After finishing his education in manufacturing engineering at Cambridge University, Ben experienced a lull in job offers. Shortly after 9/11, he went to 15 first-round interviews and 10 final interviews to no avail. When he understood that the big companies weren’t really recruiting, Ben took a year off to reassess. Eventually, Ben took a position on a property modeling team with the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) just before the 2008 global financial crises.

After the 2008 crisis, Ben and the team at RBS turned their attention to damage control by restructuring loans and creating a procedural manual in the process. What he ultimately learned was this: <“The best way to actually maximize returns for the bank was to actually take the keys back from borrowers who were more than happy to give those keys back at that time.” — Ben Deacon> However, when Buzzfeed leaked the manual, it was thought that RBS was incentivising staff to repurpose properties. While this certainly wasn’t the case, the general consensus was that the staff used underhand tactics to take back the real estate. Ouch. Ultimately, an independent review found nothing wrong with the procedures. From there, using the same experience he’d gained from RBS, Ben went on to do the same sort of work for Rotary Capital.