Billion Dollar Backstory

At 15, Harald Berlinicke got a front-row seat to Black Monday during a bank internship outside Berlin. It was total chaos, with people yelling "SELL!" and a 20% drop in a single day.

Most people would have run away from that pressure. But Harald ran toward it. And that's the day he knew he wanted to be in finance.

Decades later, he's the guy on the other side of the table as a fund selector and family office CIO, with a surprisingly impressive LinkedIn presence for someone who will tell you straight up that he's an...

Six months into launching your fund and already feeling like you're making every mistake in the book?

You're in good company. That's exactly how the founder who wrote in is feeling. And honestly, year one can do that to a person. 

The chaos is real. The second-guessing is real. The wondering-if-anyone-will-ever-take-you-seriously is very, very real.

In this Story Snack, Stacy Havener tackles the fear that tends to sit underneath all of it:

"I'm too early to be taken seriously."

It's not irrational. It's just not the whole s...

What if the biggest problem with “Emerging Markets” is the name?

Edward Lam thinks that label has been doing the category a disservice for decades.

Today, he’s sitting down with Stacy to zoom out and question the category…then zoom back in to what that means for portfolios, risk, and real alpha.

Edward grew up in Hong Kong, went to boarding school in the UK, and landed in EM in 2004. 

He had no training program or mentor, just four walls of books he was determined to read. By the time...

Commenting is one of the most underrated relationship builders on LinkedIn, especially if you want to stay on people’s radar without cranking out content nonstop.

But most people comment in a way that does nothing, or worse, makes things weird.

You know the two classics:
 
1. “Great post!” (nothing burger)
2. And the thoughtful comment followed by an immediate pitch DM. (instant ick)

In this Story Snack, Stacy Havener breaks down how to comment in a way that actually builds familiarity and trust over time, without sounding awkward, annoying, or despera...

93% of the population. Almost entirely locked out of an industry that says it wants the best talent.

Laurie Robathan grew up on the wrong side of that statistic. He was raised in inner-city Bristol, went to a state school, and grew up in a single-parent family. He found his way into finance through one thin thread of chance, and he's never forgotten how easily it could have gone the other way.

At some point, that thread started to feel less like luck and more like a problem. Because what about everyone who never...

You want to post more on LinkedIn. You know it matters. You've probably even got a draft sitting there.

But the fear of being judged, specifically by people who already know you in real life, keeps stopping you cold.

In this Story Snack, Stacy Havener breaks down exactly why that happens, why your brain is making it bigger than it is, and how to move through it without just white-knuckling your way to the post button.

Listen in to learn:

Robert Gardner has built four ventures in financial services,  including Redington, the UK investment consultancy that’s advised on £800B+ in assets.

Now he’s taking on a new category: Natural Capital.

Because nature has always been “investable”, just usually as a commodity.

The old way looks like squeezing every ounce of value out of the Earth without any regard for long-term consequences. The playbook was essentially cut it down, harvest it, extract the value, and move on. 

Robert thinks that model is outdated, and he’s building the alternative...

Let's talk about conference season.

You showed up and collected a gazillion business cards. You smiled until your face hurt. And three days later you got home, looked at that stack of business cards, and thought… now what?

If that sounds familiar, this Story Snack is for you.

In this episode, Stacy breaks down why conferences tend to feel like a huge waste of time. 

She’s sharing what she’s learned over the years about what it actually takes to make a conference worth your time. 

Listen i...

Shannon is Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer for Wealth at Neuberger Berman, a firm with north of AUM, and she's spent years on the other side of the table, sitting through roughly 300 manager meetings a year. She knows exactly what earns credibility fast. And she knows exactly what kills it.

In this episode, Stacy Havener sits down with Shannon to pull back the curtain on what allocators are actually looking for,  and why the managers who win aren't the ones performing. They're the ones listening.

Because the real answers don't come out w...

What do a Notre Dame finance degree, a brief detour into ninth-grade teaching, a Merrill Lynch internship, and 20 years at BlackRock have in common?

They’re all plot twists on the road to finding exactly where you belong.

In this episode, Stacy sits down with Ellen Bockius, Head of Business Development & Marketing at JLAM, a boutique real estate investment firm focused on the Mid-Atlantic coast, an area big institutional money often overlooks.

