How Great Leaders Make Decisions Under Pressure | Deborah Smith | The Leadership Match

What does it take to make clear decisions when markets are uncertain?

In this episode of The Leadership Match, Martin Rowinski sits down with Deborah Smith, Co-Founder and CEO of The CenterCap Group, a boutique investment bank focused on the real assets sector.

Deborah shares what she learned from building a certified women-owned investment bank after the global financial crisis, leading through changing markets, serving in the boardroom, and advising companies through strategic consulting, M&A, and capital markets.

We get into:

Why calm heads prevail in uncertain markets

How leaders know when to stay the course or pivot

What building CenterCap after 2008 taught her about resilience

How to build credibility in investment banking and real estate

Why trust is built through responsibility and accountability

Why relationships are a two-way investment

Why no decision is still a decision

Deborah’s message for leaders is clear: if you are the designated decision maker, make the decision. Take in the facts, listen to the right people, trust your judgment, and keep learning every day.

Leadership is built one conversation, one connection, and one action at a time.

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Guest
Deborah SmithCo-Founder and CEO, The CenterCap GroupBoard Member | Investment Banking | Real Assets | Strategic Consulting | M&A

#TheLeadershipMatch #MartinRowinski #DeborahSmith #Leadership #DecisionMaking #InvestmentBanking #RealAssets #WomenInLeadership #BoardLeadership #ExecutiveLeadership #Resilience #Trust #Entrepreneurship

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome back to the Leadership Match. I'm Martin Rowinsky, and today I'm joined by Deborah Smith, co-founder and CEO of the Center Cup Group, a boutique investment bank focused on the real assets sector. Deborah has built and led certified woman-owned business, advised companies through strategic consulting and MA, served on the board of AIMCO, and built a career across firms like Morgan Stanley, Wakovia, Lehman Brothers, and CBRE Global Investors. Today we're going beyond the title to talk about leadership, judgment, deal making, boardroom perspective, and what it takes to lead through changing markets. Deborah, welcome to the leadership match.

SPEAKER_00 0:46

Thank you. Thanks for having me on, man.

SPEAKER_02 0:49

I'm so excited for this. So we're going to start with Beyond the Title. So before the CEO title, before the board seat, what experience shaped the way you think about leadership?

SPEAKER_00 1:04

Well, I changed firms a few times in my career, which always brings a new set of experiences. But I've also sat on the principal side. So I've sat on the banking side and then I went to CBRE and I ran their global MA business for a couple of years. And so that brought me inside the management space of a manager itself. And you know, I from there I've kind of wrapped that into building out our firm and I took the CEO title. I'm not sure I fully appreciated everything I needed to do, but I just did it, right? You get out of bed and you've got a company to run and you just got to put one foot in front of the other. And then your company grows and you have to make more decisions. And I think, you know, companies succeed or fail based on those quality of those decisions.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

You have worked through major market cycles and different financial environments. What has that taught you about staying calm and making clear decisions when things are uncertain?

SPEAKER_00 2:04

Yeah. Well, the only thing I can assure that when you're an entrepreneur and you're building your own business is something is going to go wrong and you didn't anticipate it. That's the two things I know for sure. And I think it's calma heads prevail, right? It's looking at the facts in the situation and then making a decision based on it. But I think what I've learned is that sometimes you have to pivot, right? Or you have to say, what I'm doing isn't working. And so instead of getting bogged down and what you're doing and waiting for it to work, you know, they always say you should keep pushing and pushing and pushing. Well, maybe what you're doing isn't right and it's not working, you don't have a market for it. And so you have to adjust. Like, so for us, we started out as an MA shop, you know, advising our real estate investment management deals. Over time, we've expanded our capital raising business. We have a very large consulting practice, which has allowed us to balance out the types of business and the types of clients, but also to be able to work no matter what position of the market we're in, right? But but that was none of that was by design. It was, well, we see an opportunity, how are we going to take advantage of it? And now we've got a principal investment business, we're looking at building that out too. How did that come about? We saw something, an opportunity where we weren't taking advantage of it. We're like, well, how can we do that? But but that has allowed us to cover for ups and downs in the market where sometimes things are tough. And you got to figure out how you're going to navigate through that. I think the biggest mistake people make is that not anticip or not recognizing the difference between when you should quit and do something else and pivot or stay the course. And and I can for for us, for me as an entrepreneur to intuition is I just for me, I just make the call. And I've been fortunate that those calls have been the have been the right calls. But I think if you don't understand and that uh and you can't get that balance right between those things, it's why so many companies fail.

