New Transition Plan for Goldman Sachs

Goldman Sachs (GS) is assigning new responsibilities to several long-serving insiders as the Wall Street giant addresses a range of challenges. One member of the firm’s top management committee, Ericka Leslie, is stepping down from her position as the firm’s Chief Administrative Officer to assume the role of Chief Operating Officer for Goldman’s global banking and markets division. This division is the largest within Goldman and includes investment banking and trading operations.

The previous occupant of this role, Will Bousquette, will now become the Chief Operating Officer for the bank’s asset and wealth management division. Bousquette is succeeding Laurence Stein, a Goldman veteran of 27 years, who is set to retire at the end of the year.

Goldman Sachs is entrusting these new positions to two experienced company veterans in response to several high-profile executive departures earlier this year. Among these departures were Julian Salisbury, formerly the Chief Investment Officer of Asset and Wealth Management, and Dina Powell McCormick, the former Head of the bank’s Sovereign Business.

McCormick left to join BDT & MSD Partners, a firm co-led by another ex-Goldman executive, Gregg Lemkau, who previously oversaw investment banking for Goldman.

Will Bousquette, the newly appointed COO of asset and wealth management, has been with Goldman since 1998, while Ericka Leslie, the new COO of global banking and markets, joined the firm in 1996.

In her new role, Leslie will report to the three co-heads of global banking and markets: Ashok Varadhan, Dan Dees, and Jim Esposito. While the role of Chief Administrative Officer may potentially re-emerge in the future, there are currently no immediate plans to fill it, according to a source familiar with the situation.

This reorganization is taking place amidst increased scrutiny of CEO David Solomon, who is facing pressure to improve Goldman’s performance following the firm’s lowest quarterly profits in three years. He is grappling with issues ranging from job cuts and a prolonged investment banking downturn to reports of partner dissatisfaction and questions about his leadership style.

Goldman Sachs has already announced over 3,200 layoffs this year and intends to reduce expenses, including compensation, by $1 billion over the next two years. The bank’s stock showed a slight increase on Monday morning but is down 5% since the beginning of the year.

Under Solomon’s leadership, Goldman is attempting to strategically pivot away from its costly expansion into consumer lending while waiting for a more robust period of deal-making in investment banking.

However, the bank is poised to benefit from a new wave of initial public offerings beginning this week, with Goldman acting as one of the lead banks for IPOs from companies such as chipmaker ARM and grocery e-commerce firm Instacart.

Solomon expressed in a recent interview with Yahoo Finance that if these IPOs perform well, it could generate a positive cycle that attracts other companies that have been waiting on the sidelines.

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