 Okay, very good morning. It's Wednesday 28th of April, and I'm absolutely thrilled to have someone who certainly I used to watch on on CNBC very much early in my career. I used to see you every day I think Louisa, but Louisa boysen so absolutely great to have you with us Louisa Anthony. Thank you so much for for wanting to chat for wanting to chat. It's really, really kind of you and, and I really appreciate it like anything that we can do to help further this profession I'm all in so. Yeah, and I know you and I have spoken a number of times the real purpose of our conversation is a big part of what Amplify does is helping helping young people in a variety of different ways but mainly just trying to find their future in finance whatever that might be. I didn't have a defined career path I thought I did but that changed. So I'm Danish I left for Chicago and I was barely 18 figured out how to get there myself and and figured out that if I went and I and I worked as an au pair. I love children so I thought I can I could take care of a child who needs to go to school and then I'll go to school at the same time which was what I did. I hadn't done before was arranged for university and things like that so when I landed in Chicago again barely age 18. I went out on the streets and I literally asked people on the street. What are the, the main three schools that you know of around here the main three universities and they would give me whatever names. I checked out that the main three that people kept kept mentioning one of them was quite quick to enroll me. That's how I started studying in Chicago. Now I thought that I wanted to be a doctor. So I was kind of I was I was kind of going towards there but at the same time Chicago this was in the in the 90s the mid 90s. Well early 90s initially and and and and everything was booming. And I was really drawn to La Salle Street which is where the Chicago Board of Traders and I kept finding myself kind of around there and I thought it would be fantastic if I could work in there. Now in the end what ended up happening was I did all my premed things I put my way through school by working taking care of senior citizens I moved on from the repair job after a year I lived with and worked with 17 senior citizens in an organization called home housing opportunities and maintenance for the elderly, all private money but you had 17 grandparents and then you didn't pay rents basically so that allowed me to then work a million other jobs on the side, and those jobs were very geared towards kind of I guess my newly found interest for this world of trading and So even with that just jumping straight in there is that you obviously were doing a lot of that kind of volunteering work, paying your way to have the access to housing and things like that, while studying whilst looking for a job. I mean how was that just managing that because I know a lot of students go through that. It was incredibly hard, but I thought it, it wasn't fair for my parents to pay for my schooling or my desire to go abroad, given that I was raised in Denmark where things are paid for through taxes so I could go to school for free and then for free through my parents taxes in And I just thought it wasn't fair. So, in hindsight it was insanely hard, insanely insanely hard including, you know, having to kind of catch some naps on benches and things like that between jobs because I was up so early and working so late and working so many jobs to kind of piece things together so you know I always had a home but but I, you know, it was it was hard, but I also think it teaches you a lot because basically whatever you want just go do it, you know just figure out a way to do it so for an example, I worked at the board of trade twice over so so the first time it was a summer job and I was a runner and then the second time I was that well and that first time I was offered a, someone will sponsor a seat for me basically so so I'd be trained under this individual and and hopefully one day end up, you know, being being my own my own trader basically, but I wasn't done with school so I maybe foolishly maybe smartly said no thank you to that opportunity in order to finish school. Once I was done with school I thought I'm still not ready to go to med school yet there was something that was kind of pulling me. And so I basically printed out, well first I exhausted all of my contacts to get back into the Chicago Board of Trade, and it's and then I literally printed out a very basic CV I mean at the time I would have been early 20s printed out a very basic CV, and I stood at the door on the south street you know this massive skyscraper and waited for everybody to come out and when they came out after I'd say hello to everybody and shake their hand and give them my CV and say if you know of anybody who needs somebody to do something, please let me know and eventually there was a man who said, you know, you're the smart enough or crazy enough to be standing here and I think I might know of an opportunity and that was how I got back in to the Chicago Board of Trade the second time around. So again, it's, it's, you really can do anything you know that I want that to be the message to to you guys who are watching this and maybe just starting out it's just about figuring out how. So, around the same time, when I then started the Board of Trade once again I said okay this is an environment where I see myself in for for a certain timeframe it was insanely stressful. I loved it I love the adrenaline. I love the trading, but I but I kept seeing myself kind of, you know, years from now I'm not sure I wanted to be in that really really really stressful environment I learned loads loads loads loads and I really have that to thank for, you know, a lot of the almost 20 years that I since did at CNBC from all those initial experiences and in how the world works in terms of the markets basically so, but I said I'll stay here for a certain amount of time. And if I haven't moved up then I'll move out and I'll do something else. And in the meantime, I got a job at Merrill Lynch. And again I was, I was told I applied to a job that I thought was interviewing to be a stockbroker and it turned out that it was, it was a, it was a, it was basically a meeting with a, what's it called a job finder. Okay. I was a job agency and the person I spoke to tore me apart. A girl around my same age at that time, she tore me apart and told me that I would I would never work in the industry. And I, I left there. And I crossed the street and I walked into Merrill Lynch and took the elevator up and I asked if if there was somebody I could