Tan Su Shan – Group CEO of DBS Bank

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In March 2025, Tan Su Shan became CEO of DBS Group — the first woman to lead Southeast Asia’s largest bank, an institution with a market capitalisation above US$100 billion. Her path there is notable for its length and consistency. Born in 1968 and educated at Oxford in politics, she began her banking career at Morgan Stanley’s Singapore office in 1997, rising to executive director before moving to Citi, where she served as a regional head covering Brunei, Malaysia, and Singapore.

She joined DBS in 2010 as Managing Director and Group Head of Wealth Management, and from there her responsibilities steadily broadened. She went on to lead consumer banking and, later, the bank’s corporate and institutional banking division — an unusually wide sweep of the business that gave her intimate knowledge of DBS from the perspective of individual customers, wealthy clients, and large corporates alike. Across more than fifteen years at the bank, and over 35 years in the industry overall, she became known as a specialist in wealth management and institutional banking who understood the institution from multiple angles before ever taking its helm.

That breadth matters. Running a bank the size of DBS is not simply a matter of setting strategy from the top; it requires understanding how retail, wealth, and institutional businesses interact, how technology is reshaping each of them, and how a regional bank competes with global giants. Tan’s career effectively served as a long apprenticeship for exactly that challenge, and her appointment was widely read as a natural progression rather than a gamble.

Her rise has also carried symbolic weight well beyond DBS. As the first woman to lead the bank, and as a leader who worked her way up through nearly every major division, she has become a prominent example of homegrown Asian banking talent reaching the very top. She has appeared at the top of influential rankings recognising powerful women in business, and her leadership is closely watched as a bellwether for how established Asian banks navigate digital transformation and regional expansion.

Fortune named her at the top of its Most Powerful Women in Asia list; you can read more at Fortune.

Sources: Fortune, Reuters, the official DBS management page, the Institute of International Finance, and eFinancialCareers.

TS Anil – Veteran Banker and Former CEO of Monzo

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When TS Anil took over as CEO of Monzo in 2020, he arrived not as a disruptor from outside the system but as a seasoned insider who had spent more than 25 years working within it. His career threads through some of the biggest names in global finance — Citi, Standard Chartered, Capital One, and Visa — across markets including India, Japan, and the United States. Educated at the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad, he built deep expertise in retail banking and payments long before joining the UK’s digital-banking wave.

At Visa he served as global head of payment products and platforms, a role that gave him a rare vantage point on the underlying machinery of how modern money moves. That perspective proved unusually valuable at Monzo. He arrived at a pivotal moment: the challenger bank had built a devoted customer base and a strong brand, but it faced the harder, less glamorous task of turning rapid growth into a durable, well-governed, and ultimately profitable business.

His mandate, in other words, was less about inventing the brand and more about helping it grow up. That meant tightening operations, strengthening governance and risk controls, deepening relationships with regulators, and steering the company toward sustainable scale rather than growth for its own sake. Under his leadership Monzo expanded into one of the UK’s largest digital banks and reached important milestones on the path to profitability — the kind of progress that rarely generates excitement but which determines whether a fintech survives its adolescence.

Anil represents a particular type of modern business leader: the experienced operator who brings the discipline of traditional banking into a technology-first company without smothering what made it distinctive. His blend of big-institution rigour and start-up ambition is exactly the profile that investors increasingly look for as the fintech sector matures. He has since transitioned into a vice-chair and non-executive board role, a move that reflects the arc of a leader who guided the company through its most consequential growth phase and then helped set it up for its next chapter.

The Guardian profiled his approach to leadership and his long career across international banking; you can read that piece on The Guardian.

Sources: The Guardian, Wall Street Journal, Sifted, Milken Institute, Innovate Finance, and the Monzo board page.

Naïm Abou-Jaoudé – CEO, New York Life Investment Management

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Based in New York, Naïm Abou-Jaoudé runs one of the largest asset management operations in the world, yet he remains far less recognized than the size of his portfolio would suggest. Born in Lebanon in 1966 and educated at Sciences Po in Paris and Université Paris II – Panthéon, he built a career spanning roughly three decades in investment management before taking the top job at New York Life Investment Management (NYLIM) in May 2023.

His reputation was largely made at Candriam, the European asset manager he led as CEO for about sixteen years. During that tenure he steered the firm through its 2014 acquisition by New York Life and helped establish it as an early and committed leader in sustainable and responsible investing — a positioning that looked prescient as ESG considerations moved from a niche concern to a mainstream expectation among institutional investors. Rather than chasing the spotlight, he focused on building durable investment platforms and a culture of research-led decision-making, an approach that earned him a series of industry honours recognising his leadership in sustainable investing.

