Become a lawyer: That was the message Leo Tucker heard over and over from his Jamaican immigrant father while growing up in the Fort Lauderdale, Florida, suburbs. “My father felt that being a lawyer or a doctor was the pinnacle of American success, but I didn’t want to do either,” said Tucker, who jokes that “getting into financial services was my way of avoiding law school.” But his father needn’t have worried. Tucker has spent more than 30 years at Northwestern Mutual, becoming its first African American managing partner. He is now responsible for running the firm’s Washington, D.C., region, overseeing about 300 people in six offices.
Throughout his career, Tucker says he was “usually the only guy who looked like me.” Regardless of the challenges that posed, he said he always has strived to be a positive role model for others like him and to prove that diversity pays off. The success of his region has demonstrated that, prompting Northwestern to invite him to participate in its recently formed Sustained Action for Racial Equity task force. Tucker believes that investment literacy and planning should be for everyone, not just the few, and that financial organizations should today’s marketplace. “It’s easy to recruit a lot of diverse people; the hard part is retention,” he said. “For that you have to address the corporate culture. People are the seeds, culture is the soil. You need the right soil conditions for seeds to sprout.”
— Evan Cooper