Ellen shares what it’s like to build a career by raising your hand and moving across businesses… and then s...

What if the questions you ask say more about you than the answers you give?

Two weeks before graduating from college, Buffy Alegria walked into a bank job interview knowing basically nothing about banking. 

But she did walk in with four pages of questions on a yellow legal pad.

They hired her before she finished the first page.

That moment set the tone for everything that came after.

Today, Buffy is the co-founder of Loud Ventures, a healthcare-focused venture capital firm built on a simple (and kind of radical) b...

What if the secret to building a firm people know, like, and trust wasn’t a slicker pitch deck… or a better track record?

What if it was the audacity to just be yourself?

Sweta Singh didn't wonder. She just built it.

Before she was a founder, she was on the other side of the desk entirely, issuing bonds for the State of New York, watching how public money moves through communities, hospitals, schools, and retirement funds. Most portfolio managers never see that side. Sweta did. And she never forgot it.

Twen...

Most CEO stories start with an Ivy League credential and a tidy career ladder, but this one starts with a blackjack table.

Before Natalie Wolfsen was running Orion, she was dealing cards to pay for college. At the time, she had no idea that the lessons she was learning on that casino floor would follow her all the way to the C-suite.

In this episode, Natalie opens up about the chapters that don't fit neatly on a résumé and why she believes those are often the most important ones.

Listen in to...

Every allocator asks: “What makes your boutique different?”

And most fund managers default to something like, “Our people are great!” or “Our process is best-in-class!”

Which is fine. It’s just… also what everyone else says.

In this episode, Stacy explains why saying “We’re better” in meetings won’t do you any favors and why being different (even if it’s uncomfortable) is the best way to stand out to allocators. 

Listen in to learn:

“Ugh… I’m going to sound like a broken record.”

If you’ve felt that in a 2nd or 3rd meeting, you’ve probably had the urge to “freshen up” your story just to keep it interesting.

In this episode, Stacy breaks down why that instinct can backfire.

She’s digging into what actually matters in follow-up meetings, especially when new people join, when the sales team thinks “we already covered that,” and when you’re tempted to improvise a whole new version of your story.

Listen in to learn:

Most founders lead with the team because they’re trying not to sound egotistical.

But allocators aren’t sitting there thinking, “Wow, great org chart.” They’re thinking: “Do I understand this firm yet?”

In this episode, Stacy breaks down what allocators actually want in the first meeting and why you’re better off leading with a crisp origin story (even if the founder isn’t in the room to tell it).

Listen in to learn: 

If your meeting goes off the rails, it’s not because your prospects are “unruly.” It’s because no one’s driving.

And with the right moves, you can take the wheel fast without making it weird.

In this episode, Stacy breaks down how to prevent unhelpful tangents before you ever walk in the room (hello, champion prep call) and what to do in real time when someone hijacks the conversation.

Listen in to learn how to:

Ever felt the urge to tidy up your story before sharing it? You scan the room, see the impressive bios and the blazers, and think: “Oof... maybe I should skip that part.”

You’re not wrong for feeling that way, and you’re definitely not the only one.

In this episode, Stacy opens up about her London panel debut, where she felt that pull to edit out the messy parts of her story on the fly. She’s explaining why she chose to dig in her heels and tell the raw version, even though it was ner...

If you’re still following the traditional sales funnel framework in 2026, your firm’s growth is sure to stall. 

Because the “inverted triangle” view of a funnel is oversimplified, and it’s starting to feel like the fundraising version of that tired investment process slide that makes everyone want to poke their eyes out. 

It flops because not everyone in your funnel needs the same thing, and “just checking in” isn’t a follow-up strategy that actually moves people forward.

That’s why in this episode, Stacy’s breaking down what actually works to keep your fun...

You thought you nailed the meeting. The conversation went well, heads were nodding, and everyone seemed engaged. Then you followed up with a thoughtful email and… crickets.

Or maybe you got hit with the four words every fund manager dreads hearing: "We’ll watch you."

Most people take either of those as signals to retreat and move on. But what if they're actually something else entirely?

In this episode, Stacy explains why hearing "no" (or radio silence) doesn't always mean your deal is dead. 

She's also sharing the high schoo...