Today he oversees NYLIM’s distinctive multi-boutique structure, which spans the United States, the United Kingdom, and other markets, and which collectively manages hundreds of billions of dollars in assets. The model he champions allows specialist investment teams to retain their own identities and expertise while benefiting from the scale, distribution, and stability of one of America’s largest financial institutions. It is a balancing act — preserving entrepreneurial autonomy inside a very large organisation — and it reflects the way he has approached leadership throughout his career.

What makes Abou-Jaoudé an interesting figure to watch is precisely that he is not a celebrity executive. He is the kind of leader whose influence is measured in the resilience of the businesses he builds and the talent he retains, rather than in headlines. As sustainable investing faces both political scrutiny and growing client demand, his long track record in the space positions him as a steady, credible voice at a moment when the industry is still working out what responsible investing should mean in practice.

According to New York Life’s official announcement of his appointment, he assumed the CEO role following a distinguished career in investment management. You can read the company’s statement on the New York Life newsroom.

Sources: New York Life official newsroom, Financial Times, Funds Europe, and the NYLIM leadership page.

Top 10 Places to Live in the US

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Whether you’re looking to relocate for work or you want a change of life, these 50 cities just might be the answer. The Daily Meal has compiled a list of the best places to live, taking data from WalletHub. And many of these sunny, happy locations won’t be a surprise to you.

#10 Washington, D.C.
#9 Santa Rosa, Calif.
#8 Oakland, Calif.
#7 San Diego, Calif.
#6 Huntington Beach, Calif.
#5 Sioux Falls, S.D.
#4 San Francisco, Calif.
#3 Irvine, Calif.
#2 San Jose, Calif.
#1 Fremont, Calif.

See the whole list of 50 and have fun dreaming about starting your next adventure.

Places NOT to Travel to in 2018

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Now this is an interesting idea. We spend so much money on our vacations, and they take so long to plan, that you certainly want to go somewhere that you’ll enjoy. CNN has recently covered 12 places NOT to travel this year, and the list is worth reading. After all, when so many people visit Venice, Italy that you can barely move while you’re there – you’ll probably want to know this.

If you’re thinking of Croatia, for instance, then listen up. This is what CNN has to say, “With UNESCO threatening to take away its World Heritage status due to extreme overcrowding, Dubrovnik has decided to take drastic measures in order to cut tourist numbers. The city is capping the number of people who can scale its 15th century ramparts at 4,000 a day — 10,388 did so in one day alone bay in August 2016, many drawn by the city’s starring role in “Game of Thrones.”The mayor is also planning on cutting the number of cruise ships entering the ancient port. Nearly 800,000 people disembarked from cruise liners in 2016, most staying for just three hours.”

CNN offers alternatives, however, for those who desperately want to be near these locations. Instead of Croatia, for instance, they recommend staying near Cavtat.

The Top Places to Visit in 2018

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If you have your heart set on traveling in 2018, then CNN is the place to look. They’ve just put together a list of 18 must-see locations for the year ahead. Here is a quick glance of a few of them. To get the full picture, pop over to their site and relish in the glory of the pictures there! The first three they cover are:

Cape Verde Islands: Off the coast of West Africa, the Cape Verde Islands consist of 10 Atlantic archipelago with incredible beaches and outdoor adventure.

Botum Sakor National Park, Cambodia: This is Cambodia’s largest national park with rainforest, coastal plains and grasslands.

Malta: Matla’s capital, Valletta, has been named Europe’s Capital of Culture for 2018.

 

New Mexico

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New-Mexico-MountainsNew Mexico’s State Register of Cultural Properties has an addition to its registry. The Hurd family home, belonging to artists Peter Hurd and his wife Henriette Wyeth-Hurd is a 40-acre compound that adds to the state’s history and architecture. Anthropology graduate student in the College of Arts and Sciences in New Mexico, Brittany Porter recommended the Hurd House and Studios to the New Mexico Cultural Properties Review Committee, because of the history and significance the artists have made to New Mexico.

Porter was able to study the Peter Hurd and Henriette Wyeth-Hurd papers in the Archives of American Art as she received grants from both the Archaeology Society of New Mexico and NMSU College of Arts and Sciences.

According to NMSU Anthropology Professor Emerita, Beth O’Leary, “Porter is the first NMSU student to present a nomination to the committee and have it approved before she had completed her master’s degree.”

