The Interview: Marie McNeela

As Managing Director of Intertrust group in Guernsey, Marie McNeela has a front-row view of the island’s growing popularity and strength as a funds sector player. She tells us how she plans to grow her firm’s funds business further, and how both the sector and Guernsey can navigate the challenges ahead. Photograph: Chris George

Tell us about your early career and how you came to the Guernsey funds sector.

I grew up in the UK and initially thought I would be a physiotherapist. But after finishing education and taking some time out to work in Africa, I spent what I thought would be a couple of months working for Coutts in London and absolutely loved it. As a result of that, I ended up staying for nearly 10 years. 

After a decade in London I took the opportunity to move to Cayman and spent three years working there before arriving in Guernsey. 

I only intended to be here for a short while before moving back to the UK, but that was nearly 20 years ago, I love island life and it’s a great jurisdiction to work in.

What was it that you enjoyed so much in that early role with Coutts, and which made you so determined to carve your career in the funds sector? 

I loved how much variety there was in each day. I was in the fiduciary and tax advisory department and the quality of the clients and the type of work we were doing with them was amazing. 

Private wealth particularly is a people business – it’s a relationships business – and that just excited something in me. I still enjoy the people side of things. 

There are certainly some parallels between Cayman and the Channel Islands. Did the experience you had in Cayman play a part in you eventually settling in Guernsey?

Absolutely. The nature of the work onshore is quite similar in some ways, but it can also be very different to offshore activity. 

We did a lot of offshore planning at Coutts and I felt I was doing that work without having the experience of actually administering and managing it on the ground. The chance to go to Cayman and see both sides was something I wanted to do and was something new. 

It helped me grow in my career because I could see all angles. I could see the positive impact of the funds, the private wealth and the corporate offerings for clients and it all became very relevant, I had a better holistic picture of what we were doing for our clients. There’s no doubt that played a part in me wanting to be offshore again, in Guernsey.

What attracted you to Intertrust and your role there?

I’d previously worked for Credit Suisse and Rothschild & Co in the islands. I was aware that Guernsey had a strong jurisdictional reputation in terms of quality and how nimble it can be, and Intertrust Group has always been at the forefront of that. 

The opportunity to work for another very good organisation, and one that was at the start of an exciting strategic journey, was too good to pass up. 

I also have a lot of international experience and, with Intertrust based in more than 30 countries, it felt like the perfect fit for me.

You’re also an Executive Director of We Are Guernsey. Can you tell us a bit about that role and why you find it valuable to be involved?

I joined the board a year ago because it felt like something I could add value to. We in the finance industry need agencies in our jurisdictions – in all offshore locations – to promote what we do in a positive way. 

It’s an exciting time for We Are Guernsey, with a lot of initiatives under way to demonstrate just how valuable Guernsey is as a jurisdiction. 

Clearly, I joined at the start of the pandemic, so most of my involvement to date has been virtual rather than physical but that’s been an interesting journey, too. As well as the great work We Are Guernsey does in promoting the jurisdiction, it has a wide scope and can be a great conduit for businesses in the industry. 

Tell us a bit more about Intertrust Group – the scale of the business and its USP in the market.

We are a global specialised administration services business operating in more than 30 jurisdictions. We provide bespoke corporate, fund, capital market and private wealth services and we’re listed, which provides transparency of practices and strategy. 

Seven of the largest corporations in the world, about 40 of the top 50 PE firms and some of the world’s wealthiest families partner with us so that in itself is a great endorsement of our business. One of the great byproducts of that is it makes it really exciting and energising for our staff.

In today’s climate, I think it’s really important to be a successful player in intergenerational wealth transfer and preservation and that’s a big focus for us. We help manage the complexities that our clients are trying to navigate, whether it’s through their personal wealth, their business wealth or through their employees’ wealth, and that personable approach is really important.  

