IADEI Fellows & Forum Program

Leena Bhutta is the chief investment officer for the Doris Duke Foundation. She joined the foundation in 2019, was promoted to Deputy CIO in 2020 and to CIO in January 2022. Before joining the foundation, Leena served as director of alternative investments at the Hollyhock Foundation. In that role she created the investment program for the foundation and initiated investments in external fund managers across various strategies. Prior to that role, Leena was an investment professional at Joho Capital, an Asia-focused hedge fund, where she invested in public companies across the region. She started her career in investment banking at Goldman Sachs. Leena earned her Master of Business Administration from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and a Bachelor of Arts in economics from Wellesley College.

Laurie Bonello, CFA, Managing Director, directs the research, development, and implementation of Strategic Investment Group’s hedge fund investment activities. Additionally, she is a member of Strategic’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee, a cross-functional team that works to develop and retain diverse talent both within the firm and within the financial industry, to encourage and evaluate diversity within our sphere of influence (our firm, our managers, our vendors), and to foster an equitable and respectful work environment throughout the firm. Prior to joining Strategic, Laurie worked in the Equity Research Department of J.P. Morgan Investment Management in New York. Laurie holds a B.S. in Applied Mathematics from Saint Mary’s College, Notre Dame, Indiana. She is a CFA charterholder and a member of the CFA Society of Washington, D.C.

Nicola is a Director of Investments at ALSAC St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. Prior to joining ALSAC, she was an Investment Consultant with Fund Evaluation Group (FEG), where she was responsible for creating and managing custom investment portfolios for endowments and foundations in higher education, healthcare and other nonprofit organizations. Additionally, Nicola has held a number of different roles in the investment industry, including manager research and equity research. Nicola has an MBA from the Johnson Graduate School of Management at Cornell University, and a BA in International Relations and Economics from Tufts University. Nicola is a CFA and CAIA charterholder and is a Board member of the CFA Society Memphis. 

Ashley Dennig is Director of Investments at the Broad Family Office and Foundations in Los Angeles, helping to oversee the Foundations' and Broad family's diversified investment portfolios across asset classes. Previously, Ashley was a Vice President at Franklin Templeton Private Equity (FTPE), working to build out FTPE’s private equity fund-of funds business. Prior to FTPE, Ashley served on the investment teams at San Francisco Employees’ Retirement System (SFERS) and Kingsbridge/Riverun multi-family office. She began her career at Goldman Sachs. Ashley graduated from Princeton with a degree in History. She was born and raised in Hong Kong.

Mark is the San Francisco Foundation’s Senior Director of Investments and leads the team which stewards $1.6 billion in philanthropic capital. Mark’s team is responsible for the strategy, operations, and communications related to the foundation’s core investment portfolios, externally managed funds, and impact investing portfolios.   The foundation is committed to advancing racial equity and economic inclusion. Currently, 40% of the foundation’s assets are invested with firms that are majority-owned by women or people of color — two groups that have historically faced barriers to accessing capital. In 2019, Mark helped launch the foundation’s Mission-Aligned Investments program which seeks to invest in companies whose work contributes to the foundation’s equity agenda. 

Greg joined NYSIF as Chief Investment Officer in June 2015. As CIO, Gregory oversees an investment portfolio of over $21 billion in assets and investments for both the Workers' Compensation Fund and Disability Benefits Fund. Prior to joining NYSIF, Greg spent more than 20 years as an investment professional in both the private and public sector, including senior investment positions at GE Capital, New York Life Insurance Company, and Santa Clara County. Greg began his career at the investment banks of Donaldson, Lufkin, and Jenrette and Bankers Trust Securities. Gregory holds a bachelor’s degree in Applied Physics from Columbia University School of Engineering. He is a graduate of the Bronx High School of Science.

James Glenn is the Director of Investment Operations in the Spelman College Endowment. He focuses on curating operation efficiencies and strategic enhancements to the functioning of the endowment. He also partners with his OCIO in sourcing, investment performance tracking, and portfolio construction. In his free time, he enjoys spending time with his dog, practicing jiu-jitsu, gardening (primarily vegetables), and learning about AI and its applications. 

Geetanjali Gupta joined The New York Public Library as the Chief Investment Officer in February 2018. Prior to joining the Library, Ms. Gupta was a Senior Vice President of Absolute Return and Public Market Funds with the Harvard Management Company for more than 10 years and helped manage portfolios valued at more than $15 billion across a wide array of asset classes globally. Earlier in her career, she worked for Goldman Sachs in the Investment Banking Division. Ms. Gupta graduated from Harvard University with a B.A. in Applied Mathematics and Economics, and received an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and J.D. degree from Harvard Law School.

