Ross heads corporate development and strategic partnerships at Aurora, where he has worked on transformative acquisitions, including Uber’s self-driving division and various LIDAR and simulation technologies, while securing marquee partnerships with Continental (Aumovio) and NVIDIA. He joined Aurora in 2020 following the acquisition of Zoox by Amazon, where he managed strategic partnerships for the sensors and computers essential for autonomous systems. Ross began his career in New York City in investment banking and then private equity before transitioning into the robotics sector after earning his MBA from Wharton. He is a 2010 graduate of Yale University and a proud alum of Timothy Dwight College.

Yuri Cataldo is a Research Scientist and AI & Market Intelligence Lead at Autodesk Research, where he leads competitive intelligence across AEC, Manufacturing, and Media & Entertainment sectors and leads the go-to-market strategy for research teams launching projects. As Founding Partner of RavenRock VC, he invests in AI infrastructure and vertical applications.

His career spans creative and technological domains, from training at Indiana University, Juilliard, and Yale Drama School (MFA) to earning his MBA from MIT Sloan. He worked on a number of Broadway shows, founded IndigoH2O, a multi-award-winning bottled water company recognized as having the world's best-tasting water in 2015, and launched the Business of Creative Enterprises program at Emerson College. An award-winning entrepreneur and author of a bestselling book on blockchain, Yuri currently serves as Senior Research Fellow at The Digital Economist. He frequently speaks at leading universities about AI, blockchain, and technology innovation, bringing unique perspectives shaped by his interdisciplinary background across the arts, business, and technology.

Jia Chen is a global product leader at the intersection of tech, data and health at Medidata AI, a Dassault Systèmes company. Previously she led the launch of new products serving millions of users, and held leadership roles in industry solutions, strategic partnerships and AI client centers at IBM corporate headquarters as well as in emerging markets. She was a first-generation graduate student at Yale, where she earned her MS and PhD degrees in Physics, and says that Yale has been a source of inspiration for her.

As an alumni volunteer, Chen has served as a board member of the Graduate School Alumni Association (GSAA) and is currently the group’s chair. She has been co-chair of the annual "Where Do I Go from Yale" career event for graduate students and postdocs; a GSAA representative on the Wilbur Cross Medal Selection Committee; and an advocate for collaboration among the GSAA, the Office of Career Strategy (OCS), the Graduate Student Association (GSA), and the YAA’s Career, Life and Yale (CLY) initiative to engage broad groups of graduate students and alumni.

Chen has hosted virtual and in-person GSAS admission events for incoming graduate students, and has been an active panelist for CLY events such as the "Careers in Data & the Digital Economy" workshop. She mentors and supports physics, engineering and biomed graduate students. She is in her third year as a member of the YAA Board of Governors, where she co-chairs the Alumni Committee.

Rebecca is an impact-driven public health leader working at the nexus of AI, digital technology, and global healthcare. For over a decade, she has worked with technology companies, foundations, non-profits, and governments to advance health equity across low resource communities. This multi-stakeholder approach informs her work at the intersection of AI, public health, and policy, including the use of AI in health systems in low- and middle-income countries.

Rebecca previously built and led the AI & Digital Health portfolio at the Patrick J. McGovern Foundation, a philanthropy committed to bridging the frontiers of AI and social impact, and served as Director of Global Health Initiatives at Element, a deep learning company co-founded by Yann LeCun. Throughout her career, Rebecca has partnered with organizations such as the World Health Organization, the Global Fund, Gavi the Vaccine Alliance, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Wellcome to advance innovation in public health.

Rebecca holds a Masters in Health Policy and Global Health from the Yale School of Public Health and a BA in Political Science from Yale University. She is a Carnegie Ethics Fellow, a Term Member at the Council on Foreign Relations, an alumni World Economic Forum Global Shaper, and was previously selected as an AI XPRIZE Semi-Finalist and Gavi INFUSE Pacesetter.

Nusrat Farooq is an expert in Responsible AI operations, with experience that spans business, tech and geopolitics. She founded effectivRAI, a CEO advisory and tech firm committed to trusted and responsible AI operations. She previously led the enhancement of Incident Response Protocol at Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT), which was founded by Facebook, Microsoft, YouTube and X (formerly Twitter, which exited in Sep 2024). In this role, she coordinated responses to terrorist and violent extremist attacks across 60+ countries, working with over 30 technology companies and 200+ global stakeholders.

