(Philadelphia Business Journal) Ryan Hicke is equal parts humbled and excited to succeed SEI Investments Co. founder Al West after being named as just its second CEO since its inception in 1968.
When he steps into the role in June, the 44-year-old Roxborough native will tap into his varied experiences over 24 years at Oaks-based SEI, a provider of asset management software and services to banks, investment advisors, institutional investors and investment managers. Hicke’s path to CEO started as an intern while attending St. Joseph’s University and eventually took him and his growing family across the Atlantic, where he led SEI’s U.K. asset management and private banking businesses and helped expand the company’s global footprint.
In the first of a two-part interview, Hicke — who is currently chief information officer — discussed his journey to the top at the only employer he’s ever known.
On how he started at SEI
I actually started at SEI the summer after my junior year. I was an intern at SEI while I was at St. Joe’s. I worked at SEI for about 20 hours a week throughout my senior year and then going through our associates program in the summer of 1999. But I’ve basically been here continuously since the summer of 1998.
On what he learned from Al West
He won’t like this answer. First and foremost is humility. Al’s leadership style is so authentic. He’s so real and he is so humble. I started here at 20 years old and I grew up with parents that really instilled a strong work ethic in me, just respectfulness, good manners… all those things that are really important. And Al just exudes that humility and leadership every day. So I have learned from that for 24 years.
The other thing that I think is often understated that I’ve learned is accessibility. And that manifests itself in the actual physical space here. The fact that we don’t have offices and people are walking the halls, I really believe the accessibility is a big part of our culture and a big part of kind of who we are when we come here every day. The willingness for Al to meet with any employee or talk to any employee is something I have learned and tried to really embody. It forces you to make sure you kind of check your ego at the door and you don’t let any role go to your head because if he’s not going to let his role go to his head, then none of us should.
And then on the business side, I think I have always tried to really learn and mirror two things. One is Al has just great strategic vision. He can see out years beyond what many people can. It’s a gift. But it has forced me to be kind of more thoughtful and think differently and maybe become more patient about things that I want to do. I also think collaboration is a really strong part of our culture that we actually all collaborate, and we do listen to each other and we listen to clients and we listen to the market and then we gather that information and we talk and we then we act.
On what the company was like when he started and how it has evolved
I would say we were probably 1,500 people back then [and over 4,000 employees now]. There’s a lot of things that have changed, but a lot of things that have remained the same. Obviously we had just opened the old campus. So the kind of physical presence, the same ground that was kind of an eye-opening thing when I came to interview for the internship at this space and the people and the culture, really still are so differentiated. I moved to London in 2001.
So although I’ve been with SEI for 24 years, half of that time was over in London and really kind of helping in getting started with some new businesses that we launched and ran over there and then came back in 2012. I’ve seen so many parts of SEI for different jobs because of moving domestically and globally. Obviously, we’re a lot larger today, but I think our core values kind of remain the same. One of the things that I think has kept us being so relevant and fresh is our willingness to kind of challenge and reinvent ourselves every 10 years. I think our adherence to listening to clients and listening to the market and really trying to stay ahead of serving those needs.
On moving his family overseas so he could advance his career
I was young, so when I moved over, my wife, Terri, moved over with me after about a year. My three oldest kids, who are now 17, 15 and 13, were all born in London. I think for me, one of the biggest challenges was I had never left the United States. I had to literally get a passport to take the job. It was a total leap of faith. And I’m not exaggerating when I say I did not know a single person in London. It was a very, very eye-opening, growth period for me, both professionally and personally. But on the work side, it was so much fun. There were 12 or 13 people in the office. We really grew that office and grew that business substantially over the years. And Terri and I, we had a great time. We loved living there. Again, we moved back when the kids were 7, 5 and 3, and then the other two were born when we came back.
On how his experience on the wealth management and technology sides of SEI helped prepare him for the CEO role
If you kind of look at the career trajectory, I’ve been able to work on the sales and client side of both our asset management and technology businesses. I really understand our solution and our capabilities and how they’re sold. And then the last six years running technology has been a really great experience for me, both from an educational perspective, intellectually and really trying to get up to speed with what’s going on in the world of modern technology and running a workforce that is motivated in different ways than a sales organization. But I’ve been super fortunate just because not only I’ve been able to move around and have a lot of roles at SEI. I know so many of our clients and so many of our employees. Because of that, it’s really given me a unique opportunity to create relationships inside and outside of the office. I’ve used the word a couple of times. I’ve actually been really grateful. I remember when Al asked me to go run technology, I didn’t really think it was the most logical choice. But he’s smarter than I am. And his view then was more business leaders are going to be running the technology in the future, and that was six years ago, and that’s definitely borne itself out to be true.