SPEAKER_02 4:12

So I this next question, I uh I'm really looking forward because I remember 2008 and you co-founded the Center Cup Group in 2009, right after in real estate? Yeah, yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 4:27

Oh, yeah, what a great idea.

SPEAKER_02 4:28

Yeah. So what did building a firm during that period teach you about resilience and timing?

SPEAKER_00 4:35

Yeah. How about the fact we'll throw in there? It was a couple of uh females in women in real estate who decided to open up an investment bank coming out of the GFC. Let's go all in on how bad the fact pattern was. You know, it's interesting. I I don't think I really thought about it. I don't think we thought for a second that we couldn't be successful or we wouldn't figure it out. You know, my most one of the common lines I throw out is we'll figure it out. Let's just figure it out. We'll figure it out. How hard could this be? Seriously, how hard could this be? It's it's that it's it's that belief that whatever you're gonna do, you will just you don't know if it's gonna work out or not, but you know you'll figure it out when you get there if it's not working out the way you want. So an opportunity came to us um to work on an investment management deal. We took it, and then one thing just led to another, led to another. It's not that I had this grand big scheme that I wanted to be the next, you know, female and but you know, break glass ceilings and own an investment bank as a female. It's it's there was no plan on any of that. It was there's an opportunity here. Um, let's take advantage of the opportunity and we'll see where it goes. And we had a few big wins in our early days that really helped propel us forward. Um, and we had a lot of knowledge from our CB days and our banking days, which gave us a very different perspective on how we looked at things. And then I realized that that kind of advice, and me being a very blunt Aussie, that people value that advice. Not everyone will, but our the clients that work with us do, where they really want a real view of what you think. Um, and so we've used that and now we own it, and we've continued to build a business on it, but it's always around the investment manager. So then it goes out to capital raising MA, consulting, and investors, but it's understanding what we're good at and staying around true to that, and then figuring how we can branch beyond it.

SPEAKER_02 6:40

So you said a lot of things there that I want to know this next answer because you lead a certified, not only just woman-owned, but certified woman-owned business in investment banking, an industry that has not always had enough women in leadership.

SPEAKER_00 6:54

There's still not a lot of women in leadership in investment. Yeah, and in real estate, there's not much either. So it's two wonderful industries to make this call on.

SPEAKER_02 7:02

Yeah, but what leadership lesson came from building credibility in that environment?

SPEAKER_00 7:08

Um, I think we and my partner um believe we this is what we're good at. And we don't apologize for that. And so we think we're good at this stuff, um, and we carry it with a confidence um that I think it's hard for clients to trust you if you don't emanate, if you don't put out their view or their branding or your messaging that in your own confidence. You have to believe in your own judgment and your own ability to be successful in order for others to believe it. There's a character traits that go into that. And we've always owned that we think we're good at this. Um, we are good advisor, I'm a good advisor. Um, and I think I'm a trusted advisor, and I've got years of experience of working with the same clients to back it up. And so I think at this point, that gives you a level of confidence that you project in every conversation, right? So when we're talking with clients um or prospective clients, I'm unafraid to say to prospective clients that your fund, what you you think what you want to sell, I don't think you can sell this. And I'll tell you why I don't think you can sell this. This is there's at least 10 things you need to do differently, and you're not picking up as a result of this. And and I'm okay. They may walk away and say, I don't want to work with this person. 99% of the time they say, actually, I want to hire you. Can you come and help me fix this so that we can do a better job? I'm like, sure. Um, and so I I think you have to have um that level of confidence in yourself um and believe that you can achieve anything. Um, and and at this point, we look at it as well, what's the next step forward? And how hard could this be? Surely we can figure this out. If other people do it, we can do it. Um, and so we we project that and I think we own that capability at this point. It uh did you think I was gonna say that?

SPEAKER_02 9:06

No, but in a way I did. I mean, you're so confident, and I I and if your partner's on your level, wow. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 9:15

Well, thank you, Bam. You're so nice of you to say.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

It's awesome. What what is one we're getting into the match now? What is one leadership lesson from your career that you would match with every executive listening? How can you help them out?