I think all of our people really understand that everything we do, at every level of the business, has an impact and a business development angle – because if we provide great service and clients feel like they can trust us, it provides the positive endorsement we need to grow.

You’ve been in your role as MD of the Guernsey operation for nearly three years – and you caught this massive period of disruption. How has the past 18 months affected the Guernsey business?

It’s been challenging for everybody in every business. I think at Intertrust Group we have been fortunate because we have managed to retain a pretty seamless delivery of client service. We’ve fast-tracked some things, but in a way that has demonstrated that we can adapt and still perform at a high level. 

In some ways it has been an opportunity to strengthen relationships. Intertrust globally allowed each jurisdiction to manage the pandemic on a local basis and I think this has been integral to our response.

If a global mandate had been provided, it might have been difficult to manage at each office – especially as Guernsey hasn’t been in lockdown as much as many parts of the world. So I think that local approach was useful.

You’re right that the islands weren’t as affected as other parts of the world. Do you feel that has further enhanced the appeal of Jersey and Guernsey?

I think that’s absolutely right. There’s been a lot of positive reporting around the way the Channel Islands have managed the pandemic in general, and especially so in Guernsey.  

I think it has benefited us in many ways – the client base, the number of businesses that have been setting up here, and the number of families moving to Guernsey. That is shown by having the best year in our housing market for decades. 

Do you feel that the funds sector specifically has been able to demonstrate its value and its stability during the response to the pandemic?

Yes I do. I’ve been in this business for a long time now, and I think that across the finance industry – but particularly in Guernsey as a jurisdiction – we’ve always managed to evolve and adapt. That’s true in the funds, private wealth and corporate sectors. 

What’s especially telling is that our Guernsey funds business has doubled its assets under management over the past year, our private wealth service line has grown and we are continuing to see a lot more enquiries. 

I think part of the reason is that over the past 18 months, clients have had time to stop and think about their circumstances, think about their business strategy, and adapt where they see new opportunities.

When you took on your current role, you set out a number of objectives – from enhancing the strength of the business to giving a platform to employees to develop professionally and personally, and leveraging tech for growth. How are those areas progressing?

In terms of empowering people, that’s absolutely a priority and the past 18 months have brought that right to the fore. 

We’ve done a lot to make sure that people are comfortable and we have worked hard to understand the impact that the pandemic has had on staff – some people haven’t seen their families for two years, for example, so we try to support them accordingly. 
 
One of the keys areas of focus has been to ensure our staff don’t have some kind of hiatus in their career path because of the pandemic.

As a result, we have continued to promote professional development by working with partners to ensure our people continue to have a defined career path, and that they continue to be motivated and excited by the opportunities available to them.

In terms of the tech piece, we continue to develop the tech offering and that’s improving constantly. 

We don’t want to be fully reliant on third-party technology – we have that skillset within the business and that has enabled us to create client portals that many of our clients are now using. 

That skillset is also allowing us to take a look at how we use technology to manage risk and the increasingly complex regulatory landscape.

All of these things are driving efficiency and effectiveness across our business. We certainly haven’t put anything on hold because of the pandemic.

We’ve maybe changed the phasing slightly, to respond to changing priorities, but we haven’t lost sight of what’s important and we’re already planning for next year to ensure that we continue to evolve.

What will that evolution mean in terms of the services you offer going forward and how you plan to grow the business?

The local board here is looking to grow the business, and our strategy is to grow it not just in terms of revenue but in terms of the services we offer as well. 
 
We’ve started to provide capital market services, which in the past hasn’t been done out of Guernsey, and we’re also working on a few SPACs (special-purpose acquisition companies) – and that’s all really exciting for us. 

We’re certainly focused on new revenue streams. We’re also looking at using that in-house tech capability I spoke about earlier to enhance our compliance and our reporting offering – and using our operational team in our centre of excellence in India to enhance the efficiency across all service lines.

Efficiency is certainly a buzzword across the islands right now – and tech is clearly an enabler for that. What’s the driver for you seeking greater efficiency?

Even before Covid-19 we needed to improve that as an industry. We’re a legacy industry and we’ve been around for a long time. This sector was historically paper-based and manual, but now the world is moving very quickly, so we are moving with it. 

We’ve recognised for a long time that our clients are much more mobile than they’ve ever been. What the pandemic has done is reinforce the journey we’re on and emphasised how important it is that we meet our clients’ needs around how they are served.

Intertrust Group’s acquisition of [tech-enabled provider of middle and back-office services] Viteos in 2019 provides us with the tech to further enhance our proposition, and it’s important we don’t pause because that is how you get left behind.

We want to stay at the top of the industry and that means equipping our clients with the tools to operate how they wish, with the technology at their fingertips, to communicate wherever they are in the world and to not have to wait for business hours to operate.

What other challenges does the funds sector face right now – what else is high on the agenda?

As is the case for many across the industry right now, ESG has become one of our core pillars. There’s a huge focus on that. 

We have been working with internal teams around the globe to drive initiatives that ensure we have the appropriate KPIs for improving our carbon footprint and also demonstrating ESG credentials. It’s absolutely at the forefront of everyone’s mind right across the finance industry. 

I also think there’s big competition for assets with high valuations right now – and having that combined with ESG awareness is a challenge for the industry. 

People are looking at what they’re buying and considering what it might look like in five or 10 years’ time, and then they’re making sure that’s sustainable. We’ve seen businesses hiring heads of sustainability to do that – it’s a key focus for our industry.

Other market trends that we’re keeping an eye on are things like the consolidation and rationalisation of business partners. There’s a lot of consolidation going on in the islands at the moment. 

Covid-19 may, of course, present more challenges and I think the one thing we are all mindful of is the increased regulatory burden on clients and on businesses. 

I don’t think of that as a negative, but we need to be very smart around how we balance what we do from a regulatory point of view. We need to make sure we are operating within those regulations while still providing ultimate service to the client at an appropriate price.

Another hot topic you’ve written about in the past is the representation of women within the financial services sector – in particular at board level. What are your views on why we still face such a challenge in this area and your approach to tackling it?

Yes it’s important to me. I don’t think approaching it by quota is the answer, as some do. For me, it’s much more important to make sure that you have the right skillset and that the right people have the opportunity to provide that skillset. 

I’ve built a really strong senior leadership team here in the Guernsey office, and it’s great we are fairly equal in terms of gender and diversity. But we did that by focusing on getting the right skillsets around the table – regardless of gender.

I’m also really proud that, in Guernsey generally, women make up more than 25% of the directors on the island – which is a really strong statistic globally, even if it isn’t yet as high as we would like.

We have some really good female leaders and role models on the island, including some who work in our office. It’s a small community, a lot of us know each other, which means we are able to have discussions and to network.  

Much of that has been borne out of the fact that we’ve had some really good male leaders on the island who have been keen to promote and support that type of initiative. Certainly, all businesses benefit from having a diverse board in my opinion.

That’s certainly a strength of Guernsey – but what are the other strengths of the island that mean it is likely to remain a strong jurisdiction for funds activity going forward?

Our legislative and regulatory landscape obviously plays a big role in our appeal and will continue to do so. The International Stock Exchange (TISE) is also based here – that’s really useful and we have a strong relationship with TISE.

There are around 800 funds set up in Guernsey alone and Jersey’s even bigger.

While there are always threats to our standing, such as the murmurings around global tax rates and the like, I think the Channel Islands are bigger than that. 

If you look back over the past 10 or 15 years, we have seen constant change, including political and regulatory change, but we have retained our strength and our standing. 

We see that strength in our everyday work at Intertrust Group – in the fact that we have so many outstanding professionals in the offices in both islands, which enables us to understand the factors that we face and look at ways to enhance our client offering.

I think that’s a big part of the reason people choose Intertrust Group in the islands.