David Land

David Land joined the College in September 2025 as Finance and Investment Bursar.

What were you doing before you started your current role?
I spent a long time in the city, working in the financial industry. After studying physics at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and completing a PhD in Particle Physics at Harvard, I was originally planning to be an academic in the subject but suffered from bad timing. I was trying to land a job just as they were terminating the Superconducting Super Collider project – the project that was going to supply all the experimental data for particle physics at the time.

I was, however, able to parlay a talent for arithmetic into a role as a trader at Goldman Sachs in the early days of derivatives. I worked there for over twenty years, ultimately helping to set up an insurance company inside Goldman called Rothesay which spun off into a standalone company that now pays about a million people their pensions. You may have seen the name at test match cricket, which the company sponsors.

What brought you to Univ?
I always had working in academia in the back of my mind and felt a great affinity with the work of universities. As the years passed, I became increasingly conscious of the debt of gratitude I owed to the institutions that formed me.

I started donating to my old college to help them continue to make a similar experience available to as broad a group of people as possible and became more aware of that world of donors.

The ultimate trigger was seeing Bill Ackman throwing around his weight as a Harvard donor in an attempt to dictate the running of the university. I thought to myself, “If you really want to be part of the solution, then you should try to get a job!”

What does being Finance and Investment and Bursar involve?
The way I’ve often thought of it, as somebody coming from the business world, is that the Governing Body fellows are the Board of Directors who have appointed the Master as CEO and chair of the board. The Finance and Investment Bursar is the CFO and therefore responsible for keeping the institution on a sound financial footing. This means managing financial risks, helping to steer the investment of the endowment, finding sources of revenue, and seeking out efficiencies to cut expenses where possible.

Then, at the end of the year, I need to sign the statutory accounts – though it turns out that the end of the year coincided with the beginning of my appointment, providing a great incentive to learn quickly!

What do you enjoy most about working at Univ?
The warmth of the reception from the College has been remarkable – from first setting foot in the Porters’ Lodge to meeting the Master, Univ people, whether students, fellows or members of staff have been universally welcoming.

I’ve been to quite a few different College events and have also joined the boat club. It’s quite different from when I was a student, when it felt like you had to prove yourself in order to be accepted. Perhaps it’s a Univ thing, but you get the benefit of the doubt and are encouraged to come along.

What’s your advice for students at Univ?
I’d say, don’t waste a moment of your time at Oxford – because you’ll only get it once. So much of life as an undergraduate can be devoted to the effort of figuring out what you’re going to do when you leave and getting a job. I know that’s important, but you’ll potentially have many, many jobs in your life, but there will only be one period when you have access to the kind of community that you get here in Oxford.

I would also say, the more you do, the better you’ll do it, so get organised and get involved.

What do you do in your spare time?
Mostly sitting down sports like cycling and now rowing with UCBC – I’m hoping that they won’t be too embarrassed to be dragging some grey hair up and down the Isis.

Describe your first impressions of Univ in three words.
River, Soon, Head.