Her work has involved international development, track-2 diplomacy, crisis response, education, business development and social science field surveys. She has served organizations such as the World Bank, Columbia Law School, UNICEF, India Institute, Harvard University, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Nusrat is an incoming PhD student at Yale University. She holds an MPA from Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs and a Bachelor of Engineering from the University of Kashmir. She has been recognized as an emerging leader by Morocco's Policy Center for the New South and by Germany’s Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung für die Freiheit.

She has been published by Bloomsbury, Palgrave Macmillan, Taylor & Francis, and by Columbia Public Policy Review. She is also a contributor at Tech Policy Press.

Ossa Fisher first visited Yale as a high school sophomore in 1993, and she still remembers the impact. Today, she says Yale has played a key role in shaping her worldview, pushing her comfort zone, and fostering deep friendships that are akin to family. Her goal is to pay it forward to the ever-growing Yale community through continued service, and sees the YAA Board of Governors as a great fit for extending that service.

While Fisher’s service to Yale shows up in various ways — interviewing prospective candidates, hosting admissions receptions for local admits, hosting the Whiffenpoofs when they come through town, cheering on the Yale Bulldogs at the Bowl, etc. — her most meaningful act of service has been to serve as president of the Yale Club of Dallas for the past six years. She stepped down this summer at the end of her second three-year term.

Fisher is president of Aurora (NASDAQ: AUR), a technology company with over 1,800 employees and nine offices that delivers the benefits of self-driving to the trucking and automobile industries. Before Aurora, she spent over 20 years at innovative technology companies in high-growth industries, serving in both strategic and operational functions. She thanks Yale for teaching her how to be a leader, and says that Yale’s classes, community and culture taught her the importance of influencing the world towards a greater good.

Board of Governors, Planning Committee Member

Nathan Gould is the founder of Endeavor Labs, a boutique consultancy that helps organizations from early-stage startups to Fortune 100 companies improve operational efficiency, strengthen decision-making, and build differentiated customer experiences using data and AI. Before launching Endeavor Labs in 2022, Nathan led software engineering and data analytics teams as Director of Engineering at Electric, a New York City–based IT operations startup. He began his career in the clean energy sector as a market analyst at EnerNOC and then founded GridReason, a predictive analytics SaaS platform for commercial and industrial electricity buyers. Nathan graduated from Yale College in 2010 with a B.A. in Applied Mathematics. A proud alum of Timothy Dwight College, he is also a world traveler, husband, dog dad, and resident of Stamford, CT.

Dr. Sandy Kuzmich is the Managing Partner at Haug Partners, LLC in New York City. She received her PhD from Yale in Pharmacology in '89, and worked as a post-doctoral research associate at the Fox Chase Cancer Center, before entering the pharmaceutical sector (SEE BELOW), where she grew a successful career for several years before taking her professional interests in a new direction: law. This branched path allowed her to utilize her deep knowledge in pharmacology to become a successful litigator in the fields of patent litigation and strategic intellectual property counseling. An avid proponent of developing new talent both at her own firm and at Yale, Sandy is deeply involved in Yale's Alumni Association and works tirelessly to help uplift those around her. Follow her interview for advice and tips on how to take your passions and skills with you into the world after Yale.

Board of Governors, Planning Committee Member

Andrew Leonard, YSM ’93, is a Classical Guitarist and certified BioMechanist (TBMM-CES).

Andrew has performed in the US and Europe to critical acclaim. His recordings have been featured on NPR affiliates throughout the country, and he has performed and recorded with Grammy Award winner Doug Smith.

As an educator, Andrew taught at Wesleyan University and the University of Kentucky, where he ran the guitar program and created online courses for TrueFire.com. Suzuki-trained, he has taught guitarists as young as three.

In Kentucky, Andrew was trained as an arts consultant through the Kentucky Peer Advisory Network (KPAN). In this capacity, he led board retreats for nonprofit organizations and provided consulting services to musicians, sharing the knowledge he acquired through years of acting as his own manager, booking agent, and publicist.