You made it to the final investor meeting again. You were sure this one was yours because your pitch was on point (no surprise, given that you rehearsed every line). 

But still... no deal.

What gives? Why are you always the bridesmaid but never the bride? 

In this episode, Stacy is breaking down why so many fund managers find themselves stuck in this frustrating loop. 

Listen in to learn: 

If you’re like most founders, “creating a yearly business plan” is one of those tasks you keep bumping to the bottom of your to-do list. 

Maybe you tell yourself you’ll get to it when things slow down, but they never do. 

And before you know it, you’re steamrolling into the new year without a plan, which leads to overthinking every single decision and drowning in busy work. 

And somehow you end the year wondering how you were so busy… without feeling like you moved the needle at all. 

Stacy doesn’t wa...

Everyone loves a success story, but what we don’t talk about enough is what it costs to get there.

And what it’s like before the money is wired or anyone cares. 

Before all of that, there was a guy with a phone, a thesis, and a long list of people telling him no.

That guy was Cole Wilcox.

In this episode, Stacy Havener sits down with Cole, CEO & CIO of Longboard Asset Management, to talk about what it really takes to build an investment firm when you don’t...

“Be authentic.” “Own your story.” “Sharpen your edges.”

We say these things at Havener Capital all the time (and Stacy says them a lot). But here’s the real question: do they actually move the needle?

Mike Denklau, founder of Dorset Agriculture, is here to tell you they do. Today, he’s giving us a behind-the-scenes look at what happens when you stop code-switching… and start building from your real story.

Before launching Dorset, Mike was part of Harvard’s endowment, helping manage a $4B+ agriculture and timber portfolio. Long before that, he was an Iowa farm kid...

In this industry, everyone talks about innovation. But innovation rarely starts in a conference room. It starts when a client hits a wall. When they’re overwhelmed, under pressure, or staring at an opportunity they can’t quite reach alone.

That’s where Ultimus Fund Solutions steps in. This team doesn’t just throw tech at the problem. They roll up their sleeves, pick up the phone, and build real solutions, side by side with their clients.

In this episode, you’ll hear what that actually looks like:

Panels are weird. Everyone’s trying to look smart without sounding rehearsed. 

And somehow you’re supposed to introduce yourself and tell memorable stories in just a matter of minutes. 

It’s not easy, and it’s not something you want to wing (especially if you want to make sure your participation is worth your while).

That’s why, in this episode, Stacy’s breaking down her top dos and don’ts for showing up sharp and human on a panel. Whether you’re intro’ing yourself or riffing off someone else’s point, these moves wil...

Most people love to talk about the “boutique advantage,” but very few can show you what it actually feels like from the allocator’s side of the table.

Seb Stewart can.

Seb is Partner and Head of US Institutional BD at Pacific Asset Management (~$20B AUM) and Chair of IMI, the global think tank for specialist firms. 

In this episode, Seb and Stacy sit down at NASDAQ Studios to discuss what allocators actually value, why boutiques win when they stop acting like large platforms, and how human behavior (not products or performance) raise real fu...

If your firm’s outside the U.S. and you’re thinking about bringing your fund here, you’ve probably already started googling and found yourself a million new to-dos. 

But before you start checking off all of the boxes (structure, fees, compliance, product, etc.), make sure you’re not skipping the vital first step most fund managers miss.

In this episode, Stacy breaks down the underrated first step that sets successful firms apart when they expand into (or out of) the U.S. and why the smartest managers start with who, not how.

...

You know those Wall Street movies where young, hungry salespeople make 500 dials a day?

That was real life for Devon Drew.

He built his career in distribution at some of the biggest asset managers in the world—including Vanguard—before walking away from it all to launch AssetLink, a tech platform designed to disrupt how fund distribution gets done.

Because Devon realized something: the model wasn’t just archaic, it was broken.

Now, he’s putting powerful tools in the hands of fund managers who’ve been overlooked for too long a...

The founder is retiring. The team is evolving. The story… gets archived?

Not so fast.

In this episode, Stacy shares what to do before you toss the origin story and how to transition from version 1.0 to 2.0 without losing the magic.

