Maud van Beuningen started her career in law. She worked in the legal profession and as a lawyer both in the Netherlands and abroad, in project finance and at an investment office. She is now a board member at PYM. Her strong sense of justice remains an important motivation in everything she does.

You have built an impressive and versatile career. How did this lead you to impact?

After studying law in Groningen, I started working as an M&A lawyer at Clifford Chance, and later I also worked in Paris as a legal counsel. Fantastic experiences, but I wasn’t truly inspired by the idea of ‘making more money just to make more money.’ I knew I wanted a change. I ended up at ABN AMRO, first as a corporate lawyer in the corporate M&A team, where I regularly worked with the Energy Transition Fund (now Sustainable Impact Fund). Here, I saw for the first time that you can achieve returns and do good, precisely by supporting innovation. This was my turning point: I decided that every future job had to have impact.

I then started working in project finance in the energy transition, and after ABN AMRO I worked for Bluemetric, an investment office that advises wealthy families on their investment decisions in private and public markets. I was the intermediary between analysts and families and, among other things, together with a teammate, worked on focusing on impact in private equity and set up a training program for the next generation. In this role, I learned how much financial conversations in families are determined by family dynamics.

How did you become a board member at PYM?

After I resigned from my job at Bluemetric, my cousin Liet called with the news that she was stepping down as chair at PYM, and asked if I might see a role for myself on the board? It was a perfect moment, as I was completely open to new challenges, especially in the impact space! I have now been a board member since February, and I see a huge opportunity to make conversations about wealth and impact easier, especially among young people who struggle with family dynamics and expectations around money.

Do you also invest in impact yourself?

Yes, I am part of a family office, an independent investment vehicle with about 300 family members. Together with 9 other family members, I invest on behalf of the family, for the family. We have a decent portfolio, but it’s certainly not 100% impact. Not yet!

Discussing money remains difficult—even in my own family. That’s why, together with a cousin and a niece, I set up the Family Academy, where we have just started a course called ‘Introduction to Investing.’ With this, we hope to involve everyone more in the family wealth and open up the conversation. Moreover, we are building a solid financial foundation to better understand impact and invest more enthusiastically. The next course will be about impact investing!

Do you invest directly or in funds?

With the family office, we invest in various funds and private equity. Examples of impact funds we have invested in are Carbon Equity and 4Impact, but we also make direct investments in companies. This summer, we will strategically look at how we want to invest further, and hopefully also create some impact goals. Personally, I am also, on the one hand with my husband and on the other hand with my brother and sister, looking at how we can invest more in impact together, with our own funds.

You do a lot at once. What do you do besides PYM?

I am the director of an agri-business, I sit on the advisory board of a financial administration office, and I guide private wealth holders with their assets. I am currently a ‘sparring partner’ for several women. I help them, among other things, with drawing up wealth/investment plans, but I don’t make decisions for them. I especially enjoy empowering people to make their own choices. In addition, I am also a mother of a 5-year-old son and a daughter who is almost 3.

Can wealth also be a burden?

Yes! It may sound a bit spoiled to say, but I have noticed how many people with wealth struggle with it. There are high expectations, both inside and outside your family. Many people of my generation, for example, find it difficult to balance their parents’ expectations with their own ideas. There is also shame, especially when people assume your life is easy if you have some money. It can change relationships with friends or colleagues once they know you have money. And it can paralyze you from using your money or deploying it yourself. Sometimes it’s easier to just pass it on to the next generation as it was ‘given’ to you: as if it was never really yours.

I would like to break the taboos around money, because money doesn’t have to feel ‘dirty’ and you’re not immediately lazy just because you have wealth. Within PYM, we address these kinds of topics in the ‘circles’ we organize. This way, we learn together that you can do a lot of good with money.

What is your goal at PYM?

Worldwide, there is a huge wealth transfer underway; in the Netherlands alone, about 400 billion euros will be transferred from the current generation to the next. That is an incredible opportunity to change things! I want to make the conversation about money easier, both within PYM and within my own family. Especially for 20- to 50-year-olds, who are now in that transition phase and are about to gain decision-making power.

For PYM, I see a role in supporting these young people to bring about a system change. You can make an impact with capital in all kinds of ways. For example, you can also be an advocate for change as a shareholder of a traditional company, or use your dividends to invest in impact. Let’s make it all open for discussion!