As a BioMechanist, Andrew presents workshops with his mentor, Matt Pidgeon (Clinic Director of Activ8 Posture, Boston, Exercise Therapist & Certified BioMechanist), and works with individuals one-on-one to help them understand and correct body posture misalignments to improve longevity and alleviate pain.

Cory McCruden is a senior consultant with Ernst & Young LLP, where she provides business strategy and technology advisory services to the wealth and asset management industries.

McCruden has two master’s degrees from Yale and is passionate about building connections between the university and its alumni, especially from underrepresented and nontraditional backgrounds. For the Yale Graduate School Alumni Association (GSAA) she has served as a board member, co-chair of the DEIB (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging) Committee, and a member of the Nominating Committee.

McCruden is an Entrepreneur in Residence with Yale Ventures, an initiative launched in 2022 to foster a vibrant ecosystem for Yale innovators. Through the GSAA and the YAA Board of Governors she provides mentoring to students interested in both academic and nonacademic careers.

I recently built WhichGLP, an AI-powered platform that helps patients compare weight-loss drugs using structured data extracted from 10k+ Reddit posts. I shipped it in 2 weeks with 700ms average load time (faster than Google Search) and full production polish including custom branding, SEO, and legal/compliance. It's open-source and live at whichglp.com.

I'm a full-stack engineer with 4 years building at early-stage startups backed by tier 1 VCs. As the 3rd-8th engineer, I've owned features end-to-end: from talking to users and collaborating with product/design, to shipping to production and iterating based on feedback and metrics. I've built platforms managing 1M+ insurance policies, prevented $100k+ churn through rapid debugging, and shipped 50+ mobile features to beta waitlists of 1M users.

I sharpened my product-mindedness during my Associate Product Manager internship at Google, where I was 1 of 45 APM interns globally. I wrote PRDs and coordinated cross-functionally to build AI features. As an engineer, I've approached technical decisions through the lens of user problems and business impact.

Victor Padilla-Taylor is Director at the Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale, where he leads an interdisciplinary and entrepreneurial ecosystem spanning staff, consultants, alumni, and partners. His work integrates immersive programming, personalized relationship management, and a curated technology stack to scale innovation across the university. He received Yale’s 2021 Linda K. Lorimer Award for Distinguished Service, conferred by the university president for exceptional commitment to innovation and Yale’s educational mission.

He also received the 2023 Yale Alumni Leadership Award and the 2025 Yale SOM Distinguished Volunteer Service Award for founding and scaling the school’s largest entrepreneurial alumni professional group.

Victor has served in leadership and advisory roles with the Global Consortium for Entrepreneurship Centers, Long Wharf Theatre, the Yale SOM Alumni Advisory Board, the Yale SOM Campaign Committee, and Saint Thomas More Chapel and Center at Yale.

Previously, Victor was a Global Leadership Fellow at the World Economic Forum, where he managed cross-sector partnerships addressing digital transformation, global trade, and sudden-onset humanitarian response. He managed a Global Future Council convening leading public, private, and academic stakeholders in the Middle East and, as Senior Community Manager, oversaw a partner portfolio valued at $14 million annually.

Earlier in his career, Victor held senior roles with AgTech trading firms across Latin America, leading operational optimization, information systems transformation, M&A initiatives, and the execution of large commodity contracts with governments and private-sector counterparts in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. As Corporate Development Manager for a family-owned conglomerate, he led international teams executing multimillion-dollar investments in chemicals, precision agriculture, and transportation.

He was also a three-time founder who built and exited bootstrapped ventures in B2B services, consumer products, and real estate.

Victor holds a Master of Advanced Management from Yale School of Management, an MBA from Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, and degrees in Chemical and Industrial Engineering. He completed an Executive Master’s in Global Leadership through the World Economic Forum and is a trained coach through the Co-Active Training Institute. In Guatemala, his adoptive country, he served as captain of the Men’s National Basketball Team.