The Reincarnation of Idaho Salmon

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coho-salmonSalmon – that was feared to have been instinct in Idaho – may be making a comeback. Clearwater River opened a fishing season for coho salmon, offering people the opportunity to try to catch what has become an extinct fish. It seems that the tribe of Nez Perce has managed to save and restore Idaho salmon with its coho program.

What happened was, the dams from the 1900s blocked the pathway of fish into the Clearwater River Basin, and then when more dams were added the amount of coho from the Snake River continued to lessen. So much so that between 1984 and 1990 only 12 adult coho crossed from the Lower Granite Dam and then from 1991-1996, none at all returned, thus making most believe the coho was now extinct from the area.

But then all of a sudden, in 1997, 840 adult cohos returned, with fewer the next year. But by 2003, that figure had gone up to 1,135. Then, five years ago, cohos that returned were spawned and supplemented with eggs from the Columbia.

This year, the number has exploded to 15,000, enabling Idaho to open a sport fishing season, giving credit to the tribe that has been supportive of the program.

Impact of Anthropological Research on Humankind

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getting-fitA study published in Pediatrics (the Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics) has shown that if school kids don’t move around enough it could affect their brains as well as their waistlines. According to kinesiology professor at the University of Illinois, Charles Hillman, “if you consider the anthropology of humankind, we were designed to move.”

Hillman’s study showed that kids aged between 7 and 9 who ran around for at least 70 minutes a day, had improved thinking skills (especially when it came to multitasking) than those who didn’t. There were two types of data used: one, when kids were engaged in activities and the other, a brain scan.

Another study took this theory even further. Researchers from Oregon State University (OSU) found that kids with autism are less likely to move around than their non-autistic peers. In this study it was found that they spent 50 minutes less a day engaged in moderate physical activity, with 70 minutes more each day of sitting. What was positive about this study was the finding that kids with and without autism had similar fitness abilities in all areas except for strength. It seems that the kids with autism just need to be given similar opportunities such as adaptive physical education programs. As Megan MacDonald, assistant professor at OSU said, “anything we can do to help encourage children with autism to be more active is beneficial.”

So because historically we move less these days – largely due to lack of need – it is important to find modern ways of integrating exercise into our daily lives. And there is no better way to start this than with education and children.

Human Population “Explosion”

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population-explosionWhat do anthropologists do about the population explosion? What are the current statistics indicating? This article will examine the current growth in population, the anticipated continued explosion and how such growth has affected humans since the Industrial Revolution.

Since 2011, there have been approximately seven billion humans on our planet. By 2050, anthropologists and scientists believe this figure will have escalated to 10 billion. While on one hand this is really good news – because it means that people are living longer due to improved healthcare and farming practices – on the other hand, it leads to an escalation in greenhouse gas emissions and fewer resources. In terms of the latter issue, many argue that it is not the population explosion that is to blame for this, but rather a huge rise in consumption. In other words, there is too much global inequality.

To address these problems, Dr. Tim Jones who wrote Future Agenda, believes that our biggest challenge is to develop cities that will address what rapid growth means. He explained this as follows:

“Hong Kong and Paris are good examples where densities are key to success. They are seen as successful cities. For example, just 5% of Hong Kong’s personal income is spent on transportation whereas in Houston it is 20% because everyone drives such huge distances commuting. Paris, with its six- and seven-storey housing, open spaces and street-based cafe culture is a model to aspire to. The Japanese are also role models when it comes to living densities. We must aspire to be like them. For example, we can’t let China shoot past Japan and attempt to live like the Americans.”

But is this a new phenomenon? Since the population explosion started around 2,000 years ago, Oxford College Associate Anthropology Professor Aaron Stutz has established archaeological and demographic data to indicate when humans thrived.

“The Industrial Revolution and public health improvements were proximate reasons that more people lived longer. If you dig further in the past, however, the data suggest that a critical threshold of political and economic organisation set the stage 1,500 to 2,000 years ago, around the start of the Common Era. ‘The resulting political-economic balance was the tipping point for economies of scale – It created a range of opportunities enabling more people to get resources, form successful families and generate enough capital to transfer to the next generation.”

So what has happened is that:

“Humans have used up the natural resources the world can supply in a year in less than eight months, campaigners warned last month. The world has now reached ‘Earth Overshoot Day,’ the point in the year when humans have exhausted supplies.”

So this theory supports the one above that it is not the population growth per se that is causing potential earth problems, but the human consumption in certain corners of the earth. In fact, human population explosion is good and indicative of enhancements in health care and farming practices, but humans need to be respectful and there needs to be enhanced global equality in this regard.