FWA Males from the Top Chapter 7: Inclusive Leadership, 17 February, 12-2pm

Please note that lunch will be provided. FWA thanks National Australia Bank for the kind sponsorship of venue and lunch.

THIS IS A MEMBER AND INVITE ONLY EVENT.

FWA is pleased to organize the seventh chapter of our flagship Males from the Top series featuring FWA Male Champions. The discussion will centre on “Inclusive Leadership”. What does inclusive leadership mean? How do you measure inclusion? Who should drive inclusive leadership and what benefits or risks does it bring?

We explore this topic with our male champions. We are pleased to have Neil Parekh, General Manager, Asia (ex-Greater China), National Australia Bank, and the NAB Asia Leadership Team’s sponsor for Diversity & Inclusion,  present the keynote address. In the panel to discuss this topic are FWA’s latest male champions, Wilf Blackburn, CEO, Prudential Assurance Company Singapore, Alex Lee, Managing Partner, Axiom Asia Private Capital and Jeff Plein, COO, Fullerton Fund Management Company Ltd. 

FWA Singapore announced the Male Champions initiative at the annual celebration of International Women’s Day on 6 March 2015. FWA Male Champions actively support the advancement of women in their financial careers. The role of men in supporting the advancement of women is of paramount importance given that they constitute the majority of senior leadership positions and make key hiring and promotion decisions. In this regard, FWA is proud to feature selected male champions who support and are committed to the development of women.  

Event Agenda

Bios of Speakers & Moderator

NEIL PAREKH

General Manager, Asia (ex Greater China)

Member of the International Leadership Team

National Australia Bank

In his current role, Neil is responsible for all business, governance and regulatory matters in the Asia region for all countries except HK and Mainland China. Neil joined NAB from Natixis, where he was Head of Corporate and Institutional Banking Coverage for Asia and a member of the Executive Committee - Asia Pacific. In this role, he was responsible for all client coverage and deal origination in the region.

Neil’s prior experience with financial institutions includes senior roles with DBS (Global Head of FIG and Head of the Middle East Region) and Societe Generale (Global Head of Non-Investment Grade Finance and Head of US Debt Capital Markets). Neil also worked with Bank of America in various product and client coverage roles.  He has worked in US, Asia, Middle East & India and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, a Master’s degree in Finance and an MBA in International Business.

Neil contributes his time as a board director to Nautilus Insurance, The Indus Entrepreneurs (TIE) and as Vice-Chairman for Singapore Chamber of Commerce.  Additionally, he serves on the governing council of the ABS (Association of Banks in Singapore) and the Advisory Committee of the AICD (Australian Institute of Company Directors).

A Singapore Citizen, Neil has been married to his wife, Mika, for 24 years and has two adult children pursuing their undergraduate studies at Columbia University in New York.

WILFRED BLACKBURN

CEO

Prudential Assurance Company Singapore

Wilf Blackburn assumed the position of Chief Executive Officer of Prudential Assurance Company Singapore (Prudential Singapore) with effect from 4 October 2016.

Wilf is an industry veteran with close to three decades of diverse experience, having worked in seven countries in Asia.

Wilf joined Prudential in 2012 and led new market initiatives prior to his appointment as CEO of Prudential Vietnam in July 2014. His work included overseeing the launch of Prudential's business operations in Cambodia and the establishment of Prudential’s representative office in Myanmar and Laos.

Prior to joining Prudential, Wilf was with Allianz, during which his roles included Regional GM, Life & Health Insurance for Asia and CEO of their joint venture companies in China, Thailand and the Philippines. Before Allianz, Wilf worked in the United Kingdom for three life insurers and a firm of consulting actuaries.

Wilf, a British national, qualified as a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries (FIA) in 1995. He has an MBA from the University of Bath and a BSc (Mathematics - 1st Class Hons.) from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne (his home town) and has been a postgraduate student at both the City University (now CASS) and Harvard Business School.

Wilf and his wife, Judith, have five children.

ALEX LEE

Managing Partner

Axiom Asia Private Capital

Alex Lee is a Managing Partner at Axiom Asia Private Capital, a private equity funds-of-funds manager with US$3.5BN of assets under management. Alex leads Axiom's private equity secondary investments across Asia and is also involved in primary fund investments and co‐investments across Asia, with a particular focus on Australia, Japan and Southeast Asia. Prior to joining Axiom Asia in 2009, Alex spent six years at global secondaries firm Coller Capital, first in London and later in Singapore. Alex also worked for Temasek linked companies, first as an engineer with Sembcorp Industries, then as an investment manager with venture capital firm Vertex, where he was active in both direct and fund investments. Alex has a BSc in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University, an MBA from INSEAD, and an MSc in Applied Finance from the National University of Singapore.

JEFF PLEIN

Chief Operating Officer

Fullerton Fund Management Company Ltd

As COO, Jeff is responsible for Fullerton's Legal & Compliance, Finance, Investment and Fund Operations, Risk and Technology teams globally. Jeff is also the Chairman of Fullerton’s China business. 



Prior to Fullerton, Jeff held senior business operations roles in Asia Pacific at PIMCO and BlackRock. As Managing Director at BlackRock, Jeff was responsible for managing the Asia Pacific Operations as Head of Operations, overseeing the firm’s Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Australia, and India teams, and was subsequently the Head of Asia Pacific Institutional Operations. 



A strong proponent for industry advocacy, Jeff is a member of the DTCC Executive Council (Asia), CITI’s Client Advisory Board for Investment Managers and Thomson Reuters’ Customer Advisory Board. He was instrumental in working with industry to migrate fixed income trade confirmations to Omgeo’s CTM platform in Japan, automate equity confirms in Korea, and fund orders and equity confirmations in Taiwan. He is currently working to promote the centralisation of the KYC and AML process to an industry-wide portal in Singapore. 



Jeff holds both an MBA from The Wharton School and an MA in East Asia Studies from the University of Pennsylvania. He has worked in Asia Pacific for 20 years and has 15 years of investment management experience.

Ms Jennifer Lewis

Managing Director, Communications

GIC Pte Ltd

Ms Jennifer Lewis is responsible for the strategic management of GIC’s internal and external communication activities. She joined the sovereign wealth fund in 2007 after more than twenty years as a journalist with television, print and online experience. She was the founding Editor of both Straits Times TV, Singapore's first television news organisation owned by a newspaper, as well as STOMP (Straits Times Online Mobile Print), a news website that leveraged online tools to change the way news was received and distributed in Singapore. Jennifer serves on the board of the Singapore International Foundation and has been a Governor since 2007.
 

RSVP Details:

As we expect this event to be very popular, seats will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis. Please sign up early to avoid disappointment. Deadline for RSVP: 10 February 2017. We apologise that requests for places after the deadline will not be entertained.

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