Cutler Center 2012-2013 Annual Report - Babson College

Addendum D: TopMBA Interview
Mark D'Annolfo has over 20 year of investment and operating experience,
having worked on 30-plus transactions valued at over $4 billion, and held senior
management positions in both start-ups and Global 500 firms. He is currently
the managing director of the Stephen D. Cutler Center for Investments and
Finance and teaches a graduate-level investments course at Babson College.
1. Why did you decide to teach at Babson?
When I was with the investment banking firm Adams, Harkness & Hill, now
Canaccord Genuity, we had several of our investment conferences at Babson, so
I knew Babson from our conferences, as well as by its great reputation as a
business school. Being on campus, I also knew that Babson had a long history in
finance, dating back to its founder, Roger Babson, who was an investment professional, to the present
day, where on average a quarter to a third of Babson students accept positions in the finance area.
After leaving investment banking, I wanting to try teaching and called Mark Potter, the chair of the
finance division at Babson at the time. As it happens, the professor teaching equity portfolio
management was going on maternity leave and Mark was looking for a replacement. After meeting
additional times, Mark offered me the opportunity to co-teach the course with him. I would focus more
on teaching equity analysis and stock selection and he would focus more on portfolio management
theory. I accepted and really enjoyed the experience.
After teaching at Babson for several semesters, I taught equity analysis at my alma mater, Boston
College – the ‘other BC’ – for several years. When Babson was looking for a director for their Stephen D.
Cutler Center for Investments and Finance, I knew them and they knew me and I started shortly after.
The fact that Stephen Cutler of Essex Investments, the main benefactor, was also a client when I was in
investment banking probably also helped seal the deal.
2. How does your experience as a Wall Street analyst inform your teaching?
The courses I co-taught and taught in the past, equity portfolio management (at Babson) and equity
analysis (at Boston College) were very closely related to what I had done for 15-20 years as a senior
equity analyst. I designed my classes, which were electives, around what students needed to know if
they planned to go into the investment management business. The classes provided a practical
understanding of equity analysis, which is as much an art as a science. Students were taught basic
valuation techniques and their application, industry, strategic and competitive analysis, modeling
income statements and balance sheets to project earnings, how to write research reports, and how you
add value in equity research – in other words, what I did when I was an analyst. I taught the classes
through a combination of lectures, case studies, guest speakers and class participation.
I am currently the faculty advisor and teach the Cutler Center Management Consulting Field Experience
(MCFEs) classes, which involves overseeing, guiding and grading teams of three to five graduate
students who perform semester-long consulting projects for companies in the investments and finance
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