Philipp Hildebrand and Peter Kurer delivered a spellbinding joint MPP Masterclass on crisis management on 6 December.

‘The Hildebrand and Kurer Masterclass was a fantastic - and surprisingly honest - account of the events leading up to and following the financial crisis from the perspectives of UBS and the Swiss National Bank,’ said MPP student Alison Cies. Ms Cies also appreciated ‘their contrasting perspectives,’ which ‘ drove home the point of how important the active participation and cooperation of stakeholders is to managing a crisis.’  

The pair spoke candidly about their two very different but complementary roles in dealing with the UBS crisis in Switzerland in 2008. Philipp Hildebrand, now Chairman of Blackrock, was Chairman of the Swiss National Bank at the time, and has been highly commended for his decision and execution of bailing out a bank that dwarfed Switzerland’s economy in size. Yet it was then-UBS Chairman Peter Kurer’s ‘extraordinary cooperation in his own demise’ in order to save the bank that Hildebrand praised.

Using the dramatic narrative of the crisis and the specific case of UBS, Hildebrand and Kurer illustrated some key lessons for when ‘the unimaginable becomes real’. One such lesson the pair impressed upon students is that there are limitations to even the best-laid plans. ‘Theoretical war games never really capture your intention’, Hildebrand told the class. Suggesting a new direction for teaching at the School, he recommended dealing with the unexpected by finding a way ‘to keep your focus and strength’, including sleeping and going for the occasional run.

Dr Philipp Hildebrand is Chairman of Blackrock, former Visiting Research Fellow at the Blavatnik school’s Globalization and Finance Project, and a member of the school’s International Advisory Board. Dr Peter Kurer was Chairman of UBS from April 2008 to March 2009.