Inside the episode:
 • Why “retiring the founder” ≠ “retiring the story”
 • How to pull legacy threads into your firm’s next chapter
 • What to do if the original story was never that strong to begin with

This is Story Snacks, a bite-sized, jam-packed series for fund managers who are ready to master strateg...

Some RIAs slap ESG labels on products and call it impact investing. Chat Reynders has been doing it for real, since before it was cool.

In this episode, Chat sits down with Stacy Havener to unpack the story behind Reynders, McVeigh Capital Management, the $4B firm he co-founded after starting his career… raising money for a whale documentary.

Yes, really.

In this episode, you’ll hear about:

Out of more than 100 episodes, this is the one that brought Stacy to tears.
And once you hear it, you’ll understand why.

Meet today’s guest, Lon Stroschein, founder of Normal 40, where he works with high-achieving professionals who look successful on the outside but feel stuck on the inside.

In this episode, he and Stacy talk about:

A lot of people build firms.
Very few sell them.
Even fewer?
Walk away from it all to start again.

But that’s exactly what Toussaint Bailey did.

After building and selling a $2B RIA, he’s back on the founder path, this time leading Uplifting Capital, a values-first platform rethinking what private market investing could look like.

In this episode, he sits down with Stacy to discuss: 

The finance and investment industry is a tough club. It’s known for being money-centric, number-focused, aggressive… even cutthroat.

And few places capture that intense energy quite like the trading floor of the NYSE, where today’s guest, Joe Greco, cut his teeth.

He started as a floor trader and media commentator, appearing on CNBC and guiding real-time market decisions.

Today, as Founder & President of PALIO, Joe coaches executives in wealth, finance, and investing, helping them make high-stakes decisions with clarity, speed, and trust.

In this episode, Joe sits down with Stacy...

The chart you shared on LinkedIn isn’t flopping because people “don’t get it.”
It’s flopping because you made them work too hard to understand it.

That’s one of the most common content mistakes fund managers make:dropping data without enough context.

The good news? It’s an easy fix, and in this episode, Stacy shows you how.

She dives into:  
 • 3 quick rules to make your chart posts actually land
 • A better way to use data to tell a story
 • Why one great chart beats four cluttered ones every tim...

Your story isn’t too messy, too boring, or too personal to share.
It’s the very thing that sets you apart.

And Holly Crawshaw Joyner has built her entire business helping leaders do exactly that.

Holly’s ghostwritten 120+ books and built a standout brand on LinkedIn by being raw, honest, and far from perfect. She knows what it takes to turn life experience into the kind of authority that makes people stop scrolling, and start listening.

In this episode, Holly joins Stacy to discuss: 

People matter more than performance. Yes, even in a numbers-obsessed industry. 

Take it from Karl Heckenberg, founder of Constellation Wealth Capital, a $1B platform that takes minority, non-controlling stakes in large RIAs and wealth management firms.

Yes, he understands the numbers and mechanics behind investing. But what actually sets him (and his fund) apart is the fact that he builds real partnerships. 

In this episode, he sits down with Stacy to talk about:

What if the most powerful thing a CEO can do… is show up?

That’s exactly what John Bowman is doing. As the new CEO of CAIA, he’s not sitting behind a desk or delegating from an ivory tower. He’s on a plane, in person, listening to the very people his organization serves.

In this episode, Stacy sits down with John to talk about the underrated power of founder-led sales (even when you’re leading a global organization), the ROI of empathy, and why success in finance is less about numbers and more about peop...

You’ve got your pitch deck. Your talking points. Your “why us” slide.
But if you’re telling the wrong story in meetings, none of that matters.

In this episode, Stacy’s diving into the two MVPs of storytelling for fund managers: the job story and the brand story. Think of them like the hammer and wrench in your toolbox, you need both, but you’ve gotta know when to use each.

Inside this bite-sized episode, you’ll learn:
 • What makes a job story different from a brand story (and why that mix-up matters)

The impressively bold mindset that drove Chad Willardson to leave behind a million-dollar salary and a top 1% client base to build his own firm from scratch is the same mindset that grew his firm to $1.5B AUM and earned him the status of 5X bestselling author.

In fact, Chad’s story is proof that thinking like an entrepreneur can take you far in the fund world–and beyond. But can this mindset be learned and developed? Find out in today’s episode.

Plus, hear Chad’s full backstory and learn: