This is another in a series on area executives and political and community leaders who have played prominent roles in the development of Downtown or Jacksonville as a whole over the years. Some are still in the area, working or retired or a bit of both. Some have moved away and are working in other areas of the state or country. The series continues with Margaret Black-Scott.
by Max Marbut
Staff Writer
What she did: Financial advisor with Morgan Stanley, member of the Jacksonville Regional Chamber of Commerce Cornerstone group, Board of Trustees of the University of North Florida Foundation, Executive Committee of the Republican Party of Duval County, member of the Mayor’s Economic Development Council, Director of the Northeast Florida Chapter of Safari Club International. She also received an Eve Award in 1984 as Jacksonville’s Business Woman of the Year.
What she’s doing now: Morgan Stanley’s vice chairman for national sales.
From England to Los Angeles to Jacksonville then back to Los Angeles and now, back to Jacksonville from time to time. That describes the journey of Margaret Black-Scott, known more familiarly as “Mag.”
Born and educated in Sheffield, England, Black-Scott came to America and a career in finance with a job at what she described as a “small boutique brokerage firm” in Los Angeles. What brought her to Jacksonville was a position with a somewhat larger firm, Morgan Stanley.
“When I came to Jacksonville I managed the office that served clients in not only North Florida but also in Sea Island, Savannah and Hilton Head,” said Black-Scott.
As an extension to her job in L.A. she also appeared on a daily financial-interest television program. Shortly after Black-Scott arrived in Jacksonville, she met a producer at Ch. 7 and was soon on television here as well, first on the Public Broadcasting station and later on Ch. 4 when it was an affiliate of CBS.
In addition to her professional and on-air duties, she also performed more than her share of public service on a variety of boards and committees. Black-Scott also discovered coming from Southern California to a smaller, slower-moving environment had its advantages, she said.
“Jacksonville was still a small city when I arrived,” she said. “There were only about 350,000 people living here then. Every community has its own pace, I think. You just have to find the rhythm of the community and the business.
“The best thing was I didn’t have to buy any clothes for three years because back then almost no one in Jacksonville had seen an L.A. wardrobe.”
In 1996 she was offered a new position with Morgan Stanley that included a move back to Los Angeles. She was steadily promoted through the ranks of branch management, regional management and eventually took over Morgan Stanley’s Western Division.
Five months ago, she was promoted to vice chairman for national sales at Morgan Stanley and moved into a new office in the Century City area of Los Angeles. She specializes in making sure the firm’s high-net-worth clients are being served. It’s a group Black-Scott said has not really been affected by the slowdown in the economy.
“There is still a lot of money in the world,” she said. “The mega-yachts are still being built and bought – just not by the dot-com people any more.”
Another thing she’s responsible for at Morgan Stanley is enhancing the gender diversity in the company. Black-Scott believes there should be more women in the financial and economic arenas.
“If you look at the statistics regarding women in this business you’ll find we represent only about 15 percent of the financial advisors. Women on Wall Street face unique challenges but I think it’s a great business for women. Some don’t pursue finance as a career because they think it’s so risky, but look at how many women have careers in real estate. How risky is that? Morgan Stanley would like to convince more women to enter the financial services industry,” said Black-Scott.
Despite her career move back to Los Angeles, she considers Jacksonville home. Black-Scott and her husband, former Gemini and Apollo astronaut Dave Scott, own a home here and she takes the cross-country flight several times a year including, since January, for meetings of the Board of Trustees at Jacksonville University. It’s also where Black-Scott earned a Master’s of Business Administration when she worked here.
Another part of her Morgan Stanley career involves sharing her expertise and insights with groups across the country on the subjects of women in business and finance and economics. Next month Black-Scott is combining a trip back to her adopted home with a speaking engagement at her MBA alma mater. She will be the guest speaker Sept. 16 at an event sponsored by JU’s Davis College of Business and the Economic Roundtable of Jacksonville.
“I’m going to present a real economic outlook for real people,” she said. “It will include a lot of the same material I’d use if I were speaking at Wharton or Harvard but I want to make the information accessible for non-economists.
“My goal is for the audience to walk out with an understanding of the issues and an understanding that economics is a global issue that affects all of us 24 hours a day, seven days a week, not just when we’re pumping gas into the tank.”
356-2466