New York Goes
for Growth
14
rabobankers at work
WHAT'S NewS Issue 5 May 1997
Our New York office has initiated a far-reaching internal reorganization
that is aimed at building a solid platform for its future growth.This is
even more impressive when seen against the background of our rapid
international evolution, as well as the ever-changing demands and
opportunities that characterize the contemporary marketplace.
Reinier Mesritz: 'Maintain status quo or
embark on a path of growth?'
As we have evolved over the past 16 years
- from a domestic Dutch institution into
an enterprise with a substantial global
profle - our US operation has
simultaneously emerged as a leader in
terms of profitability, scale, and market
scope. It is a premier player in the US food
and agribusiness, and a recognized
force in the healthcare sector and among
international corporates as well.
FRESH CHOICES
Success - as always - has brought fresh
choices. 'Basically, we found ourselves at a
crossroads,' explains Reinier Mesritz,
executive vice president, Investment
Banking. 'The question was whether we
should maintain the status quo or embark
on the path of growth in order to become
a true leader and star performer in our
chosen strategie niches.'
'Fundamentally, we need to develop the
capacity to offer not only loans but a
wider range of services and products -
both to existing and potential customers in
such strategie industries as food and agri,
health care, media and telecom,' he says.
In order to ensure access to sufficiënt capital
from Rabobank International, New York
has set itself a goal of reaching an overall
net return on solvency (ROS) of 10 per cent
by 1999 - and of doing so in a dynamic
manner that advances our overall customer
focus and customer value strategies.
AMBITIOUS GOALS
'These might seem like ambitious goals
but we absolutely have to achieve them if
we expect our parent organization to
make further investments in our future
growth,' says Dennis Ziengs, general
manager and executive vice president for
North America.
The reorganization involves a
redeployment of human resources - as
well as a fine-tuning in the way we
distribute scarce financial capital. Dennis
Ziengs stresses that these changes are not
motivated by any special concern about
New York's performance to date - which
has been very good - but rather by a need
to bring people into positions where they
can best contribute to meeting the banks'
goals in the most cost-effective way.
'We face more demanding and
discriminating customers, more aggressive
competitors, and a market that is far less
forgiving of mistakes than ever before,' he
says. 'We have many talented people, we
have not always been smart about how we
mobilized their talents.'
REORGANIZATION HIGHLIGHTS
The highlights of the staff reorganization
are as follows:
ln Investment Banking, the structured
finance function is being integrated into
the Corporate Finance Group (now
headed by Hans den Baas). This unit will
also assume responsibility for syndications
and for private placements. This will
eliminate a certain duplication of
functions in back and mid-office.
Moreover, notes Mesritz, 'it will clarify
our intent to ensure that people who are
best at structuring and executing
transactions are doing exactly that - just
as those who are best at relationship
management will be placed in functions
more clearly consistent with those
particular skills.'
Consistent with a policy being applied
Dennis Ziengs: 'Positioning people to meet
the bank's goals'.
throughout the worldwide network,
relationship management for Financial
Institutions in North America, hitherto
coordinated out of Utrecht, is also being
shifted over to New York, under a team
headed by Michel de Konkoly. This is a
new and critically important part of US
strategy.
The Corporate Banking arm has been
increasingly supported by a separate
corporate finance group that was built up
under Ton Gardeniers. He will now join
the Corporate Banking unit as senior vice
president, Corporate Banking
Development. Working in concert with
Reinier Mesritz, Bob Bucklin and Dennis
Ziengs, he will put his considerable skills
in origination, marketing and
relationship development to use in further
strengthening relationship management.
Steps will be taken to bring officers more
closely in touch with the needs and
expectations of clients in all target
markets.
A new 'Investment Banking Committee'
is being formed to ensure an orderly and
pragmatic exchange of information and
viewpoints among the Corporate and
Investment Banking arms - and thus to
further enhance the 'one-bank, one-team,
one P&L' philosophy. This high-level
committee will take on an arbiter role -
and will decide whether or not deals
should be approved by trying to balance
the sometimes conflicting priorities of
profitability, relationship impact, and the
availability of scarce resources (financial,
human and otherwise). This
committee will be chaired by Reinier
Mesritz.
APPROPRIATE BALANCE
'Obviously, we can no longer afford to
spread our resources too thin,' says
Mesritz. 'By the same token, we
sometimes need the flexibility to extend
loans at less than optimal rates in order to
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