By Rose Fry

f you tend to follow the crowd, don't apply for work with Andrew Cooke, CFA, at Goldman Sachs JBWere. He's not interested in job candidates who don't think for themselves.

“If I look for one thing when I'm looking for an employee it's to try to understand if they're insightful, whether they're independent thinkers,” he says.

Moreover, Cooke selects employees based on initiative as well as thought process. He says that studying the CFA Program demonstrates both.

		As chief investment officer at Goldman Sachs JBWere in Melbourne, Andrew Cooke, CFA, is responsible for the research and portfolio management activities of the domestic investment teams and is also head of Australian Equities for the firm. Andrew became a charterholder in 1990.

“If a young person comes to me with a CFA charter or partly through—especially if they're funding it themselves—it really shows a level of passion and commitment to investing and in themselves,” he says. “That is certainly something that you take on board. By doing something like the CFA Program, which is done after-hours and using your own initiative, it's another sign of differentiating yourself amongst the pack.”

Specifically, Cooke is looking for job candidates who have the mettle to face what the industry puts out every day with its accompanying constant uncertainty.

“One of the challenges has always been one of conviction and really believing your analysis rather than what the market is doing on any particular day,” he says. “That can be very challenging especially for younger people who are seeing their investment calls not work for them in the short term. And so one of the challenges, I think, in the industry is to hold your conviction level. To go back and retest your investment theses and say, ‘I know I'm right and I'll just hold my nerve.'”

Cooke is chief investment officer (CIO) at Goldman Sachs JBWere Asset Management, an Australasian investment banking, financial advisory, securities and investment management firm of 1,200 employees headquartered in Melbourne. The firm is the result of a merger that took place in 2003 between the global firm Goldman Sachs and local JBWere. Cooke oversees a department of 15 investment professionals who make up the domestic investment team. He has oversight responsibilities over all the asset classes, but he also works as a hands-on investor on the equity side.

With more than 15 years of experience in investments, Cooke recommends the CFA Program.

“The CFA charter is as much for the individual as it is for the organization,” he says. “If people want to work in the investment management field, the CFA [designation] is something that will serve them very well. After being here for about two years, I've really looked to trying to put [employees] into the CFA Program to broaden their skill sets further.”

He explains, “The CFA [Program curriculum] crosses a number of different asset classes so it gives people perspective about multiple asset classes and makes them better investors in whatever they're doing.”

Another benefit of the CFA Program, according to Cooke, is its international nature, both in terms of content and recognition.

“One of the good things about investing is it's pretty universal and increasingly so,” Cooke explains. “People look at the same fundamental metrics irrespective of [where you are]. So, it's a global skill set, and that's one of the beauties of something like the CFA Program. Everybody sits the same exam. The course content is the same everywhere.”

Secondly, he says, “I've worked overseas and it really doesn't matter whether you're in Tokyo or the U.S. or the U.K., people recognize the CFA Program. And it's probably the only program of its type in our field that they do recognize internationally.”

“Now one of the things that you look for,” he continues, “on the surface you can look at the content of the CFA Program but I think much more credible and speaks greater volumes is the ongoing traction of the program. And the fact that you're getting increasing numbers in a more varied type of candidate taking on the program. That for itself speaks of the content and the quality of the program. And that's what I take confidence in.”

For his own part, Cooke likes the investment profession particularly because it requires a whole blend of skills. He finds the work constantly engaging because the expertise needed to evaluate a company runs the gamut—from corporate strategy, accounting, economics, quantitative analysis, business judgment, and market analysis to just plain understanding the jargon of the individual industry. That variety makes the field unique and compelling to those who choose to pursue it.

“It's more about using a broad set of skills but also overlaying it with good common sense and judgment and a willingness to cope with the uncertainty,” he says. “It's one of the very few areas that I've ever seen, heard of, or been in where people are totally fulfilled in that role. So, if you like the area and you find it fascinating and challenging you can stay there for the rest of your life. I think that's pretty rare.”