Raffaele Riva has always let his life experience guide him to where he needs to go. As the President and Founder of AUREA Multi Family Office, he’s learned how to pursue what he loves without losing his flexibility. He opens up more about what this means to him, and how he’s managed to parlay his skills into a career that makes him proud.
A Positive Mindset
Raffaele Riva’s business encompasses a wide variety of financial services, including investment, wealth management, asset management, auditing, and accounting. This businessman has spent years in the business world, and he’s learned how everything from international laws to tax code changes can affect different people. Whether it’s a conglomerate or an individual, the truth is that money management is a complex affair.
What keeps Riva going is his positive attitude and insatiable curiosity. He stays up-to-date on topics that affect his business, but he’s also happy to branch out and explore different subjects as well. His well-rounded acumen is the fuel for his recommendations, ideas, and decisions. People trust him to sketch out not just the basic facts of any given problem, but also the extenuating details that could influence its outcome.
Providing Value
Like many successful entrepreneurs, Raffaele Riva is more concerned with what he can do for someone else. This is a difficult quality for many to master, particularly when they’re first getting started. The impulse to make money can lead leaders to skimp where they shouldn’t skimp. This may work in the short-term, but as a long-term strategy, Riva can say that it’s not worth the risks.
As he put it, “Providing value in the lives of your clients has been always extremely important for my long-term business success.” This quote makes more sense when you consider just how many deals Riva has been involved with. Rather than shy away from anything he’s unfamiliar with, he takes it upon himself to do his homework so he can be more than a bystander.
This approach is aided by his passion, as he typically only takes projects that he’s passionate about. “When you wake up each morning asking for more ways to better serve and satisfy your clients, you will dramatically boost your business. Always think in terms of serving, and even if your client was the one who was wrong, take the initiative to fix things and correct them immediately: it will provide value in their life.”
Becoming successful in any field is a combination of talents, skills, experience, and instincts. Riva emphasizes that his relationships have always been some of the most important assets in his life. As most business people will tell you, networking is more than just shaking a few hands. You have to form bonds with other professionals that are strong enough to withstand the test of time.
The Life of Raffaele Riva
Riva was born in 1962, and holds a degree in economics as well as a Dottore Commercialista (chartered accountant) from the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. While he was in school in Milan, he studied corporate financing, tax law, mergers and acquisitions, banking law, and accounting. He also completed a post-graduate program at the Canton Ticino Management Business School and a subsequent post-graduate program at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland. He has citizenship in Switzerland and Italy, and he speaks fluent French, Italian, and English.
From 1992 to 1996, he served as the Sr. Executive, active board member, and operations manager at a number of affiliated companies across the globe. Working in Canada, South America, Central America, Western Europe, and South Africa, he would learn about how different countries handle international cross-border activities, mergers, estate planning, corporate financing, and corporate restructuring.
From 1997 to 2008, he served as the managing partner for the same companies, climbing the ranks thanks to his rare ability to integrate his education and experience into his everyday to-do list. His colleagues trusted him to take charge of challenging situations, and Riva was more than capable of handling the pressure. In 2008, Riva decided it was time to open his own business, which was when he launched AUREA.
