MELANIE SEYMOUR: I don’t believe innovation is something that just happens. You have to create the right environment, the right people, and the right mindsets, and then innovation happens. We were looking for opening a new office where we could start to think about, what talent will we need to take us through to the next 30 years? That was here in Hungary.
HENI JORDAN: I believe that BlackRock sees something in Hungarian people to create this amazing office.
JANOS CZAK: The Hungarian mindset is pretty unique in that– well, some say we are really, really critical. We like to challenge the status quo and challenge ideas.
MELANIE SEYMOUR: I, very early on, recognized this sort of challenging mindset that I now call an intellectual curiosity. We didn’t want people that would come here and follow process. We wanted people that would come here and challenge process.
HOUNSTON SANTOS: What is like special about being in the Budapest office, it’s like it’s not just a branch, that we’re here to solve some tickets or anything. We are actually really enforced to bring new ideas and try new things. I feel like a huge startup, and that’s something really amazing.
FERENC NAGY: At BlackRock, and especially in Budapest, it feels like there are no boundaries at all, and exchange ideas freely.
SPEAKER 6: There is a special attention when you have any kind of innovations or process changes, and this is special.
MELANIE SEYMOUR: My role here at BlackRock is to ensure that we do something different, that we build something that is going to explore the next generation of BlackRock, that we develop talent, we bring in people, we retain people that really are going to help us drive the future.
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