Meghan Shue spends a lot of time analyzing the big-picture events and broad data points that influence the investment portfolios of her clients at Wilmington Trust, the wealth management arm of M&T Bank.
But Shue also values hearing directly from those clients. They help her gain a more granular view of economic trends.
"We will sometimes see at the macro level that labor market data looks okay," Shue said. "And then you speak to enough business owners or individuals, and you might get a little bit more color that, underneath the surface, it's actually a little bit softer, which is our current view."
Given the volatility in the market, Shue is spending even more time on the road presenting to and speaking with clients. "When things are great, nobody really needs to hear from me. I hope they want to hear from me, but they don't really need to," she said. "But when things are uncertain or the market is volatile, that's when we really have to be out in full force."
Despite the heavier demands on her time as a client-facing executive, Shue has been working to improve operations behind the scenes at Wilmington Trust. Over the last year, she took on responsibility for the trust's trading and implementation team, giving her purview over the full cycle from developing investment strategies to integrating them into customized client portfolios.
"Being able to sit across all of those, I think, has helped me to find areas where we can connect better, we can improve our process, we can improve our efficiency, our communication, and we can just ultimately deliver a more seamless investment experience for our clients," she said.
Traders, for example, now have a better sense of underlying investment decisions. Strategists, meanwhile, get clearer insights into how their decisions impact clients in critical areas such as taxes.
"It takes it down from the ivory tower to what clients actually experience," she said.
Wilmington Trust is focused largely on capital preservation for its clients, who may have sold a business or inherited wealth. "We're not swinging for the fences," she said. Nonetheless, the company outperformed its benchmark in 2023 and 2024.
Shue is aiming to beat the benchmark again in 2025 while continuing to streamline operations, including through the automation of manual processes. She also is on the executive steering committee for a project upgrading the bank's trading software, a tech initiative that she acknowledges is outside her comfort zone.
"That's been a learning and growth opportunity for me," she said.
Shue, a 2022 The Most Powerful Women in Banking
Outside work, over the last few years, the former college swimmer and mother of two young children has been training for and competing in triathlons following the encouragement of a good friend. This summer, she placed top five in her age group in a half-Ironman, which involves biking, running, swimming and solving myriad problems in the heat of competition.
"It's been an amazing developmental experience that makes me feel better equipped to handle whatever is thrown at me at work," she said.