With performances that express a breadth of tradition, guitarist Kim Perlak has been recognized as an inspired voice in new American music. Her playing was praised by The Austin-American Statesman as, “thoughtful, enchanting, vivid…a songwriter’s circle without the lyrics,” and by another Austin reviewer as, “moving…the most patriotic thing I’ve experienced in many months.”

Kim’s approach to the guitar includes new music, education, and public service. Her performances of classical works, original pieces, and collaborations with jazz and traditional players have been featured on National Public Radio, at the Peabody Institute Fretfest, and on five recordings. Her projects combining performance, American music history, and educational outreach have been funded through grants from the Center for African American Southern Music and Yale Alumni Ventures.

Kim’s collaborative guitar work with American veterans in the concert project “Ben & I Play for Peace” was honored by the PBS program “From the Top” as part of their Arts Leadership series, and was recognized by the U.S. House of Representatives. Today, the work of “Ben & I” continues in the Veterans Guitar Project, based in Austin, TX. Kim's past positions include: producer at the Fred Plaut Studios at Yale University, Editor-in-Chief of Soundboard: The Journal of the Guitar Foundation of America, and faculty at the National Guitar Workshop and several college, university, and community programs. Kim serves on the boards of the Guitar Foundation of America, the Boston Classical Guitar Society, The D'Addario Education Advisory Board and The Music and Health Institute at Berklee College of Music.

At Berklee College of Music, Kim served as Assistant Chair of Guitar for five years before becoming Chair of Guitar in September 2018. As part of her curriculum development for the department, she authored the book Classical Technique for the Modern Guitarist, which was published by Berklee Press/Hal Leonard in 2016. She is the recipient of the 2016 and 2018 Berklee Chair Recording Grants. Kim is an advisor to the Berklee Career Center, and is the director of Berklee Guitar Sessions.

Kim’s current artistic work includes creative work in two duos. For more than 10 years, she has collaborated in improvisation, composition, and course development in a duo with slide guitarist, Berklee guitar professor David Tronzo. Together, they have produced two recordings of original and spontaneously-composed music, a team-taught curriculum for the department, and a series of concerts and clinics for Berklee, Peabody Fretfest, Birmingham Southern College, and the International Association of Music and Medicine. Kim's recent duo with drummer and Berklee percussion professor Francisco Mela has performed at the Berklee Performance Center, and will release their first recording in Spring 2025.

Kim also hosts Berklee Guitar Department's Coffee Talk. Listen now

Kim holds degrees from The University of Texas at Austin (DMA ’08), Yale University School of Music (MM ’01), and Stetson University (BM ’98), and a certificate of completion from the Harvard University Management Development Program (2014).

Kim concertizes on guitars by Thomas Humphrey and Kirk Sand, and uses D’Addario Strings.

Board of Governors, Planning Committee Member

Matt Pidgeon, clinic director of Activ8 Posture, received a degree
in Athletic Training and Sports Medicine from Springfield College in
Springfield, MA. He gained National certifications in Athletic Training,
and is a Certified Biomechanist and a Postural Alignment Specialist.
With these credentials, he has worked in sports medicine and
rehabilitation clinical settings, at the Division I and III collegiate levels,
and in the traditional clinical physical therapy setting in Massachusetts.
Given these diverse settings, Matt has a great deal of experience
working with people of all ages and activity levels. He’s helped people
as young as 5 years old, a fair number of 80+ year olds, and everybody
in-between. He’s worked with people looking to be able to do daily
activities without pain and limitation, to people looking to participate in
athletics at a high level, and current and former professional athletes and
Olympians. He also has extensive experience treating an array of pains
and conditions including, but not limited to, muscles strains, ligament
and cartilage damage/degeneration, bone on bone osteoarthritis, sciatica
and other nerve conditions, scoliosis, migraines and chronic headaches,
digestive issues, TMJ pains, plantar fasciitis, scoliosis, stenosis, bulging
and herniated discs, numbness in hands and feet, peripheral neuropathy,
Fibromyalgia, Rotator Cuff tears, and many more.While working in his
past settings, Matt was trained to use traditional modalities and
rehabilitation techniques that merely targeted the area of pain his
patients and clients were experiencing, but not the root cause. Once
understanding this, Matt realized this was only a temporary relief to his
patients/clients, rather than fixing the why the pain and injuries
happened in the first place. This is what lead him to the corrective
exercise area of wellness where he’s practiced for the last 13 years.

