Avenue Magazine Calgary

Age:38

It’s 2 a.m. and Beth Hamilton-Keen is baking muffins. She’s stressed. Baking clears her mind and helps her sleep. Her kitchen provides the occasional creative culinary outlet; she even sometimes makes cringe-worthy concoctions such as lacing hamburgers with curry powder.

Fortunately for her clients, Hamilton-Keen’s experimental side doesn’t extend to her work as a portfolio manager at Mawer Investment Management Ltd., where she helps clients with a minimum of $2 million invest their money. “I’ve got a conservative job,” Hamilton-Keen says. “I’m hired to be a shepherd, a steward of people’s assets. Most don’t come to me and say, ‘Make me millions.’ They’ve already done that.”

Hamilton-Keen is no stranger to the spotlight. She is often in front of the camera, commenting about financial markets on the Business News Network, CBC Newsworld and CBC Radio. Always humble, Hamilton-Keen dismisses the challenges of providing live market analysis. It’s easy, she says stoically. “Just look in the lens and remember to wear a dark suit.”

Indeed, talking to the masses about markets is far away from Hamilton-Keen’s original career path. After completing a BBA at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, she moved to Jasper where she wanted to work as ski lifty. “At the time, that was my career ambition,” she says. That job never manifested, however, because her career in finance took off. She began working as a bank teller, a job that cascaded into 18 years in the financial industry, employed with such firms as CIBC and TAL Private Management Ltd. “In university I enjoyed finance classes the least, but here I am today, professionally in finance,” she says. Meticulously minded, Hamilton-Keen kicks back with glass-blowing and cooking classes. “Baking doesn’t allow much experimentation, so I like the constraints,” she says. “When I'm allowed to get creative, I can go a little too far.”

COMMUNITY WORK

Volunteer,
Inn from the Cold

Volunteer, Lycée Louis
Pasteur School

Volunteer,
Junior Achievement

Canada President's
Council representative
and exam grader,
Chartered Financial
Analyst Institute

Member, Private
Wealth Advisory
Committee

PAST

Board member, Junior
Achievement of Alberta

Member, Continuing
Education Task Force

Member, CFA Program
Task Force