see about possibly starting at Merrill Lynch. And the next day I started at Merrill Lynch. It's really down to, you know, the worst that can happen is that they would have said no, you know, was this strange person standing here wanting a job but, but sometimes it pays off to be hungry for something because people feel that, you know, so I worked at Merrill Lynch. And I ended up also working as a day trader where we were a team of four trading. Well, someone's positions basically so it was it was a young guy at the time and he was an independent trader and so we were a team of four trading his money basically so I then went to med school went back to Denmark to do that. I did half of it and was just insanely unhappy with that decision so I love taking care of people. I, you know, I love the experiences I had with the senior citizens, I thought I was, you know, really wanted to do psychiatry or psychiatric type of type of work but but in the end I still had this pull towards the markets and and that was then where I started to see NBC and in Copenhagen back in the year 2000 as it were. So so what was that decision then because you're going from like a market, your market participant directly almost actively like taking positions to then working on the CNBC side so what was the decision not to go back there to actually go over to financial media, so to speak. I think it was opportunity at the time because sometimes you know you said you always have a plan and sometimes we might think we have a plan I want to do exactly this. But don't say no to other things that might come your way, because, you know, I'd never thought of working for a group like CNBC, you know, but when the opportunity opened up and, and, you know, it was phenomenal. And it was the best thing I've ever ever done the best jump I ever did the best decision I ever made, and the best opportunity that that I ever had thrown my way as well so so it was. It was, it kind of seemed like it was a really good mix for me to both have the creative side of of of being your own master, a very large part of the time within this really fantastic organization that you know it's like it's a, it's a real name CNBC to work for and at the same time, you know, you have the creative side but you also at the same time you have to, you know, you really have to think on your toes. So, so you're definitely using, you know, your brain daily, you know, it's not sitting interviewing somebody about, you know, eating peanuts or you know you know, it's exciting and you have to constantly learn. And I love that element of hearing things that I didn't know. So, regardless of who you talk to, in that position, if you're open to it you literally learn things daily, literally. Yeah, one of the, when we've spoken in recent weeks one of the things that really, I guess surprised me a lot was when you said, you still get nervous, like whatever you like if you're doing a, I guess a bigger platform you're speaking to a lot of people and so on or even just, I guess, live TV and you still you're still active now doing stuff. So, taught me through that I mean how does someone still be nervous after 20 years I mean. Well, nervous slash excited. Yeah. Because we're all human right so we all have bodies that function, pretty much the same. You know you have adrenaline you have cortisol. You have testosterone you have all kinds of things in you, you know. And, and I say testosterone because they've done all these interesting studies about, if you're about to go perform that your body kind of battles between, you know testosterone which is that kind of feel good. And then Lee hormone right for lack of better word and then you have cortisol which is the stress hormone. And you have these studies that have been done where basically, if you if you make yourself small physically. So for an example you're going into a job interview or you need to do something really important or you need to give your, your very first or your biggest presentation. So what's natural to do these days it's you know you sit on the couch in the waiting room or in the green room, and you're on your device, and you're closed you know you're looking down you're closed you're, but actually what you should be doing is making yourself expensive like really big you know think Arnold Schwarzenegger, like, you know, and we kind of were taught I guess especially in our society that you don't do this type of stuff right we're supposed to be small and quiet and but actually the bigger you can be and the more expensive you can make yourself you know like think of the old blacks and New Zealand rugby team right like before they go into play. They're doing a dance I mean they're massively expanding themselves are sticking a tongue out there. You know here I am because they don't want cortisol they're not you know why would they want like a nervous hormone that's like when they're going out to play they won't, you know testosterone. It's the same thing that you need to think about when you go on stage so you actually want to expand yourself physically make yourself as big as possible and the other thing is that if you're not expanding yourself concentrate on what's happening. You know, that's the other key that if if you do get nervous which ties into those Lehman days for an example right where concentrate on who you're talking to concentrate on what the subject matter actually is. You forget about yourself, you know you forget about all the nervous or whatever that concentrate on what it is that you're actually doing. And that also carries a long way but but ultimately I think it's it's only natural, you know so to be nervous and or to be excited and and oftentimes also I think because it's finance or because it's business, we maybe subconsciously or inadvertently or taught like it's serious. Yeah. Manly, you need to get people, you need to say a lot of things like abbreviate stuff and you know so I'm like you know what you're talking it's not about that you know oftentimes when you think about the people who you admire the most in the industry. They simplify really difficult stuff and make sure that everybody in the room is along. Finance is one of those things that I'm not going to say you either have it we don't but I guess some people have a great ability to turn it on and be able to be in a situation where they can just trust themselves and reflect the best them but that's not the case for everyone and certainly a lot of people that we interact with haven't been the ones who've just gone in the front door at Goldman's or Bank of American Royal Lynch and just got the job and they feel a little