Joan Solotar - Scale as Advantage at Blackstone

Joan Solotar is global head of Blackstone Private Wealth and a member of the firm's management committee. Joan's career tracks the fascinating evolution of Wall Street in the past thirty years.  Joan worked on three notable IPOs: DLJ in 1995, Goldman Sachs in 1999, and Blackstone in 2007, and we discuss the strategic reasons behind them.  She was tapped to lead the development of Blackstone's private wealth group, which has since grown to $250 billion.  We talk about the state of the industry she covered in the 1990s, the challenge of building a two-sided marketplace in private wealth, Blackstone's management committee, how they prioritize, and the wisdom of building businesses organically. Before joining Blackstone in 2007, Ms. Solotar was Head of Equity Research at Bank of America Securities and a highly ranked Institutional Investor All Star financial services analyst at Credit Suisse and Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette. Ms. Solotar is a member of the Board of Trustees of East Harlem Tutorial Program and East Harlem Scholars Academies. She wrote a Harvard Business Review article entitled, "Truths for Our Daughters," and co-authored,  "Truths from My Daughter." Ms. Solotar received a BS in Management Information Systems from the State University of New York at Albany and an MBA in Finance from New York University. Please enjoy my conversation with Joan Solotar. Circulus Substack:  https://circulus.substack.com/ If you like these discussions, please subscribe or leave a review.  NOTE: This podcast is for educational and entertainment purposes only. Anything said by the guests or host should not be construed as legal or investment advice. Thanks for listening.   Joe Reilly is the head of Circulus Group, a family office network, and the host of The Inheritance Podcast.   FOLLOW JOE: https://twitter.com/joereillyjr WEBSITE: https://circulus.substack.com/ INHERITANCE PODCAST:   https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-inheritance-podcast/id1644964   If you like this show, do me a favor and send it to someone you think would enjoy it.  Just copy the link into an email or text.  I appreciate it.   S4E7 ©2025 Joe Reilly