SPEAKER_00 9:32

Yeah, I someone told me this when we started up our phone, and it has stuck with me through to this day. So, and I'm so I'm happy to share it because it I've turned it is absolutely true. The people you thought would help you be successful once you've started don't show up. And the people you least think will be helpful, they do. And and what I mean by that is that we have a whole bunch of people associated with our firm, our advisory board, people we work with from lawyers, accounts, etc., they have been with us a very long time. Some of those, most of those people I didn't even know when we've started up, but they have been supporters of ours and have stuck with us since day one. And yet there are other people from old banking days that you could think would help you and show up, and they haven't. Um, and we haven't asked anything of any of these people. But what's been interesting is the number of people that have wanted and have said, how can we help you, Deb, become more successful? What can we do to help you with your firm? How can we get more involved to help you out? And they've done it for no other reason that they believe in our business and believe what we're trying to achieve. And I see it and I know it, I'm forever grateful for it. Um, because I think that those relationships are really hard to come by. And if you find those relationships, you hold them and you clutch them and you don't let them go. But you have to put work in them. Like all of these people that the backbone of our company and our clients, it's our clients too. Like I said, we we've had clients for 15 years. Um, multiple all of our clients are through referral. They're all inbound. And and they've all showed up because they've been referred by a client, someone we work with, someone we know. Um, and that relationship is a two-way street. Relationships don't come out just from them making the effort. If you want a real relationship, you've got to put in as much work as you take out. Um, and investing in those relationships is super important. But that's if so coming full circle, it's people have you've got, if you want to be successful, you need other people. You can't do it by yourself. And and you need people to show up. And so you have to figure out how to use your network, but also the people identifying people in it who are willing to help you build where and help you going where you want to go, but realize that if you want something out of a relationship, you have to contribute as much as you take out of it.

SPEAKER_02 12:14

What is one action leaders can take this week to make better decisions, build more trust? I love all your talk about trust, or create more value.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

I think that every day I get up, I focus on learning something new that I didn't know yesterday. And that comes out of the calls or the meetings I'm gonna have, or I'm gonna read something, or I'm gonna ask something of somebody. So that's for me, it's to be better at my job, there's always more for me to learn and to take from other people because that fuels how I'm good at my job. As for trust, if you want people to trust you, you have to, I believe you have to give them responsibility and you have to be accountable, particularly in any firm structure and when we work through our corporate architecture work. It's if you want the best out of people and you want them to trust you, then you have to trust them to do what you've asked of them. And but what you ask of them, they have to understand and you have to have made clear what are the how's this relationship working? This is what I expect from you, and I'm gonna hold you accountable for it. And you'd be amazed at how many people can blossom and flourish if you give them that latitude, but you have to give them the latitude, right? A lot of times, people who micromanage, the real reason they micromanage is trust. They just don't trust. They don't trust the people underneath them, they don't trust the people we're around them. And so it's like I I've come to a place where I think if you can't build that trust relationship, then you should remove them from your ecosystem and put people in there that you do trust or you're willing to give an opportunity to trust. Because once if you haven't earned that trust, it's very hard to work with people if you don't trust them.

SPEAKER_02 14:14

I would agree strongly. All right. One word that you people I associate with your leadership.

SPEAKER_00 14:26

Um that I'm a decision maker.

SPEAKER_02 14:31

I knew it was gonna be a good word.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

Yeah, decision maker. You can't be a leader if you're not a decision maker. Yeah. I mean, I take in other people's views, but at the end of the day, someone's always in charge. And so it's a determination who's that person. And if that person's been designated to me and I'm the designated person in charge, then it's my job to make decisions. Yeah. No decision is a decision. So you might as well make an affirmative step in it.

SPEAKER_01 14:59

You must be in the affirmative. I just did a video on that.

SPEAKER_00 15:02

You did?

SPEAKER_01 15:03

No decision. It's still a decision.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

It's still a decision. So if you want to be respected and you're and you've been the designated decision maker, then you have to make decisions. Um, if you want the trust, they have to be good ones.

SPEAKER_02 15:19

I might I'm gonna send you a link after this to my uh my short about that. That's funny. Um I think that's right.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

I think that's right.

SPEAKER_02 15:26

No, it's absolutely right. Thank you, Deborah, for joining me on the leadership match. I love this conversation because leadership is not just about titles, transactions, or numbers, it is about judgment, resilience, 2008 to 2009, trust, and knowing how to create value over time. And for everyone listening, take one idea from this conversation, just one, and put it into action this week. Subscribe, share this with another leader, and I'll see you in the next match. Deborah, this was awesome. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

Thank you. Thanks for having me. It's fun. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 16:02

Absolutely.