Moderated by Stefano Fasulo, director of graduate student affairs, the one-hour Zoom session gave students exclusive access to Amendola for practical career insights and professional inspiration as he answered questions to help guide their own career paths.

In addition to his professional accomplishments, Amendola continues his dedication and service to his community through numerous volunteer and charitable endeavors. At Quinnipiac, Amendola’s philanthropic leadership includes chairing For the Ambitious, Quinnipiac’s $162 million comprehensive campaign. In 2024, Amendola was inducted into the Hall of Fame for Quinnipiac’s Global Asset Management Education (GAME) Forum, the world’s largest student-run financial conference, in honor of his years of service as an active contributor and presenter. He is also a contributor and presenter at the Greenwich Economic Forum. 

Amendola spoke on how he leveraged his Quinnipiac bachelor’s degree in financial management and his own entrepreneurial spirit to build a reputation for solving complex finance problems for high-net-worth clients. A former managing partner of Aegis Wealth Partners in New York City, Amendola founded his Connecticut-based wealth advisory firm, Wooster Square Advisors, to give back to his hometown of New Haven, where his family has roots spanning three generations.

In 1910, his great-grandfather immigrated and settled on Wooster Street in New Haven, a city defined by generations of immigrants seeking economic opportunity. Both his great-grandfather and grandfather owned their own businesses, while his father, the first in the family to attend college, embarked on a career with a major corporation. Looking back on three generations, Amendola views his family’s upward trajectory as the result of consistent hard work, continuous learning and an unwavering drive to improve.

“I think about Quinnipiac the same way I think about my family’s journey,” Amendola said.

“The Sunday dinner experience we had on both sides of my family was always talking about the past and the future. I was always fascinated by those stories. I liked looking forward and thinking about what I was good at. I have an entrepreneurial bent to me — I like to do things quicker, with fewer steps. I like to make decisions, and that doesn’t always work in big companies.”

Reminding students that people are “...the summation of our failures more than our successes,” Amendola framed setbacks as vital catalysts for growth and shared an early career experience where he learned from failure. After being placed on a performance action plan, he turned his career around by aggressively exceeding his performance targets. Afterward, his boss offered a defining piece of wisdom: Amendola’s turnaround wasn’t just about meeting metrics, but about having a clear vision of where he wanted to end up.

“He said the reality is you had vision. Vision is going to carry you there,” Amendola said. “I do think a lot about when he said that to me. If you know where you want to be, and know what you want it to look like, that’s the north star.”

Reflecting on his leadership style, Amendola attributes his approach to a mix of early hands-on corporate training and learning from both his successes and failures. At the core is his idea of “share, show, do.”

“I want to share with you where we’re trying to be; I want to show you how we get there, and then I want to watch you, support you and care about you while you get there,” Amendola said.  

He also invites two-way communication, ideas and opinions from every member of his team.

“I’ve learned at this point in my career that the person sitting at the head of the table is not necessarily the strongest one in the room. I am someone who will ask everybody’s opinion, and that doesn’t mean I don’t already know the decision, but I do want people to be included and feel heard. I want them to contribute and to give an opinion. There’s never been a scenario where I’ve done that where we haven’t gotten there better. That doesn’t mean we didn’t get there the way I thought we would, but we were able to improve on it,” Amendola said.  

His experience has helped him to develop a deeply intentional people-first philosophy, as well. Amendola makes getting out from behind his desk a priority, routinely scheduling coffee chats and immersing himself in opportunities to listen to diverse perspectives, exchange stories and continuously expand his worldview.

Looking back on when he was starting out fresh out of college, Amendola views hiding behind his work and not putting himself out there as a missed opportunity. He urged students to actively push themselves outside of their comfort zones, despite any initial discomfort.  

He also shared his personal style of connecting, which pairs his structured contact process with the sincere enjoyment of getting to know someone. It’s a type of genuine interest that turns Amendola’s everyday human connections into a vital engine for business growth, personal growth and community impact.

Amendola said young professionals often hesitate to connect with others simply because they can’t see the long-term return on that initial discomfort. Recognizing that cause-and-effect connection earlier would have reshaped his own career start, he noted.

“I think if I had understood in my twenties what the positive impacts would have been, it would have made it easier for me,” Amendola said. “If I had to coach people to do it, which I do, I would go with them the first couple of times. I would try to hide if I was feeling uncomfortable about it. I would try to make it fun, an adventure. I would try to get them to understand what the vision is, what the result will be, what the cause and effect is. If I had understood it didn’t have to be about money or that I didn’t have to be the most successful person in the room, it would have been easier for me to do those things. Now, it’s less hard.”

Amendola said he was shy and quiet as a youth but grew to embrace being in a “people business.”

“The simplest way to describe my business is that we’re in the financial advice business. We win clients based on advice or service. We think we execute or implement better than our competition. We strive and focus and constantly think about service. A simpler way to say that is I’m in a people business. I engage with people,” Amendola said. “I enjoy people. I regularly set meetings to have coffee with people, just because they may learn something and I may learn something. I’m comfortable telling my story, but I’m even more comfortable asking you yours and engaging on that.”

One reason Amendola said he’s able to enjoy connecting with people with diverse interests is due to his desire to never stop learning.  

“I take lifelong learning seriously. I have a diversified set of interests I read about — not all of them are about our business. I like that I have things to talk about. I like that I find people interesting. I like to engage,” Amendola said.

He stressed the importance of being well-read, as well as a great listener, as a way to expand personal growth and build lasting, genuine connections with others. Wooster Square Advisors is a “learning, reading organization,” he said.

As a parting thought, Fasulo asked Amendola what he felt was the most remarkable trait in a great leader.

“I don’t know a lot of leaders I would describe as great leaders that aren’t humanists, that aren’t people-people,” Amendola answered.

“I think anybody can be a good leader if they want to put the time and effort into it and if they’re sincere about it. I think sincerity is an unbelievable word to a good and great leader. The best leaders I’ve been around are those that say, ‘I’m a humanist and I want to hear about you, period.’”