Frances Pollock is a composer, producer, and cultural strategist whose work challenges the myth of the "starving artist" by building new economic engines for cultural production. Her operas and musicals have been presented by the San Francisco Symphony, Opera Grand Rapids, Greenville Light Opera, Kaufman Center, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Seattle Opera, Chautauqua Opera, Opera Omaha, Aspen Music Festival, PROTOTYPE Festival, and others. She graduated with a Doctor of Musical Arts from the Yale School of Music, where she has created acclaimed stage works and reshaped how the arts engage with power, policy, and capital.

At Yale, Frances founded Midnight Oil Collective, a venture studio supporting artist-owned enterprises and mutual economics in cultural production. In collaboration with MOC, she launched the Cultural Innovation Lab at Yale, a national consortium that adapts the university tech transfer model to the arts. The Lab reclaims this model for culture, building shared infrastructure—with partners at the University of Michigan and CalArts—for developing, protecting, and scaling artistic work. By applying R&D pipelines, capital access, and institutional support to cultural production, Frances is helping position universities like Yale as engines of sustainable, artist-led innovation.

She works closely with Yale Ventures and the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development to establish Connecticut as a national hub for cultural innovation—reframing the arts as a vital sector driving economic growth and public value.

Frances’s scholarship focuses on cooperative funding structures, transmedia storytelling, and the systems artists need not just to survive—but to lead. Her academic work interrogates identity, authorship, and institutional power, particularly how universities frame and circulate cultural meaning. These themes shape the courses she has designed on entrepreneurship, arts institutions, and cultural theory, which prepare students to navigate and transform the creative economy.

With vision, rigor, and a deep belief in collective possibility, Frances Pollock not only composes music—but a strategic blueprint for the future of the arts. She champions authenticity, vulnerability, connection, and intimacy as essential conditions for meaningful creative and systemic transformation.

Matt works for Google, leading a team of engineers who build cutting-edge solutions for large customers, leveraging the latest Generative AI technology. Solutions span areas like agentic orchestration, generative media workflows, scaled data classification and specialized model development.

He previously led the Data & Analytics team at McDonald’s Corporation. He guided the team through rapid growth as McDonald’s launched one of the world's largest loyalty programs, and later led the use of Generative AI at McDonald's.

Earlier in his career, Matt spent 15 years in the Bay Area working on machine learning and data initiatives for NASA and Apple, and consulting for McKinsey & Company for various enterprise software companies.

Matt holds an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth, and a BA from Yale. He lives with his wife and two kids in Chicago.

Anne Toker is a partner in the New York office of the law firm of Quinn Emanuel, where she practices patent litigation, focusing on biotech and pharmaceutical patent litigation.

She is grateful to have the chance to serve as a member of the YAA Board of Governors. Toker previously served for four years on the Yale Graduate School Alumni Association Board (GSAAB), with the particular privilege in 2024 of serving as co-chair of its signature event, “Where Do I Go from Yale?” This event brought together a diverse group of Yale graduate school alumni who participated in a series of panel discussions to inspire and engage current graduate students, sharing stories about their fascinating lives and varied careers. She was thrilled to be part of this event, and to be able to help current students at a place that has done so much for her.

As an undergraduate at Yale, Toker served as a reporter for and news editor of the Yale Daily News, which gave her a chance to be deeply involved in all aspects of the undergraduate community. Love for Yale brought her back some years later as a graduate student in the MB&B Department, where she obtained her PhD. The education she received at Yale has been critical for her subsequent career.


Board of Governors, Planning Committee Member

Belinda is a strategy consultant, advising private equity firms and Fortune 500 companies on growth strategy, M&A diligence, and portfolio value creation. Her career spans more than a decade of strategic and operational work at the intersection of technology, innovation, and healthcare.

Belinda is on the YAA Board of Governors and the Immediate Past Chair of YaleWomen, where she led the organization’s first full rebrand, modernized its digital platform, and created a new strategy for volunteer engagement to drive sustainability. She hopes to strengthen collaboration among Yale’s faculty, students, and alumni to support the University’s shared priorities.

