Copyright CNBC
Marisa Drew knows she's impatient. It's her secret to leading a team through big initiatives. Drew is the chief sustainability officer for Standard Chartered, where she oversees $300 billion in sustainable finance to channel investments into high-impact, climate-friendly projects. "I know I'm impatient, and I need to move fast and I need to have results, or we need to move on," Drew told CNBC's Julia Boorstin in the latest episode of the "CNBC Changemakers and Power Players" podcast. Drew says her results-driven focus taps into her desire to innovate and be a solutions-provider for large-scale issues, like getting Standard Chartered to be net zero in its financial emissions by 2050. She said one class in college taught her how to learn and move quickly, and she recommends it to everyone. "If I could ever give anybody a piece of advice, it's take a speed-reading class early in your career or life," said Drew, who studied finance and marketing at the University of Virginia before earning her MBA at The Wharton School. "I was curious, why would anybody take this class?" she said. "But actually, it served me very, very well. And there's always a nugget out of something that I read that I can take away, and it sort of informs how I think and maybe operate." Drew recalled thinking of her boss's hard exterior as a "suit of armor" in order to present herself in an aggressive way to match the energy of the male-dominated Wall Street and "get by." Drew became an analyst under Greenberg and said "it was a wonderful opportunity to to work for somebody who was incredibly demanding, but she was demanding because she cared." Drew, who said she's always had a rebellious personality, also took her boss's tough approach and flipped it to align with her own. She realized she didn't "want to put on an ill-fitting suit just because that's what it's supposed to look like to be a banker, because if that's the case, it's going to be pretty inauthentic, and it's probably going to be a short career," Drew said. "So I set about trying to figure out how I was going to find my way and my own personal style." For example, she swapped the traditional uniform of a skirt suit and instead wore trouser suits on the trading floor. "I got so much grief, I can't tell you," Drew said. But she also received messages from the few other women in her field who said they were glad she made the small but significant change. "It was sending a message that, actually, you can have your own personal style; you can dress in comfort as long as it's professional; you can forge your own path," Drew said. "And that's just a small, silly little example, but there's so many steps along the way where I needed to do it my way." She acknowledged that as an outsider, it's important to balance doing things your own way without alienating yourself from the rest of the group. One way is to diffuse any differences with humor, and another is to over-deliver early on to lay the groundwork of being a star performer that everyone will want to work with. In banking, that meant going above and beyond in her first one or two transactions, Drew said: "Then you get that little sort of ripple effect around the floor that says, 'I heard she over-delivered and did something fabulous and went outside of expectations.' Then you create that persona for yourself, and that gives you a lot of leeway and a lot of air time to then progress up the organization." CNBC is now accepting nominations for the 2026 Changemakers List! The list recognizes women transforming business and philanthropy, female leaders who have accomplished a meaningful achievement in 2025. Learn more about the nomination process and submit yourself or a colleague today. Plus, sign up for CNBC Make It's newsletter to get tips and tricks for success at work, with money and in life, and request to join our exclusive community on LinkedIn to connect with experts and peers.
