In San Francisco, on the April 19, 2016, Wells Fargo & Company announced that Kristi Mitchem, a Stanford MBA grad, has been appointed president, chief executive officer, and head of Wells Fargo Asset Management, a division of Wells Fargo’s Wealth and Investment Management Group. Starting June 1, Mitchem will head a business with more than $480 billion in assets under management in institutional separate accounts, mutual funds and stable value portfolios.
Kristi Mitchem, Stanford MBA ’97
Kristi is scheduled to report to David Carroll, senior executive vice president and head of Wells Fargo’s Wealth and Investment Management Group. She replaces Mike Niedermeyer, who served as head of WFAM from 1994 for 28 years until his retirement in March.
The Wells Fargo team was founded in 1852 in San Francisco and it promises to ensure banking, insurance, investments, mortgage, and consumer and commercial finance facilities in 8,800 locations through approximately 13,000 ATMs, the internet and mobile banking, and has offices in 36 countries to support customers who conduct business in the global economy.
Career
Honored with Treasury & Risk’s title “Top 100 Influential People”, Kristi is endowed with exceptional leadership and management abilities. She most recently served as executive vice president at State Street Global Advisors (SSGA), the investment management company of State Street Corporation. As Head of the Americas Institutional Client Group, she strived for the growth of the business, delivering investment solutions to institutional clients in the US, Canada and Latin America. Prior to her role as head of Americas Institutional Client Group, Mitchem headed SSGA’s Global Defined Contribution business, where she transformed SSGA’s role in the retirement marketplace.
Before joining SSGA, she worked at Blackrock as managing director and head of the US Defined Contribution business and at Barclays Global Investors (BGI) as head of US Transition Services. She previously worked at Goldman Sachs & Co. in sales and management roles. Mitchem has 17+ years of experience in the asset management, defined contribution and equities markets.
Education
She earned her Bachelor of Arts in political science from Davidson College, where she was awarded summa cum laude and First Honors. She received her Master of Business Administration from Stanford Graduate School of Business in 1997, where she was an Arjay Miller Scholar. Mitchem was also a Fulbright Scholar.
Advocate for Gender Diversity
Mitchem is an advocate for young women to take higher roles in the finance field and overcome the societal pressures that they face. In an interview with New York Stock Exchange she said, “I believe the barriers facing young women fall into two categories. The first are societal barriers that are introduced to girls at a very early age as part of their overall socialization process. The second are complexion barriers that relate to what the finance industry looks like today in terms of the diversity of its population, or the lack thereof” and “It is the combination of women and men—a gender-diverse leadership team—that can have a positive impact on a company’s bottom line. Different perspectives tend to result in more imaginative inquiry and these differences also challenge norms. So, more diverse teams tend to come up with more creative ideas and this ultimately drives innovation, which is critically important to corporate success.
“Wells Fargo Asset Management is a valuable business for Wells Fargo,” said Carroll. “With an impressive mix of industry experience, a deep knowledge of the needs of institutional and intermediary investor clients, and proven success in inspiring large high-performing teams, Kristi is the ideal candidate to lead WFAM through its next phase of strategic expansion and growth.” The company sure does envision a great future with a successful business mind like Kristi as a part of their workforce.
