Unequaled

PREFACE

When a team of us worked on the United Parcel Service IPO, it was the largest IPO in history at that time. A group from Columbia Business School read about the deal in the Wall Street Journal and asked if I would give a speech explaining how we had won such a large piece of business. This deal was unusual because UPS chose Morgan Stanley to be the lead underwriter without talking to any other investment banks.

The speech that I made to the Columbia Business School students discussed the importance of emotional intelligence quotient (EQ), trust-based client relationships, and other soft skills. The presentation was well received, and word-of-mouth created demand at IBM, Princeton University, Davis Polk & Wardwell, and throughout Morgan Stanley. I heard the presentation was popular because I was authentic in telling stories and explaining what I had learned both from my mistakes and from the experience of others. Audiences also told me they liked hearing practical advice from a practitioner.

I had been a reader of self-help books for many years, but found most of them to be irrelevant or in the “dare to be great” genre. I also read books about finance and banking; they were full of complex equations, but many of them said nothing about “client”—not even in the index. I could not find a book that provided useful tricks of the trade for professional services people in banking, consulting, law, or accounting. I began to see that my presentation might help fill that need. ...