After re-careering into financial services following a management consulting stretch with McKinsey & Co., Ali Dibadj likely knew he was on the right track when, during his early years at AllianceBernstein, he was named the top financial analyst in the consumer space by Institutional Investor in the media outlet’s well-known annual survey of investment analysts. The competition banks its ranking on the surveying of institutional investors who vote for the analysts whose work they most respect.

Not bad for a man making his first foray into financial services. Yes, Dibadj had consulted with some financial service and insurance companies while at McKinsey, but this was his first pure financial play at a company whose full stock-in-trade was rooted in investing and money management.

Dibadj took the survey’s top spot for another 11 years running.

“That helped raise my profile within the firm,” he says.

Indeed. The young executive started cl