Merrill Lynch taps new lieutenant for Andy Sieg's growth plan

Merrill Lynch said Tuesday that it had promoted Craig Young to national business development executive, a new position in which he reports to Andy Sieg, president of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management.

Working with the leaders of Merrill's more than 100 market areas, Mr. Young will be responsible for designing and executing new business development ideas and best practices. He will focus on the firm's growth strategy.

For example, that means looking at how the firm delivers financial advice to families across generations, said a Merrill Lynch executive who asked not to be identified.

"As a best practice, we need to ensure we are meeting with all members of the families we serve, and using the full breadth of capabilities and resources across Merrill and the broader company to provide solutions and comprehensive advice," the executive added.

In late 2017, Merrill unveiled a new pay grid, called the growth grid, which rewarded advisers who bring in a healthy number of net new accounts, while cutting the compensation of those who fall short of the new company goals.

Mr. Young most recently was Merrill's market executive for the Westchester, N.Y./Greenwich, Conn. market. From 2016 to 2018, he was the market executive for Pasadena, Calif.

He started working at Merrill Lynch in 2015 and previously had been employed by Robert W. Baird & Co. Inc. Mr. Young also did stints at UBS Financial Services Inc. and Morgan Stanley, according to his BrokerCheck report.

He is a member of the Bank of America black executive leadership council and chairman of the Merrill Lynch African American leadership council.

At an industry meeting in November, Mr. Young said that more than 30% of the participants that year in Merrill’s financial adviser development program were people of color and about 28% were women.

He acknowledged that the firm hasn’t solved the challenge of making the profession more diverse, but said it was off to a good start.

"It’s not rhetoric around a strategic priority," Mr. Young said on a conference panel. "It’s actually built into the accountability framework of our firm. You have to hold hiring managers accountable to who they bring on board, and we have to create communities within firms that allow people to flourish when they come here."

Last month, Merrill Lynch said it would continue to eschew recruiting experienced advisers and instead introduce or reinforce programs that focus on training young or less experienced professionals with the intent of turning those newbies into full-fledged wealth managers.