SYLVIA LAM , 32

BBA ’93
Assistant Vice President,
Corporate Financial Controllers,
Deutsche Bank

Sylvia Lam’s résumé breaks the one-page rule in a big way, but most HR officers wouldn’t mind. While the first page lists her corporate accomplishments—at such prestigious firms as Citibank, Goldman Sachs, and, currently, Deutsche Bank in New York—the second page is pretty much filled with her volunteer work. For Lam, an accounting major who graduated summa cum laude, her job and volunteering are closely related.

Lam’s volunteer work reflects her own life narrative. “My first volunteer job was as a mentor. I wanted to help someone,” she explains, because as an only child she had no siblings to provide guidance or set an example for her, which made it more difficult to decide on a career direction. In her subsequent volunteer work, she branched out into working with the elderly because she was very close to her grandmother.

Lam, whose family immigrated to New York from Hong Kong, has volunteered for the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families, St. Vincent’s Hospital, and Dorot, a support organization for Jewish seniors, among many others.

Lam also feels fortunate to have been employed by firms like Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs—where she served as vice president of Firmwide Funding Controllers in New York—which “have a large impact on the community. I don’t just mean donations; they encourage volunteering in the community, like doing pro bono work for nonprofits.”

“That balance makes for a happier and more fulfilled life,” she says. “It’s not just about climbing the corporate ladder.”

—Peter Kobel

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