“You can’t tell Derrick Rose or LeBron James he’s not allowed to fake out an opponent.”
Ben Van Vliet, Assistant Professor and Associate Director at the Illinois Institute of Technology, discusses the nature of competition in the financial industry and the impact of deception in the markets.
“I think the future is new products; the same way we grew the business before.”
“There’s a tension between a desire to win and the things you need to do to manage your trading system.”
“People need to be educated and told what derivatives can do.”
“You have to work incredibly hard to survive. That’s a fact of being a rugby player, and that’s a fact of life.”
“Ultimately your career objectives fit in with your life objectives. You may not yet know what those are, but time moves extremely quickly and, before long, you will be looking to make certain changes with respect to your life. Those decisions will impact your career.”
“When people are sitting there talking about you and criticizing you or doing something against you, that means they’re taking notice.”
“Commodities are now so much part of the infrastructure of the marketplace and the asset classes that buy side investors get involved with…that they are going to continue to look for those opportunities.”
“I want you to think differently, all the time, when thinking about things, and look for parallels, because parallels help you understand things. We often speak in stories because people understand stories.”
“Your first impressions matter quite a bit, and perception is reality.”
“You don’t have to [meet] every credential and be an ‘A’ on all of it to get to that next role. You just have to believe you can do it, and you need to make others believe you can do it.”
“When your crystal ball gets foggy, your two greatest assets will be your humility and your flexibility.”
“Personally, I see it as our industry undergoing a new technological reformation, and I think it’s as significant as moving from the trading pits to matching engines.”
“Ask yourself if you’d be interested in an operations or compliance job. Because that gives you a foundation to help you excel.”
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Patrick Lothian is head of