Alumni Interview Series
Cheng-Soon Lau, Class of 1988, Managing Director, INVESCO Real Estate Asia
Amir Mansour, '09 - Class Agent
Issue date: 5/8/08 Section: GSB News
Cheng-Soon Lau, as the Managing Director of INVESCO Real Estate Asia, is responsible for direct real estate investment in Asia. He graduated from the Chicago GSB full-time program in 1988 and spoke to ChiBus about his career and opportunities for the next generation of GSB students in Asia.
Q: Within three years of graduating from the GSB you had become the Executive Director of Tuan Sing Holdings, an investment holding company which currently manages in excess of $700 million of assets. Given that rise how did the GSB help you and what initially brought you to the GSB?
A: What brought me to the GSB was that I had spent the early years of my career as an engineer and I felt I wanted to expand my business horizons. I had several friends in Singapore at that time that had been to business school, one of whom was a GSB graduate. I applied to the GSB as well as two other universities and decided on the GSB since it offered a program focused on business fundamentals. I liked the idea that it was a quantitative school and it turned out to be a great experience.
How I managed to rise to become an Executive Director? I don't think it was all my doing. I was given the opportunity at the GSB to recruit for some fairly strong, world-class institutions. I ended up joining Booz Allen Hamilton, who had a great name at that time in management consulting. I had a lot of useful and interesting experiences with Booz Allen , both in Chicago and back in Asia. In those days in Asia, that kind of background was interesting for many would-be employers. I happened to know the major shareholders of this listed company in Singapore called Tuan Sing Holdings. When I left Booz they began talking to me about joining them to try to turn around their listed company. At that time Tuan Sing Holdings was not doing very well and they invited me to turn it around and build up the business.
Q: Many of us recruit through the channels of banking and consulting, do you believe those channels open up good opportunities further down the line?
Q: Within three years of graduating from the GSB you had become the Executive Director of Tuan Sing Holdings, an investment holding company which currently manages in excess of $700 million of assets. Given that rise how did the GSB help you and what initially brought you to the GSB?
A: What brought me to the GSB was that I had spent the early years of my career as an engineer and I felt I wanted to expand my business horizons. I had several friends in Singapore at that time that had been to business school, one of whom was a GSB graduate. I applied to the GSB as well as two other universities and decided on the GSB since it offered a program focused on business fundamentals. I liked the idea that it was a quantitative school and it turned out to be a great experience.
How I managed to rise to become an Executive Director? I don't think it was all my doing. I was given the opportunity at the GSB to recruit for some fairly strong, world-class institutions. I ended up joining Booz Allen Hamilton, who had a great name at that time in management consulting. I had a lot of useful and interesting experiences with Booz Allen , both in Chicago and back in Asia. In those days in Asia, that kind of background was interesting for many would-be employers. I happened to know the major shareholders of this listed company in Singapore called Tuan Sing Holdings. When I left Booz they began talking to me about joining them to try to turn around their listed company. At that time Tuan Sing Holdings was not doing very well and they invited me to turn it around and build up the business.
Q: Many of us recruit through the channels of banking and consulting, do you believe those channels open up good opportunities further down the line?
Viewing Comments 1 - 2 of 2
Willie
posted 5/13/08 @ 4:40 PM CST
I just came back from Hongkong and Shanghai, talked with several people there. Although I feel the same way as Mr. Lau here that there are many opportunites there in Asia, yet it takes time and good opportunity to get to a position you want to me. (Continued…)
Amir
Amir
posted 5/13/08 @ 7:30 PM CST
Hi Willie, thanks for your comment. I presume that access to the top jobs, relative to the US, is to a slightly greater degree based on informal networking in these Asian business hubs. (Continued…)
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