Stronger Together
A global rebranding initiative, a multi-jurisdictional change programme and hyper-aggressive growth targets face RBC GAM’s senior marketers this year, but they are not phased in the slightest.
Corporate integrations are an agonising and fretful affair. When Price Waterhouse merged with Coopers & Lybrand to become PwC in 1998, staff continued to identify as “legacy Coopers” or “legacy Price Waterhouse” long into the early 2000s.
The ill-fated Daimler-Benz and Chrysler merger, meanwhile, became an academic case study in the importance of integrating cultures. Both businesses were ultimately unable to marry approaches to operations, personnel, and sales. Managing change, internally and externally, is hard.
The extent to which any rebrand is successful rests largely with senior leaders in marketing. In fact, it is one of the big business tasks where marketing can truly show the value of the function.
Corporate communication is the key conduit en route to a successful integration. Senior marketers must digest corporate objectives and create an environment that fosters internal collaboration and outward-facing unity. For it to be done well, it requires listening, strategic thinking, repositioning, tactical manoeuvring, and agenda setting.
It is this particular mountain which the marketing team at RBC Global Asset Management are part way through scaling. Leading the expedition is Jayne Fieldhouse, the company’s global head of institutional marketing.
“When two businesses come together, it is going to be bumpy,” she admits. “Erich (Gerth, CEO of RBC BlueBay) talks about stages of grief. When I brought the regional institutional marketing teams together into a global team, we went through something similar.”
In the UK, where Fieldhouse is based, BlueBay Asset Management rebranded as RBC BlueBay in July 2022. The move was part of a wider global initiative designed to distinguish the investment businesses owned by the Canadian banking group through a series of recognisable sub-brands.
These cobranded and client-centric identities were chosen to showcase RBC GAM’s expertise and market understanding in the different regional territories.
RBC GAM is now the umbrella term for all of RBC’s institutional asset management businesses, globally. Underneath that sits a series of region-specific RBC brands with which client groups in that locality will be more familiar.
RBC BlueBay is the brand used for RBC GAM’s institutional business outside of North America. It consists of the two former legacy businesses of RBC GAM UK and BlueBay Asset Management. RBC BlueBay will also be the brand used for the institutional presence in EMEA and APAC regions.
In Canada, the group’s institutional business carries the RBC logo with the PH&N Institutional anchorage of the legacy brand. In the US, all operations are under the RBC GAM brand, as are the retail operations in Canada.
“We know that outside North America, the BlueBay name is very strong,” Fieldhouse explains. “Clients said they did not want to lose the brand. We got the same feedback for the PH&N name as well, so we have recognised the importance of brand and culture, but we still have the RBC umbrella brand over the top.
“In Europe, with brand awareness in new markets, it is easier in some respects, as we are going to market as RBC BlueBay.”
It’s worth noting that BlueBay’s relationship with RBC is nothing new. The Canadian bank has owned BlueBay since 2010, but initially took the decision to maintain a federation of brands, post-acquisition.
The decision to bring these collective brands closer together is a logical one, but requires additional work internally, as well as externally.
During the initial weeks of the transition, the leadership team met with every single person in the business, some in small groups, others in one-to-one settings. The CEOs of both RBC BlueBay and RBC Global Asset Management have talked at length about the importance of culture.
“We have leaders in both businesses that really care about how we feel,” says Alexandra Rhys-Jones, senior director, Marketing, at RBC BlueBay. “They put themselves out there, held town halls and have had multiple touch points. That makes a big difference.
“The leadership team were not just delivering a message. They were genuinely listening.”
Fieldhouse adds that, while the legacy cultures of both BlueBay and RBC GAM were slightly different, there are many qualities which are similar, such as colleagues possessing huge amounts of drive, determination, and ambition.
“One of the things I’ve tried to do is around transparency and collaboration,” she says. “It is not perfect, but there is a lot we are trying to achieve together.
“In January, we did an offsite where we had a breakout session to identify solutions to four problems. We have continued those groups so there is more ownership of problem solving.”
We are quite intense as a team. We expect a lot from people when they come in and there is a delivery level which is not comfortable for many. We are very careful in our recruitment. We look for a hungry spirit. If they are not a team player, that won’t work for us.
Jayne Fieldhouse
Firm but fair
Fieldhouse, as leader of the newly merged global marketing function, has been keen to encourage individuals to take responsibility for their respective areas through setting clear expectations.
“An integration isn’t necessarily right for everyone,” she admits. “There is a journey you take people on, but if that isn’t going to work for an individual, it is important to marry the nice with the tough.”
Fieldhouse assumed her current role in April 2022, having worked as partner, and head of communications and marketing at BlueBay Asset Management for seven years before that. She joined from JP Morgan Asset Management where she spent a significant chunk of her formative career in the corporate communications team. Before this, she worked in various roles in public relations and business development.
Her experience has shaped how she thinks about the skillset required in a global marketing function. At the newly combined business, she recognises that her team’s approach, striving for high performance within a busy, objective-driven environment, may not hold universal appeal.
“It may not be the right culture for everyone,” she says. “We are quite intense as a team. We expect a lot from people when they come in and there is a delivery level which is not comfortable for many. We are very careful in our recruitment. We look for a hungry spirit. If they are not a team player, that won’t work for us.”
Being clear about the corporate culture from the outset, has allowed RBC BlueBay to assemble an impressive squad of senior marketers in the London office.
In a hiring market sometimes deemed “difficult” by UK HR leaders, the London office has managed to attract some phenomenally well-known talent.
In December, the business onboarded Louise Somers as director of investment communications. Somers is the former head of global communications at Architas. A month later, she was joined by Keren Miles-Perrott, a former M&G corporate comms director, who has now taken up the same role at RBC BlueBay, covering a maternity role.
The two new joiners will work alongside RBC BlueBay’s director of digital marketing, Sarah Freeland, who has worked with the business for just under five years and Alexandra Rhys-Jones, the company’s senior marketing director, with prior experience at BMO GAM, Credit Suisse and Lloyd’s of London, among others.
“We look for people who will take ownership, be accountable and fully understand that accountability,” Rhys-Jones explains, her colleagues nodding
in agreement.
“The business is a true meritocracy,” Fieldhouse adds. “It wants people to take initiative, it is welcomed, and people get rewarded for it. But you also get found out if you are not credible and you don’t push forward.”
At this point in the interview, the pace quickens. Every colleague is keen to be involved in the discussion.
“It is that curious mindset that we try to find, says Freeland. “Someone who has the maturity to be able to manage upwards and within the wider business objectives.
“We are looking for individuals who are able to partner with sales and not just perform a delivery function. They must be able to embrace the strategic inputs. That individual is quite unique in our industry, but it sets us apart. Trying to find those people can be a challenge.”
It’s clear that the team are incredibly proud of their work ethic, their quality of output and, crucially, the results they have achieved collectively.
The no-nonsense clarity on corporate culture, personal objectives, and boundaries is essential if the team are to achieve the ambitious business objectives set by RBC GAM at group level.
Good relations
As noted by Freeland, RBC GAM’s global marketing leadership team works in parallel with the sales leadership team. Crucially, marketing stands alone as a credible partner, it does not report into the sales function.
The result is that sales and marketing have a collaborative relationship where they share information, where marketing enjoys the same level of seniority and has the power of veto in instances where an initiative is unlikely to generate the necessary return on investment.
The marketing strategy is built from the overall business objectives and runs alongside the branding strategy. With the branding element bedding in, strategic marketing has a heavy growth-focus in 2023.
“Most of the areas we are in are growth areas for North America and EMEA APAC,” says Fieldhouse. “RBC BlueBay is focussed on growing its financial institution clients (such as fund platforms, wealth managers, private banks, etc. In the US, we are targeting overall growth in fixed income and in Canada, we are working to grow our alternatives capability, while staying relevant to our core client base.”
Today, PH&N Institutional sits within the RBC Global Asset Management federation of brands. The subsidiary is the Canadian institutional arm of RBC GAM and is somewhat ahead of RBC BlueBay on the rebranding journey, having started its rebrand just over three years ago.
Leading the project, on the ground, is marketing director Lisa Leong McPhee, who has been with the business since January 2018. She explains that some of the milestones RBC BlueBay has passed, follow a similar trend to PH&N Institutional.
“People in Canada knew we belonged to RBC GAM… but our materials were a bit inconsistent so we wanted to bring that together. It’s a bit like BlueBay in that the BlueBay brand also holds a lot of value.
“All of RBC GAM’s businesses are in different stages of maturity. In Canada, with PH&N Institutional, we are very well established and institutional clients know who we are. We have a really strong reputation.”
Historically, PH&N Institutional was renowned for its credentials in fixed income but it has worked hard in recent years to showcase what it does in other asset classes. Another similarity with the legacy BlueBay business is that it has a value proposition focussed on quality. This has a major influence on how it anchors its marketing, including entering – and winning – the Greenwich Quality Leader awards for the past nine years. The Canadian operation’s approach to marketing does have its differences, though.
PH&N Institutional’s editor works with the other areas of RBC GAM such as the corporate governance and responsible investment teams, but the Canadian offshoot works with content in a different way.
While it repurposes some of the content from RBC GAM and RBC BlueBay, this is tailored to specific client groups. Similarly, its own content follows a more ad hoc timetable, but when content is to be deployed, it is done in a deep dive with specific Canadian institutions in mind.
The approach to events, social media and client communications are also different from some of their colleagues in other jurisdictions.
“Historically, with things like social media, we were very reluctant whereas RBC GAM is pro social media. We now use it as a tool to drive traffic to our thought leadership,” Leong McPhee explains. “On social media, we have demonstrated there absolutely is value but it is still not our main channel. “We do measure engagement, though. If we get one engagement, but it was from a big client, then that is worth it, and the number of clicks don’t matter. It goes against a lot of what is happening in today’s world where people are interested in how many people are reading, and for how long.
“PH&N Institutional clients have high expectations and expect white glove service,” Leong McPhee, says. This is why the business focusses much of its marketing on face-to-face activities. These include event sponsorships and proprietary events.
“Our roadshow is called PH&N Perspectives,” she says. “We are going to 11 cities this year. We host three or four different seminars and so much of our resources are dedicated to this. It is our premier event, and it shows what we are all about. Client service at these events is top notch. The way we do business is different to other regions, because of our history.
Across the international marketing functions, Maryanne Sheehan is RBC GAM’s longest serving member and looks after all efforts in the US, whether strategic, product-related, sales support or digital.
Her decade-long relationship with RBC GAM means she has seen more than most, yet she is incredibly positive about how the new centralised marketing approach has enabled the team to “break down silos” between distribution and marketing.
Her current priorities are to integrate BlueBay into the wider RBC GAM business and to actively promote BlueBay’s fixed income expertise on the ground in the US.
“That is a key driver for our revenue generation,” she says. “We have the RBC master brand and the BlueBay investment brand that we are messaging and communicating within the US. We view raising brand awareness and BlueBay’s subject matter expertise as integral to our efforts.”
Sheehan is a formidable force in US institutional marketing. Her career has included director-level positions at Eaton Vance and Allegiant Asset Management and a decade clocked up at Natixis prior to that.
This experience allows her to make solid, critical, assessments of the competitive landscape in the US and beyond. When asked about how she is positioning BlueBay in the States, she notes the current geopolitical landscape as an important consideration.
“Political, geographical and exogenous events have provided considerations for how we market our capabilities. BlueBay has strong emerging market debt expertise, of which we have spent a good deal of our efforts raising awareness.
“We have added US fixed income products into a crowded space in the States. It is important that we differentiate BlueBay within the highly mature US fixed income marketplace.”
Sheehan notes this year’s major market-moving events in her assessment of the geopolitical landscape. The emergency sale of Credit Suisse and the fallout from Silicon Valley Bank are front of mind.
“It isn’t just what is going on in the US anymore… it is what is happening across the world and dissecting how that is impacting markets, and our clients.”
In terms of her approach, Sheehan explains that the US strategy is multi-faceted.
“We are doing a lot of both ‘earned’ and ‘paid’ media. We have embraced e-distribution, digital technologies, the use of expressed preferences and we are going out with sophisticated and differentiated content.”
Her team runs an events strategy alongside the main communications operation. Around half of the events this year are devoted to amplifying BlueBay’s expertise through third party conferences. This is supported by a host of podcasts and webinars.
“All of these techniques are integrated. They are pushing people to our website for deeper engagement,” she says. “We closely monitor feedback with our social outreach, we use A/B testing which is highly targeted both geographically and demographically.
“The effectiveness of each post is monitored, and we are applying those learnings to subsequent posts. We are leveraging the feedback and behaviours to help us exploit and optimise our strategy further.”
