Trailblazer Award
Gabriela Baez
Firm: Barclays
When working at Lehman Brothers, Gabriela (Gabi) Baez had been a member of the Institutional Investor All-America Research Team in the equity derivatives category for five consecutive years, reaching first-team status in 2007 and 2008. So when Barclays bought the North American investment banking business of bankrupt Lehman in 2008, and Baez was invited to work as a desk analyst in program trading, she saw a good opportunity.
Today, she is managing director in equities program trading, leading the global index and portfolio desk analyst team.
Its about coming up with trade ideas on index events and basket events, but I also have to consider how applicable those trade ideas are, Baez said. When you are in research, you put out an idea, and other people decide whether to implement it or not. When you are on the trading desk, you are seeing that process in real time, and at the end of the day you hope you have a positive P&L on the ideas you put out that day.”
At Barclays, Baez is also active in an initiative known as Human Capital Planning (HCP), which recruits employees to come up with ideas on improving recruiting, development, diversity and engagement. It wasnt easy at first, according to Baez. People were hesitant when it started, and I was one of them, but it has been very much driven by employees. We have tried to let junior employees have as much input as possible and provide them with opportunities to show leadership skills.
A graduate of Yale University, Baez has been active in recruiting and encouraging diversity since the beginning of her career, and has recruited at Yale almost every year.
It has been a passion of mine to educate students about opportunities in sales and trading specifically, Baez said. I find that a lot of students know about consulting and about investment banking, but they dont always know about sales and trading. There are very rewarding careers here.
