o Kate Schapiro, CFA, it’s not all about the numbers. That might seem an unlikely credo for the manager of the Sentinel International Equity Fund, but Schapiro believes the investment profession requires so much more than just numerical proficiency. In her view, being able to do critical analysis across a broader range of ideas is just as useful to investment management in the long run. And as a graduate of Stanford University with a bachelor of arts in Spanish literature, it’s no wonder.

		Kate Schapiro, CFA, heads the San Francisco office of Sentinel Asset Management and manages its international equity fund, which has outperformed the S&P 500 Index during her tenure. A graduate of Stanford University and past president of the CFA San Francisco Society, Schapiro leads the Marketing and Communication Committee for CFA Institute.

But Schapiro is a crackerjack fund manager whose number crunching skills have come a long way. After 24 years in the investment business, she has been counted among the “top fund managers” by the media for her superior fund management performance.

Like most aspiring investment professionals, she didn’t realize the value of her potential at first. Schapiro enrolled in the CFA Program almost immediately after college to help her gain exposure to investment concepts and understand the business better.

Her first job was as a technology industry analyst at Western Asset Management Company, where the fact that she had taken one accounting class earned her the position because she could read financial statements. The head of the local office at Western Asset was a CFA charterholder and he urged her to enroll in the CFA Program as a way to improve her skill level.

“I thought that I didn’t have a major economic or finance background at that time and I wanted to do well in my job,” she recalls. “It was just a way for me to get up to speed in a business where other people had more financial analysis knowledge than I had. And the CFA Program did all that for me.”

As her skill level grew, Schapiro took on portfolio management responsibilities at Western Asset.

“My primary job was as an analyst,” Schapiro explains, “but the CFA Program was a way for me to get exposure to a broad array of investment concepts whereas otherwise my world would have been more narrowly defined.”

That expansive coverage coupled with her quick mind allowed her to progress rapidly into managing international and domestic equity portfolios for institutional, mutual fund, and high-net-worth investors in London and San Francisco over the course of her career.

Schapiro has worked for such firms as Strong Capital Management, Wells Capital Management, and Newport Pacific Management, where she has consistently earned accolades. Her current employer, Sentinel Asset Management, describes her as one of “the best talents in the industry.”

As an employer herself, Schapiro says the CFA charter is something she specifically looks for in a job candidate.

“I don’t require it, but if I were hiring somebody and they didn’t have the CFA charter and they were not in the program, I would highly encourage and do what I could to get them in the program,” she says. “Because I think it gives you an incredible background and it makes you better at what you do.”

Her attitude as an employer mirrors her broad-minded approach to the investment profession. She believes that studying areas outside the scope of what a professional is hired to do helps them avoid becoming too narrow in their investment approach. By being able to see how a particular investment recommendation fits in with other portfolio decisions, she explains, analysts can provide a more solid and integrated plan to their clients.

“I love the fact that [in the CFA Program] you have to study other areas of expertise. So if you haven‘t done something like this (the CFA Program), your experience and your knowledge is more limited,” she says. “You may be a good technology industry analyst but what do you know about fixed income?”

And Sentinel Asset Management appears to agree that having a CFA charter is a distinguishing factor. In a recent RFP, the firm cited the number of portfolio managers and analysts who have the CFA charter to help demonstrate the firm’s high level of professional expertise. The firm has 9 of 11 portfolio managers and 10 of 20 analysts who are CFA charterholders.

Sentinel Asset Management essentially manages the Sentinel Family of Funds, which is one of America's oldest fund families with approximately US$4.4 billion currently under management, as well as the investment portfolios of National Life Insurance Company, which has approximately US$13.3 billion in assets.

The fund under Schapiro’s purview has outperformed the S&P 500 Index for the past 15 months, coinciding with the first nine months of her tenure at the firm and earning it a “Best in Class” rating from Bloomberg in June 2006. So, perhaps her success is tied directly to her belief that creative, critical thinking is just as important as crunching the numbers.

“The thing that I love about this business is you can approach it in a lot of different ways that can play to your strengths,” she says. “Because we are such a diverse industry, you can emphasize a variety of factors and be successful. And no one route is necessarily the best.”