initiating and executing some of my ideas – both in terms of client engagements and internal firm initiatives. I took a bit of a leap of faith joining as the 5th Toronto employee and I’m so glad that I did! The team is growing rapidly and I truly believe in our vision and long-term goals… growing to 50 people by the end of 2022 and continuing to secure some of the market’s leading pension funds and Asset Managers as clients. 

What has been the most important learning in your career to date?

The most important learning in my career to date has been to believe in myself… so cheesy, but in the past, there have been times where I’ve held myself back from opportunities (job applications, networking events, scholarships) because I thought I wasn’t good enough – let other people make that decision, not you! Especially in consulting where you are frequently meeting with senior people from the client/vendor side, it’s important to project yourself as a confident and capable individual. 

Your LinkedIn background photo is taken from a trip when you went backpacking in Indonesia. What role does travel play in your life? How do you find time to travel despite your busy schedule?

Ah yes, that photo is from an active volcano that I hiked, Mount Ijen! I spent 6 months cumulatively backpacking Asia prior to starting my full-time career. COVID-19 has largely reduced the role that leisure travel plays in my life – but after 1.5 years of putting international travel on hold, I’m very excited to go on a 12-day hiking trip to Peru next month! I’m a very social person and absolutely love meeting other travellers and locals, and making genuine connections with them. 

Joining Alpha has been great for my travel bug as we get 25 vacation days – much better than the 15-day industry standard. Consulting is stereotypically a job with less work-life balance, but I have found that having a supportive project team and firm will enable you to ‘find time’, even if your project is hectic! And of course, there’s travel associated with client work and Alpha socials – I’ll be going to NYC next month since our client’s office is reopening, and later to Miami in December for an Alpha North America offsite!  

What advice would you give female-identifying students trying to find their career path?

With graduate recruiting, I’ve found that ~90% of the students that request coffee chats are male-identifying versus <10% of female-identifying… now, this could be due to a large difference in asset management consulting interest, but my hunch from personal experience is that many female-identifying students may fear that they seem to be ‘wasting’ the other person’s time. Within reason, try to talk to people at different companies and industries to try to determine what might be a good fit. Finding your career path may involve some trial and error attempts (it did for me and my internships), but the more that you can determine through second-hand experience via coffee chats, the better! 

As a woman in consulting, how do you find your voice?

Love this question! I am honestly still working on this and am trying to improve every day. To be honest, a lot of my professional confidence can be directly attributed to my mentors, role models, and the support of my project teams. I think it’s crucial to have a supportive and inclusive workplace. The finance industry can sometimes give off the perception of a boys club – I’ve definitely gotten indications of this in the past, but am happy to report that I’ve felt welcomed, valued, and empowered at Alpha to be my true self. My long-term piece of advice here would be to think very carefully about the company that you are joining, their culture, and whether you would really fit in. Some women are able to push through any cultural mismatch, but I knew moving into my full-time career that I was not one of them.  

One other piece of tangible advice that I would have is to try to get to know your coworkers on more of a personal level. I find that I’m more comfortable being myself and speaking my mind to clients/my project teams once I realize that they are people too, with their own lives outside of the role that they fulfill at work. 

What actions do you recommend taking as a university student to improve your professional development post-grad? 

My holistic advice includes working on public speaking/presentation skills. While you’ll get some practice during your undergrad, looking back I wish that I had taken a Toastmasters or something similar to boost my storytelling and presentation skills. Another general piece of advice is to nurture your personal relationships during your undergrad as well as your professional ones – this is something that I definitely heard numerous times throughout school, but only when I started work full-time I realized just how right everyone was. The professional services scene in Toronto is relatively small and you’ll find yourself bumping into people in your ‘past life’ frequently, so… your network really is your net worth (can’t believe I’m saying this un-sarcastically)!