Tracy Harris is a strategic experienced CFO, SEC Qualified Audit Committee Financial Expert, Board Finance & Nominating Committee Member, and Audit Chair. A results-oriented leader, she deftly advises multi-billion dollar organizations on growth strategy, financing, and operational transformation. Tracy is a director on the Board of the Bally’s Corporation, the $10.1B CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield Board, and the District of Columbia Retirement Board’s $11B public pension fund. Previously, Tracy was Executive Vice President, CFO and Treasurer of a start-up insurance industry technology provider, MIB Group Holdings, LLC. She led the financial transformation and innovation of the former Medical Information Bureau and was key in M&A integration. While CFO for UMUC Ventures, a VC fund established by University of Maryland Global Campus, Tracy identified key sectors within the education technology vertical space for M&A and advised portfolio companies on operational and financial management to drive growth.

Rudy is the Managing Director of Investments, Private Markets for The Colorado Health Foundation. He is also an Investment Committee Member for a global Venture FoF focused on impact investments in life sciences and healthcare. Previously Rudy was Managing Director of Investments at New York Presbyterian Hospital, managing $12 billion in AUM for the benefit of the 26,500+ physicians and employees at NYP. He was also part of the investment team at the $161 billion endowment and pension of the University of California Regents. Prior to the UC Regents, he was a Managing Partner responsible for portfolio management at an OCIO firm, managing approximately $8 billion in corporate pension assets. Additionally, he was a Portfolio Manager at PAAMCO; a $12 billion fund of hedge funds; where he was also Research Manager and Chairman of the Risk Committee. The firm merged with KKR to form PAAMCO Prisma. Rudy began his career as a naval officer and pilot in the U.S. Navy. After the military, he went on to leadership and engineering roles at Sun Microsystems, Cisco Systems, and Applied Materials.

Kai leads investment strategy and strategic research at Bivium and is responsible for asset allocation and market research, portfolio construction and risk management, manager search and due diligence, as well as product development.  Kai has over 25 years of investment experience. Prior to joining Bivium, Kai was a Managing Director and the Head of Investment Management Consulting at Thomas Weisel Partners where he oversaw the outside manager investment platform for the firm's institutional and high net worth clients. Kai was formerly a Vice President and Senior Investment Analyst at Northern Trust Global Advisors where he was the lead research analyst for fixed income and the emerging manager program. Before Northern Trust, he was part of Goldman Sachs' external manager of managers group. Kai worked on a number of the outsourced CIO portfolios at both Goldman Sachs and Northern Trust. Currently, Kai serves on the board of The California Endowment.  

Yana Watson Kakar is the incoming Managing Director and Head of Americas of CDPQ, one of the largest institutional investors in the world with over $400 billion Canadian dollars in assets and 1,500+ employees across 11 offices in ten countries. As Managing Director and Head of Americas, Yana will be an integral member of the CDPQ Global Management team, contributing to the global strategy of CDPQ and its implementation, the development of key relationships across the public, private and civil sectors, and the deployment of constructive capital throughout the world. Currently Yana is the CEO of Growth for Good, a special purpose acquisition company focused on sustainable companies critical to the decarbonization of the global economy. Previously she was Global Managing Partner of Dalberg Advisors, a mission-driven multinational consulting firm specializing in policy, strategy, and investment advisory. She is a dual citizen of the United States and Canada and holds a Master of Business Administration from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Arts from McGill University.

Yup S. Kim serves as an investment director for private equity at CalPERS, California’s $450 billion pension fund. He serves on the private equity investment review committee and helps lead CalPERS’ private equity program across all functions, including strategy, team management, and investment activities across primary, secondary, and co-investment opportunities globally. Previously, he served as the senior portfolio manager at the Alaska Permanent Fund Corporation, an $80 billion sovereign wealth fund, where he helped lead private investment activities. The private equity and special opportunities portfolio generated 25% net of fee returns over the past decade. He has also held positions at DB Private Equity, where he served on the Investment Committee, Performance Equity, and Silver Point Capital, and he began his career at Citigroup in New York. Kim received his B.A. in economics from Yale University and speaks six languages.

