Debates about financial reform have led to the recognition that a healthy financial system doesn't depend solely on how it is structured--organizational culture matters as well. Based on extensive research in a Wall Street derivatives-trading room, Taking the Floor considers how the culture of financial organizations might change in order for them to remain healthy, even in times of crises. In particular, Daniel Beunza explores how the extensive use of financial models and trading technologies over the recent decades has exerted a far-ranging and troubling influence on Wall Street. How have models reshaped financial markets? How have models altered moral behavior in organizations?

Beunza takes readers behind the scenes in a bank unit that, within its firm, is widely perceived to be a class act, and he considers how this trading room unit might serve as a blueprint solution for the ills of Wall Street's unsustainable culture. Beunza demonstrates that the integration of traders across desks reduces the danger of blind spots created by models. Warning against the risk of moral disengagement posed by the use of models, he also contends that such disengagement could be avoided by instituting moral norms and social relations.

Providing a unique perspective on a complex subject, Taking the Floor profiles what an effective, responsible trading room can and should look like.

Daniel Beunza is Associate Professor of Management at the Centre for Charity Effectiveness at Cass Business School. Beunza's research explores the ways in which social relations and technology shape financial value. 

His award-winning study of a derivatives trading room on a Wall Street bank traced the roots of extraordinary returns to the use of space and internal organization. Beunza obtained his PhD from New York University, and has previously taught at Columbia University, the London School of Economics and Copenhagen Business School. 

His research has been published in Organization Science, Organization Studies and Economy and Society. Beunza is a leading contributor to the social studies of finance literature, and editor of the blog Socializing Finance. He has served as Chair of the Academic Network of the Principles of Responsible Investment, and collaborated with the UK Banking Standards Board on the use of ethnography and grounded theory research to enhance professional standards in the UK’s financial sector. 

Beunza’s recent book, “Taking the Floor: Models, Morals and Management in a Wall Street Trading Room” (Princeton University Press) considers the moral consequences of the use of economic models on Wall Street.

Source: City University of London Bayes Business School