The year was 1992, and Ashish Sharma was working at the Union Bank of California when a cohort of students from the University of Washington Global Banking Program arrived. The UW Global Banking Program, a two-week experience that brings together banking professionals from around the world to learn, was visiting San Francisco, where Sharma was working at the time.
“The diversity of the countries that were represented and the different functional areas of banks that sent participants was what drew me to the program,” says Sharma, who went on to serve in leadership positions with Wells Fargo, Wachovia, and Axos Bank. “Being in international banking, it was a great way to get exposed to many cultures, learn about their viewpoints, and make friends.”
Sharma was committed to showing his new friends something beyond the bank’s interior.
“When the UW Global Banking Program students would come to San Francisco, we would take the whole group to my house for dinner,” Sharma says. “I wanted them to see what life in the United States was like.”
Whenever Sharma reconnects with people who participated in the UW Global Banking Program years ago, he says they often remember the conversations and idea sharing before they mention the lectures or assignments.
“They talk about the people who took time to meet them and make them feel welcome, beyond the academic part,” Sharma says.
That instinct to make people feel welcome has stayed with Sharma and offers a glimpse into what has helped the program endure.
Today, Sharma works at the intersection of FinTech and venture capital as managing principal of JanuX Advisory in the Bay Area. He also serves as board chair for the UW Global Banking Program.
The banking industry has changed dramatically since he first became involved, and the program has changed alongside it. But bringing people together to connect and learn from one another has remained central to the experience.
In December 2026, the UW Global Banking Program will celebrate its 50th anniversary at a reunion event in Manila, Philippines. We spoke with Sharma as the board prepares to mark this noteworthy milestone.
Building a career through global connections
Through three decades of involvement with the UW Global Banking Program, Sharma has consistently helped deliver a curriculum tailor-made for emerging leaders in international finance.
Sharma built a career spanning international banking, global sales, operations, and executive leadership. Along the way, the bankers he met through the program became colleagues, friends, and in some cases, vital professional connections.
“What I gained from interacting with global bankers was very influential when I’d go back into those markets because they’d remember the conversations we had together, and spoke so highly of the program, how personalized it was.”
After spending 17 years at Union Bank of California in New York and San Francisco, he helped lead the sale and integration of the bank’s international correspondent banking business to Wachovia. He later held leadership roles at Wells Fargo, including Head of Global Sales and Consulting, Chief Operating Officer, and Head of Client Solutions.
He describes himself as a former “finance and accounting person,” but his career gradually moved him toward sales, relationships, and leadership. He credits the relationships he built through the UW Global Banking Program for playing a role in that transition.
“Those relationships that I built through being involved in the UW Global Banking Program helped me progress in my career,” Sharma says.
For someone working in international banking, he explains, entering a new country’s banking industry can mean entering a room without knowing how you will be received. Having already established personal relationships with people around the world gave him greater confidence in those conversations.
“Perhaps it’s surprising that the program can have such a lasting impact after only a couple of weeks of classes,” Sharma says, “but it speaks to how the Foster School of Business and board have structured the program. Networking is essential to the whole experience.”
Ashish Sharma speaking at the UW Global Banking Program’s 40th anniversary dinner.
A global program takes shape
What began in 1976 as the Pacific Rim Bankers Program was the vision of Dr. Kermit O. Hanson, then dean of what is now the Foster School of Business. During a trip to Australia, Hanson heard from bankers about the need for a program that could bring financial professionals from across the Pacific together to learn from one another.
In the beginning, senior bankers, including CEOs, would stay in the University of Washington dormitories, adding a “back-to-school” feel to the experience.
Fifty years later, the UW Global Banking Program has grown far beyond its original Asia-Pacific focus. Its alumni network now spans hundreds of banking professionals, and the two-week program welcomes 20 to 25 bankers to Seattle each summer.
Despite the name change, the goal has remained to bring experienced banking professionals together and give them opportunities to learn from people they would not otherwise encounter in their industry or home country.
Learning to work together across borders
When bankers arrive in Seattle, some participants can be shy, and it is natural for participants from the same country to gravitate toward one another. So, Sharma and the board have long looked for ways to break down those barriers early.
One favorite tradition has been a boat cruise on Lake Union, complete with karaoke. It is a memorable sight: bankers who arrived in Seattle in business suits and leather shoes loosening their ties and singing together on a boat while float planes take off and land around them.
Other traditions have included country nights, where participants wear national attire and dance and sing.
Those social experiences complement the academic ones. Participants work together through team-based simulations and other activities, learning to find solutions alongside people with different professional and cultural perspectives.
“It became such an interesting and joyful experience that they were ‘forced’ to work together and find solutions,” Sharma says, laughing.
When they return home, alumni often conduct extensive debriefs with their organizations, sharing what they learned, discussing the cases they worked through, and considering how to put those lessons into practice.
“We see program participants returning to their roles more innovative, more ready to tackle challenges, and with bigger and broader networks,” Sharma says. “We always encourage participants to share their experiences with their institutions and peers and invite them to join in this experience.”
The UW Global Banking Program Class of 2022 working on a group project.
The global banking program listens and evolves
At the end of each program, the board asks participants to nominate two classmates to share their feedback.
“We meet with students and ask them, what worked? What do you wish it could’ve included?” Sharma says.
A few years ago, participants said they wanted more practical elements and perspectives beyond financial institutions. In response, the program added off-campus sessions meeting with Seattle-area global companies such as Boeing, Starbucks, Amazon, in addition to financial organizations, giving participants the opportunity to engage with multinational organizations with global perspectives.
The capstone experience has evolved, too. Rather than completing a traditional project, participants now work on ideas that can be more directly applied within their institutions. Alumni take those ideas back home and consider how the cases and lessons from Seattle can be put into practice.
The program has also increased its focus on timely issues facing the banking industry.
The board members, who represent Canadian banks, Seattle community banks, Australian banks, JPMorgan Chase, the State Bank of India, and other institutions, bring a direct view into the challenges facing the industry and the issues their organizations are navigating.
“We see program participants returning to their roles more innovative, more ready to tackle challenges, and with bigger and broader networks” — Ashish Sharma
Looking ahead to the next 50 years
The banking industry of 2026 looks dramatically different from the one that existed when Hanson founded the program in 1976.
A half-century is a significant milestone for any program. The UW Global Banking Program is also a reflection of an unusual ability to evolve.
What has not changed is the program’s belief that some of the most valuable learning happens when people from different countries and institutions sit down together, challenge one another, and build relationships. And maybe sing a little karaoke while they’re at it.
Sharma encourages organizations to see the experience as more than another professional development opportunity.
“It’s a very value-oriented program,” Sharma says. “Sending a high-performing team member that you want to develop into a future leader is a valuable investment in the employee’s growth and the organization’s future success.”
Fifty years after its founding, the UW Global Banking Program continues to make that investment, one cohort at a time.
Every five years, the program celebrates its anniversary in a different country, and this year, the global banking community will come together in the Philippines. In December 2026, alumni, faculty, board members, and friends of the program will gather in Manila, Philippines, to celebrate five decades of global connection.
For Sharma, the anniversary is an opportunity to celebrate what has endured, recognize the people who have helped shape the program, and continue asking the question that has guided it for 50 years: How can we keep making this experience better for the next generation of global banking leaders?