Ben Liou is Managing Director of Investments and Assistant Treasurer at the Getty Trust.  Prior to joining the Getty, Ben was an investment banking executive at Nomura Securities in their Tokyo and New York offices. He was also vice- president of IT Mergers & Acquisitions in Chicago and a principal at GCM Capital Markets in Irvine. Ben has a B.A. in economics from the University of California at Berkeley. He also has a J.D. from the University of Southern California, where he was a member of Law Review, and an M.B.A. from the Drucker School of Management at the Claremont Graduate School, where he was a Mayr Scholar. 

Karen Mercer is Senior Vice President and Treasurer of AARP. In this role, she provides strategic leadership in the areas of treasury, investments, insurance, employee retirement plans, and corporate finance. She previously served as Vice President for Business Affairs at Cornell College and as Vice President and Treasurer of Imperial Sugar Company. She started her career as a commercial banker in Houston, with credit and treasury management responsibilities for large corporations primarily located in Washington, DC and the Mid-Atlantic states. In addition to her career roles, she has served on boards of several nonprofit organizations and currently serves on the board of the DC/Maryland Chapter of the National MS Society. She is a passionate advocate for diversity in organizations and in changing systems to make greater diversity possible. She is a CPA and a Certified Treasury Professional. She earned both a BBA and MBA from Texas Christian University. 

Mallika Nair joined Yale New Haven Health System in September 2016 as an investment strategist. Previously, she was a director of private equity and hard assets research at Segal Rogerscasey in Darien, CT, where she researched and recommended investment managers focused on private capital.  Prior to joining Segal Rogerscasey in 2004, she worked at Judge Baker Children's Center in Boston where she fielded and investigated reports of child abuse. She is a Chartered Alternative Investment Analyst charterholder and holds a B.A. in sociology from Wesleyan University.

Casey Plante is Director of Investments for M Health Fairview, an integrated academic health system located in Minneapolis, MN. Mr. Plante oversees approximately $2.5 billion in operating, insurance and foundation assets, and nearly $4 billion in defined contribution assets, serving many different constituents within M Health Fairview with diverse investment needs. He is responsible for asset allocation and manager selection recommendations across all asset classes including alternative investments, and oversees all investment operations. Mr. Plante has nearly 15 years of institutional investment experience and earned his MBA from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN.

Dimple Sahni is a Managing Director of Multi Asset Impact Investing at Anthos Fund & Asset Management, a values-based asset manager, rooted in a single family office. Originally from India, Dimple is an experienced investment professional – with over 20 years of experience in impact investing, investment banking and venture capital – who began her career in finance working for Goldman Sachs. She then launched a social enterprise focused on education, Epylon, which was later sold to Accenture. After working at L Capital Partners where she was a Kauffman Fellow, she shifted to impact investing at the Omidyar Network, Pierre Omidyar’s philanthropic investment arm. She continued her impact investing career with Unilever Corporate Ventures on its exploration of emerging Asia. Most recently she was fund principal at the Hattery, an early stage impact investing and design firm which was sold to Google. Dimple also serves on the Investment Committee of the Nathan Cummings Foundation in support of 100% mission-aligned investing. Dimple holds an MBA in Finance from the Wharton School and a BA in Economics from the University of Chicago. She is based in Amsterdam and speaks English, Hindi and Dutch.

Brian Scharf is a Managing Director in Investments for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. He is responsible for developing asset allocation strategies, as well as selecting and monitoring external investment accounts and partnerships across the Foundation’s portfolio with an emphasis on the Alternatives portfolio. Prior to joining the Kauffman Foundation, Mr. Scharf was a Principal at Paragon Capital Management, where he managed portfolios comprised of individual securities in a variety of asset classes, meeting the client's risk tolerance and income needs. Earlier, Mr. Scharf was a Principal at Palmer Square Capital Management, where he managed portfolios of diverse hedge fund strategies, designed with the intent to achieve high risk adjusted returns over market cycles. Mr. Scharf is a member of the DEI Advisory Committee at The Pembroke Hill School, a member of the Yale Alumni School's Committee, and a trustee and chair of the Investment Committee of the Jewish Community Foundation of Greater Kansas City. Mr. Scharf holds a Master of Business Administration from Columbia University and a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Yale University.

Ryan joined the Dartmouth College Investment Office in January 2022 as a Managing Director and manages the real assets portfolio, including real estate and renewables. Prior to Dartmouth, Ryan worked at Aberdeen Standard Investments (formerly FLAG Capital Management) for over ten years, most recently as Co-Head of Real Assets. He also worked at TransCanada as a power/renewable energy analyst. Ryan graduated summa cum laude from Merrimack College with a BS in business administration and earned an MBA from the Carroll School of Management at Boston College. Ryan is a CFA charterholder.