bit knocked down on the back of that and trying to find their way. Do you have any kind of advice about if it isn't natural how can you kind of what would be a practical way of trying to build that up is it just putting yourself in those positions again and again to just build up the tolerance or is there any input you have on that. I completely get it I mean confidence is it's so hard you know it's so hard and it's so interesting and it's so interesting the the element of resilience and how you build confidence I get it I get it you know and some days for all of us are confidence is lower than other days and some days you know we can jump over the moon and other days we can't you know and I get it we're all human. I think it's a mixture of. I think it's a mixture of training and of initially when you're first starting out. Being your own. Being your own kind of pat on the back a little bit in terms of visualizing what you would like. Or at least that's what helped me early on. I also found and identified consciously that I could do with a couple of mentors along my way and early on initially. I met a couple of people who I just clicked with you know and I would have been again 181920 and they would have been in their 40s. And they had their families of their own and their jobs of their own but they listened and they somehow were able to just you know those pieces of advice where your parents or somebody else could say exactly the same thing and you wouldn't hear it but from somebody else you kind of stuck with you you know, and I kind of made a conscious effort of keeping in touch with these people, because I felt they were amazing. And without them, I don't know where I would have been but like but they were they were really amazing. So, Oh, and also just to follow up on the kind of being your own pat on the back I don't mean it in the sense of you know, you can do it and stuff like that but more. Take a quiet moment daily. Close your eyes. Give thanks which is what I've done from about age 12 or 13 I give thank you to all kinds of things in life and I'm so so so grateful for the things I have. And then I, I ask it's a you know meditation to, you know, help to guide me in the right direction. You know, help me to be strong in this in this area. Help me to be able to do this and this help me to learn more about this and this, and that talking to yourself is almost like it's somebody saying, it's okay you can do this and over time if you do this daily I promise you if you just talk to yourself two minutes a day in the morning before you get out of bed on the bus. You know, between the commercial breaks of whatever you're watching you know wherever it is it doesn't matter just take two minutes and talk to yourself about where it is that you want to go and be thankful because when you start being thankful for what you actually have. You realize like, wow, I'm pretty lucky like I actually have a lot, you know, and. Okay, so I have this so now what can I do to keep building on this. But but it's difficult you know and also like you say I think there's there's a lot of truth to what you say that you keep putting yourself in those positions I mean the amount of auditions for all kinds of other things and I know that I've tried out for where you've gotten to know lots, lots, lots, lots, but I mean you will talk to any big entrepreneur who has big companies and they always say you know I got 12 billion knows before I got my yes. Right, so the core underlying theme here is it's okay to fail, which I think is a massive thing that we see, because we have such interactions, not failure. It's just, it's just an experience. It's not failure, you know, one of the things I've identified even from when I graduated in the early noughties is that it seems now the levels just keep going up academically everyone's very strong now so you need that differentiator. So what's your advice and kind of standing out in that respect. I mean it's a tough one you know there's there's a lot of competition for sure, but I do think be yourself. And again try to find that space of I know it sounds really airy fairy but it's true. If you can identify and find that space within of connecting and happiness. Talk to yourself meditate a little bit every day just like just talk to yourself two minutes and kind of and you can bring that out in whatever you're doing. You're already 50% further ahead than everybody else who just kind of goes through the motions. You know like Anthony again it's very obvious when you when you talk to your personable you bring something more to the table you're not afraid to share a bit you know like. I would say again like to stand out really rest in yourself like you are enough in yourself and find ways to figure out how to really believe that if you don't believe that already. Find that hat like work on it work on how they, you know, find someone who tells you that you're enough in yourself because you are enough in yourself, you know, and, and, and every day if you build that onto yourself you you end up standing out because you're not trying to, you know, be a peacock when you're a field mouse like a field mouse is a perfectly good field mouse as a field mouse you know we want to feel must to be a field mouse not a peacock you know so so I figure out really who you are. And that takes you, you know, more than half way and then of course determination as well as we were talking about like persistence and determination to stand out for the competition. So if you start at a retail, like a retail store, you know, selling clothes, you'll, you'll have to fit into a structure also there you know that that's just how companies operate you know so, you know, investment banks it's just a name, you know, it's just a place where a lot of people work, just like anything else you know so, and they're literally human and they go home and they cry and they're afraid of whatever presentation they have to give tomorrow to, and they're busy and you know, and they like birds and you know I mean they're literally human. So, you know, really remember that when you reach out to people and when you're having these interviews. Well look, good way to finish because that coming from you and you having met some of the most influential people literally in the corporate world in a political world, I think says it all so. Louisa, thank you very much it's been an absolute pleasure having you with us. It's any pleasures online Thank you so much for reaching out and and genuinely I wish everybody the best like everybody watching and just please just just go do it know it's really exciting like you can do it.