UEBS Business Series: When (and what) Finance Forgets

An early-evening debate at the University of Edinburgh Business School will bring together senior representatives from leading UK financial professional bodies and the University to explore a deceptively simple question: what can today’s – and tomorrow’s – finance professionals really learn from the mistakes of the past?

Drawing on the work of Edinburgh’s Library of Mistakes and the themes of its mid‑March “Weekend of Mistakes” in Hay Castle, the discussion will examine how financial history’s bubbles, frauds, crashes and policy missteps still shape the risks faced by practitioners today. Panellists will consider why lessons that seem obvious in hindsight are so hard to apply in real time, and how behavioural biases, incentives and organisational culture can blind even the most sophisticated professionals.

The debate will focus on practical implications for both working professionals and students:

• how to use historical case studies to sharpen risk judgement and ethical awareness;
• what professional standards and qualifications can do to embed historical insight in day‑to‑day decision‑making; and
• how firms and regulators might better institutionalise “memory” so that each generation does not have to relearn the same costly lessons.

The event is designed to be interactive, with audience questions and contributions encouraged throughout. It will be of particular interest to those considering careers in investment, banking, risk, regulation or financial policy, as well as to practitioners who want to stress‑test their own assumptions against the hard evidence of history.

Agenda

6pm: Registration, tea & coffee

6.30-7.30pm: Speaker presentations followed by audience questions

7.30pm: Networking with drinks

8.30pm: Event ends

Panellists

• (Chair) George Littlejohn - Senior Advisor, CISI
• Klyzza Lidman - Investment Analyst at Aubrey Capital Management and Chair of CFA UK Scottish Committee
• Tina Harrison - Personal Chair of Financial Services Marketing and Consumption, University of Edinburgh Business School
• Russell Napier - CoFounder, ERIC & Keeper of the Library of Mistakes

George Littlejohn graduated from University of Edinburgh in 1973 with an MA in economics. He then qualified as a chartered accountant with PwC in London before becoming a journalist with The Economist, specialising in financial and economic matters. He is Senior Adviser to the Chartered Institute for Securities & Investment (CISI), having conducted advisory work in financial centres across Europe, particularly in central and eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, the Middle East and Asia over the past two decades.

Klyzza Jayme Lidman is an Investment Analyst at Aubrey Capital Management, covering public equities as a global generalist and Chair of the Sustainability Committee. A graduate from the University of Edinburgh Business School, with an MSc in Banking and Risk Management. She is chair of the CFA UK Scottish Committee and the steering group of Leaver’s Money Skills. In 2019, she was named ‘Young Investment Woman of the Year (Small to Medium Firms)’ at Investment Week’s Women in Investment Awards.

Tina Harrison joined the University of Edinburgh in 1993 as a lecturer in Marketing. Prior to this she was a researcher at the Financial Services Research Centre, at UMIST, Manchester, where she was engaged in a segmentation project funded by the Trustee Savings Bank which provided the research for her PhD. She is currently Professor of Financial Services Marketing and Consumption and also has a University role as Assistant Principal with overall responsibility for the University’s academic standards and quality assurance arrangements.

Tina's research interests are in the area of financial services marketing, specifically financial wellbeing, analyses of consumer use and understanding of financial services and the use of technology in enabling and empowering effective financial management and decision-making.

Russell Napier is author of The Solid Ground investment report for institutional investors. Russell has worked in the investment business for 36 years and has been advising global institutional investors on asset allocation since 1995. Russell is author of the book Anatomy of The Bear: Lessons From Wall Street’s Four Great Bottoms ( in print for almost twenty years and ‘a cult classic’ according to the FT) and is founder and course director of The Practical History of Financial Markets course. The course has run since 2004 and is now available on campus at Edinburgh Business School, in a two and a half day in-person executive version in London and also online.

He is a member of the investment advisory committees of three fund management companies, Cerno Capital, Kennox Asset Management and Bay Capital. He is part owner of both Cerno and Kennox.

In 2014 Russell founded the charitable venture The Library of Mistakes a business and financial history library in Edinburgh that now has branches in India and Switzerland. Plans to open libraries in London, Singapore, Toronto and Mumbai are progressing. The Library of Mistakes hosts lectures which are live streamed and recorded and a podcast series was launched in 2022 (The podcast ranks amongst the top 2% of all global podcasts for listeners). The Library and the course are owned and operated by a Scottish registered charity called Didasko which donates its financial surpluses to promote financial education.

Russell has degrees in law from Queen’s University Belfast and Magdalene College Cambridge. He is a Fellow of The CFA Society of the UK , an Honorary Fellow of the CISI and is an Honorary Professor at The University of Stirling and a Visiting Professor at Heriot Watt University. His second book – The Asian Financial Crisis 1995-1998: Birth of the Age of Debt- was published in July 2021.

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