Welcome Aboard, New NABE Members!
Please join the NABE Board of Directors and staff in welcoming new members who joined over the last two months. Since January of 2007, 504 have joined NABE. New members are added to the on-line registry at http://www.nabe.com/mem/search.html at the beginning of each month. The first issue of two IdeaLinks e-mailed to NABE members each month includes a listing of new members. Here are selections from brief interviews, conducted by e-mail, with four new members:
 Luiz Cherman
Senior Economist
Citigroup
São Paulo, Brazil
What is your current position?
I'm a senior economist at Citigroup's economic and market analysis team. I'm responsible for analyzing and forecasting the main variables of the Brazilian economy, such as the exchange rate and economic growth, and transmitting this analysis to Citi's clients, either through reports, meetings or conference calls. I joined Citi in May 2006.
What is the main focus of your company or organization?
Citi is one of the largest financial services company in the world, with a solid presence in more than 100 countries.
What are your career highlights and education before your current job?
I did my undergraduate studies at the Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-RJ) and my graduate training at the University of São Paulo (USP). Before joining Citi, I worked as a corporate economist for the Spanish telecom company Telefonica, first on the corporate finance and treasury group, where the focus was mostly on macroeconomics, and later in the strategic planning and economic regulation areas, where microeconomic issues were dominant.
Why did you join NABE?
I would like to have access to the experience of U.S. economists in forecasting economic cycles, an area of research that has not been developed properly in Brazil thanks to decades of significant financial instability. This area of research now is becoming more relevant given the relative economic stabilization of the country in recent years.
What drew you to economics?
I always liked the social sciences, but given that my interest was more directed towards a practical rather than an academic career, economics fit better. My taste for mathematics also weighed in favor of economics.
Julie Eastman
Director, Pricing & Contract Management
Ceridian Corporation
Minneapolis, Minn.
What is your current position?
I am director for pricing and contract management at Ceridian Corporation. My teams and I work with the Ceridian businesses on strategic pricing and contract initiatives and executing those programs. We are responsible for process design, managing, and reporting on exception activities, customer profitability programs, and mitigating risks related to contract and pricing activities. We also update technologies related to our areas including a pricing/order configurator and a contract management system. I have been with Ceridian for 14 years in various positions and have held my current position for two years.
What is the main focus of your company or organization?
Ceridian Corporation is a business services company serving businesses and employees primarily in the United States, Canada and Europe. We are one of the top human resources outsourcing companies offering a broad range of human resource services, including payroll, benefits administration, tax compliance, HR information systems and Employee Assistance Program (EAP) and work-life solutions. We are also a major payment processor and issuer of credit cards, debit cards and stored value cards, primarily for the trucking and retail industries.
What are your career highlights and education before your current job?
I have a bachelor's degree from Augsburg College--majoring in business/economics with a minor in MIS. My previous positions in Ceridian include working for more than four years in mergers/acquisitions as part of the corporate legal team; more than four years as pricing manager; managing strategic initiatives for our small business segment and technology organization; and serving earlier in service, product management, and marketing. Previous to Ceridian, I worked for a law firm and the corporate legal department of Control Data Corporation.
Why did you join NABE?
I met a pricing professional at a conference who recommended the organization.
What drew you to economics?
The variety. Economics not only includes the statistics and traditional "economic" topics, but also covers the daily elements of human behavior and what results from the choices we make.
 Sebastian Palao-Ricketts
Assistant Vice President
Credit Risk Management
AmeriCredit Corp.
Forney, Texas
What is your current position?
I am the assistant vice president of Credit Risk Management at AmeriCredit Corp. I am responsible for ensuring AmeriCredit is abreast of the macroeconomic environment and its opportunities and exposures. Our group contributes to the successful development and execution of strategic plans by utilizing quantitative models to measure and forecast the macroeconomic impacts to the AmeriCredit portfolio. I have held this position for one year.
What is the main focus of your company or organization?
AmeriCredit is the leading independent automobile finance company, providing financing solutions indirectly through auto dealers and directly to consumers in the United States and Canada.
What are your career highlights and education before your current job?
I worked for Broadband Laboratories at AmeriTech (which is now AT&T), and then in the photonic networking sector of the telecommunications industry at Fujitsu. I earned a master’s degree in economics from the University of Texas at Dallas in 2006.
Why did you join NABE?
AmeriCredit is building an economics group to centralize the company’s assessment of the macroeconomic landscape to assist in forecasting and planning efforts. As a member of this new group, I hope to benefit and contribute to the positive network externalities NABE membership holds.
What drew you to economics?
While on a college trip through Latin America, I watched my economics lessons play out before me in the market squares, informal economies, and street corner forex markets. The experience galvanized the strength and potential this science holds to understand, predict, and better our environment.
Sara Rutledge
Research Analyst
Invesco Real Estate
Dallas, Texas
What is your current position?
I joined Invesco Real Estate as an analyst in the North American Research Group in June 2005. My group primarily assists U.S. direct investment by developing best strategies for property sector allocation, market selection, and asset selection. To that end, I am responsible for monitoring industrial property market conditions and trends at a national level in addition to tracking and forecasting apartment, industrial, office, and retail market conditions in major Western U.S. metro areas.
What is the main focus of your company or organization?
Invesco Real Estate is a subsidiary of Invesco Ltd., a global investment manager with capabilities spanning traditional and alternative asset classes. We serve as the investment center for both direct property and real estate securities.
What are your career highlights and education before your current job?
After graduating the Texas Academy of Mathematics and Science, I earned a B.B.A. in economics at the University of North Texas in 1997. I continued my education at UNT, earning an M.S. in applied economics in 1998. While in graduate school, I tutored for the Economics Department and was a research assistant at the Center for Economic Development and Research. My interest in development steered me into real estate, which I learned from the ground up doing primary research with Jamison Research. Jamison was acquired by CoStar Inc. and I moved on to a research position at Delta Associates in 2000, supporting brokerage activities at Transwestern Commercial Services. I was brought on board for my knowledge of real estate and economic fundamentals in Texas markets and, over five years, took on coverage across the South and Midwest, moving into a VP position. The desire to play a larger role in the application of my research led me to my current position at Invesco.
Why did you join NABE?
I think NABE offers a great opportunity to meet other economists.
What drew you to economics?
Early on, I was drawn to economics as an application of mathematics that pulled from my interests in public policy and social issues. In practice, I enjoy economics for how “messy” it can be. I find that the statistics tracked and studied in this field are just as important as the psychological reaction to them, making forecasting an art as well as a science.
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