Managing private bankers was once largely a matter of ensuring they shared the same vision and values and could offer clients the right investment advice.
Those priorities remain essential, but Teresa Lee is quick to emphasise the role her 30-strong team performs has become much broader as customer needs evolve and competition within the sector heats up.
“Many of our Chinese clients come from an entrepreneurial background, so just providing financial advice is not enough any more,” says the managing director and market head for Greater China and North Asia at Bank of Singapore. “We want to offer a 360-degree integrated service model for wealth management solutions, which means our relationship managers have to become more entrepreneurial too.”
The goal is to make sure each banker considers everything clients may need for their personal investments and the long-term expansion of their businesses. That entails building bridges within the bank to help out with anything from IPOs or debt issuance to loan syndication and beyond.
“When I first joined, I brought in a very important cultural change to engage more with bankers from the corporate side,” Lee says. “I set up a framework for collaboration to maximise internal resources. I also encourage the private banking team to bring our internal partners into meetings, so clients know what the group can offer besides wealth management, and they see we can provide one-stop solutions and win-win results.”
Broadening individual roles in this way does, though, take considerable effort. It requires extensive training on wealth planning, family offices, private equity, trust planning, and structured products. But the success rate of referrals from the private to the corporate side — and the number of new leads — shows it is paying off.
“It is an ongoing learning process, but overall it works very well,” says Lee, whose team is also strengthening ties with other group members like OCBC China to increase strategic focus on the Greater Bay Area. “We only manage offshore assets; that is our major focus. But we’re getting a lot more [inquiries from] clients looking to move production lines out of China to Southeast Asia. For that, we can help to find partners and opportunities and arrange visits in countries like Vietnam or Indonesia.”
In promoting collaboration and the entrepreneurial mindset, Lee pays close attention to intangible measures like adaptability and willingness to share success stories and ideas.
“I don’t push, I influence and lead by example,” she says. “You have to walk the talk, which is sometimes easier said than done.”
Lee grew up in Hong Kong, where her father owned a transport and logistics business and her mother, the homemaker, provided opportunities to explore different interests. This led to classes in violin, ballet, painting and karate, but from the age of five Lee really took to the piano and, later on, would happily practise three or four hours a day.
In due course, she performed in competitions, at events, for the church and for a ballet company, and finished secondary school on a two-year scholarship to study music at Grantham College of Education.
“I had hoped to be a professional pianist or a music teacher and even looked at studying in Paris,” she says. “But I also have a lot of relatives in banking, and they influenced me. They said it is a secure, prestigious job, and their lives appeared colourful and glamorous, so it seemed a good route to take.”
To that end, she started by taking a diploma of business administration and went on to complete a BBA at the University of Technology in Sydney, graduating in the late 1990s with a double major in management and marketing.
“The course was tough as, at first, I wasn’t really into finance and accounting, but I proved I could do it,” Lee says. “In Sydney, I lived with different families as a ‘homestay’ student, and that was very enjoyable. It was a great way to learn the language and culture, how to interact with new people and be adaptable. I think that paved the way for me to be a private banker where adapting to change and getting on with people are so important.”
She did consider other options like advertising, marketing in a fashion company, and accountancy. But the attractions of the Citigroup graduate trainee scheme proved decisive, offering the platform and industry knowledge needed for steady advancement.
Subsequent moves to ABN Amro and then Standard Chartered Private Bank — to work on the mainland China market — provided new challenges and experience before a lengthy 10-month courtship led to Bank of Singapore in 2017.
“I picked them because I could see a trend of clients looking to diversify their assets from European to Asian banks,” Lee says. “That was a definite pull factor for me.”
In the next two years, her sights are set on continuing to expand the business, with the ultimate aim of becoming one of the top three players in the industry. In leading her team, Lee’s philosophy is to promote efficiency, limit overtime, and draw a clear line between work and other commitments.
“When at work I go for it, but I switch off when with family and friends,” she says.
To “relieve pressure”, she likes to drive high-performance cars at up to 200 km an hour on racing circuits like Silverstone — an interest initially sparked by her husband. She also does kart racing in Zhuhai and plans to master more specialist high-speed manoeuvres.
In contrast, though, she still loves the piano and hopes to form a small band to sing local songs and play the classics.
“Personally, I like to play ragtime and jazz at home, but I have no limitations,” Lee says. “Another ambition, influenced by my late father, is to do more charity work for underprivileged children and the elderly. He helped others without asking for anything in return. In that respect, I always think I haven’t done enough.”
