This is a sponsored article from Pyxis Wealth Advisors.
 

Asian Private Banker sat down with Janice Chan (JC), co-founder and CEO of Pyxis Wealth Advisors, and Karen Lam (KL), managing partner, to learn more about the unique DNA driving this dynamic Hong Kong-based wealth management company.

Janice founded Pyxis – meaning a constellation in the southern sky that serves as a nautical compass – in 2020 after a long and successful career as both a private banker and fund manager. Her decades of industry experience include years in UBS Global Wealth Management’s ultra high net worth (UHNW) client team and, more recently, as the managing director of BNP Paribas Wealth Management.

Karen has enjoyed a similarly glittering career in private banking and, immediately prior to joining Pyxis, was the senior executive vice president and head of relationship management at Hang Seng Bank Private Banking. Karen gained a deep understanding of both individual and family office clients in Greater China during her previous role as the general manager of HSBC (China) in Shenzhen & Dongguan.

These women of vision, candour and unbound professional zeal revel in their newfound freedom. Their ability to throw off the shackles of corporate hierarchy and focus afresh on innovating solutions for their UHNW clients fires a passion for life and business that has Janice saying she “never wants to retire”. It’s a passion they are keen to share with the next generation of bankers and partners as they open their doors to youth, growth and vigour.

What was your initial motivation to found Pyxis?

JC: To keep doing the job that I love doing and to keep working with the clients that I supported and who supported me. But to do so within a different structure that was better set up to meet the evolving demands of the industry and our clients.

What would you say have been the key milestones in Pyxis’s corporate journey to date?

JC: I’m really not that focused on milestones per se. Why? Because every day since I left the bank and co-founded Pyxis it’s felt like we’ve done something great! Every small step we’ve taken since then feels like an important achievement in its own way. Whether that was getting our first tiny, three-person office, to getting our first client, then our second client and then our first external partner – our growth has been assured and organic.

But if you had to choose one inflexion point in Pyxis’s growth story?

JC: From a corporate development perspective, the key accelerator was when Karen agreed to join Pyxis, soon building a team of 10 other bankers. I started Pyxis in January 2020 and from that moment on I’d been trying to persuade her to join. It took me two years to convince her that this was the right place for the next stage in her journey.

So what clinched it for you to join Karen?

KL: A vastly improved work-life balance was comfortably the most attractive pull-factor in my coming to Pyxis. It was also clear that the bureaucracy here would be much less while the professionalism and combined expertise are equal or better. And communication at Pyxis is quicker, more open and more effective.

In almost two years I’ve been with Pyxis I’ve been able to effect a complete change in my work, family and client relationships.

Can you give us one example?

KL: When I worked at the bank, it was normal for me to do six internal meetings a day – as well as dealing with additional meeting invitations. My record was 12 meetings in a single day. My parents are aging and at one point were both in hospital at the same time. Given my high level of responsibilities at the bank and the demands on my time, it was very hard to delegate and so I missed out on seeing or visiting my parents.

At Pyxis, I’ve received a lot of support from Janice and other managers. They’ve helped keep client communication and servicing continuous while I’ve been spending more time with my parents. We’re also much more flexible at Pyxis about work location. Here we believe you can work remotely as long as you’re effective. At many banks, you still have to be seen physically on-site whether or not it’s necessary for you to be there.

How many of those record 12 meetings you did in a single day would you say were useful or benefited clients?

KL: Very few!

And how many meetings a day do you do at Pyxis?

KL: It’s ad hoc and client-driven. We only meet when we need to!

How would you describe the corporate culture you have built at Pyxis?

JC: To start with, we were only three or four people. We were all close friends and had been colleagues for a long time. I would describe myself as very straightforward, very direct, I just want to get things done. So that was our culture. Crucially: absolutely no politics!

We may have grown since to about 30 people with many more partners – and we have big growth plans for the future – but I haven’t changed and the “no politics” rule still stands! We’re all about open communication, close collaboration and straightforwardness – we’re innovative and energetic, we can move fast and we can adapt to changes quickly and creatively.

If there’s one thing you wanted to remove from your previous career as a senior manager and banker, what has that been?

JC: Hierarchy! I see all my colleagues as partners. This is their career, their second home, so they have to like working here.

My previous corporate life taught me to equate hierarchy with pain. Hierarchies stifle creativity and growth for younger colleagues and, as a result, prevent clients getting access to the best ideas and solutions. At Pyxis everyone – no matter their age, experience or specific responsibility – is encouraged to voice and bring their own ideas to the table and to be intimately involved in all the key strategic decisions.

Can you explain how this works to your clients’ benefit?

KL: Lack of hierarchy and the clutter that goes with it means we can tailor-make solutions for clients more quickly and more effectively. Customisation is clearly also available at big banks but there we deal with the key problem of tailoring from very large product shelves for very large numbers of clients. And this is often across multiple unconnected departments who find it hard to communicate. So trying to match client needs with the right solution is more difficult and takes much longer.

At Pyxis it’s more direct and to the point. I can communicate with Janice and the colleagues whose input I need 24 hours a day. Simply put, we cooperate better and more creatively in delivering the right expertise and know-how for the benefit of our clients.

Is there one other notable benefit in your new environment and its culture that you would highlight Karen?

KL: Internal competition within the world’s bigger banks can mean that people don’t share solutions with colleagues. They might, for example, be reluctant to involve less experienced team members in important decision making. At Pyxis, I immediately felt like I was part of a big family. People here are remarkably selfless in terms of sharing their knowledge and experience – they care more about solving problems for clients than they do about accelerating their own career path.

But haven’t you at the same time lost access to the huge resources in, for example, data and IT that big banks have at their disposal?

KL: At big banks people talk endlessly about innovation and harnessing new technology. Then they continue talking. At Pyxis we actually get things done! We make more effective use of Big Data and AI here partly because we care only about applying it for the benefit of our clients.

What is Pyxis’s growth strategy for the future?

JC: Our platform is now ready to welcome more partners. We are perfectly poised for growth. We want to attract more like-minded bankers. That means people who will appreciate our focus on work-life balance and who just want to get the job done well.

We are also expanding our locations. That’s in terms of our client footprint, specifically in China. And also in the form of new strategic alliances in jurisdictions like Switzerland. We already offer clients booking centre options in Hong Kong and Singapore. Geopolitical and other considerations mean we would like to add Switzerland in the near future.

Why should the next generation of young bankers consider a career at Pyxis?

JC: Precisely because experienced managers like Karen and I are ready to get out of the way of younger colleagues and let them take bigger roles and responsibility.

KL: When I was a front-line banker at a large global bank, I managed up to 300 people at one time. It was clear then that young people found it very hard to participate strategically because of the prevailing hierarchical and compartmentalised structure. So much that is of value is off limits to young people at these large banks.

We are the opposite. They can be much more hands-on and can participate in the decision-making process much, much sooner in their careers. For hungry, young people who would love to learn both the theory and practice of wealth management, we are the place to join.

How does Pyxis evaluate success?

JC: By our ability to attract like-minded bankers to join and grow with us!

KL: By the fact that all of our people look happier and smile more every day than they did at the banks they worked for before!

This is a sponsored article from Pyxis Wealth Advisors.