She holds an MPH from Yale University, in conjunction with the Yale School of Management, and a BS in Biochemistry from UC San Diego.

Asher Young is a creative director, producer, and artist. Growing up in New York City, he designed theatrical haunted houses instead of going trick-or-treating, trained with a vaudeville magician, and worked music concerts and festivals.

Young’s current work spans immersive theater, music, fashion, and art and media installations. He has put A$AP Rocky through physical and psychological tests on the sales floor of Sotheby’s; tied up 40 audience members in shibari ropes and served them tuna after an aerial duet; developed a three-dimensional hologram to represent memory and physicalize lost loved ones; brought together 30 artists and researchers to project onto Yale’s rare book and manuscript library; and woven 33,000 milliwatts of light through a garden of trees to represent mycorrhizal networks.

Collaborators include Dior, Sotheby’s, Yale, Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Big Apple Circus, Double Chicken Please, The Valentine Museum, Virgin Voyages, and Korean music collective DPR, in addition to real-estate and cultural development partners around the world.

Most recently, he served as Executive Producer and Creative Director of Masquerade, an immersive version of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s The Phantom of the Opera.

Young studied Computing and the Arts at Yale University, where he received the Susan J. Smith Arts Prize; he has also been recognized with the LIT Award for his piece Living Memory.

Decades after graduating (B.A., Branford ’74), Yale still astonishes Steve. As Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives at the Association of Yale Alumni (YAA), Steve has launched Yale’s Cross Campus online community, facilitated leadership forums, taught financial literacy, organized alumni-led skill-building events, and designed mentorship programs pairing thousands of Yalies every semester. He also serves as Trustee for the Yale College Council.

As Branford College Resident Fellow since 2012, Steve lives among students right here on campus. For relaxation, Steve loves outdoors activities in the Adirondacks. Joining KPMG after graduating from Yale, and then earning his Master's Degree (NYU/Stern) and CPA at night, led Steve to a long career as a US leader of KPMG Corporate Finance; and then to a private investment bank as Managing Director and eventually Chief Operating Officer. And, in 2011, finally back to Yale! Steve has led KPMG client merger/acquisition seminars, served on public and private corporate boards (including a solar firm, a rustic resort, a chain of 17 newspapers, and manufacturers), and has advised clients (and/or testified as an expert) in complex financial matters. Steve is a grateful and lucky Yale parent: Rebecca (Branford ’07) and Max (Branford ’09; MusM ’11). Their roles in Out of the Blue made Steve into a huge fan of Yale singing groups. Steve also loves books, traveling, racket sports, and game-playing. After serving as Yale's Fencing Captain, Steve competed nationally and internationally for another decade, earning five national championships in team saber.

John Caserta is a leading Chartered Financial Consultant with a Masters in Financial Services and a highly-sought after authority on personal finances. In addition to regularly appearing on Good Morning Connecticut on WTNH, John has been featured in articles for numerous publications including The Wall Street Journal, US News & World Report, Business Insider, and more. He has traveled throughout the country educating thousands on how to take control of their personal finances at numerous universities including Yale, UConn, Ohio State, and more.

John's dedication is evident in his growing professional designations. As a Retirement Income Certified Professional (RICP®), he helps clients with Social Security, pension plans, annuities, and tax-efficient withdrawal strategies. His Certified Life Underwriter (CLU®) designation adds expertise in insurance and risk management. He is also an Accredited Investment Fiduciary (AIF®) .

John is an active member of the Yale community, serving on the Board of Governors and as the past President of the Yale Club of New Haven. He was awarded the Yale Alumni Association's Leadership Award. He lives in North Haven, CT, with his wife, Adriana, and their daughter, Karina.

Jeffrey Feldman is a venture capital and operating executive with more than 30 years of experience leading both investment funds and operating companies. He holds an MBA in Finance and Operations from the Yale School of Management and a PhD in Polymer Science from the University of Connecticut. Over the course of his career, he has been a founding member of several venture capital funds, including Digital Media Capital, Pequot Venture Partners, Primary Succession Capital, and Bulldog Innovation Group. He has also guided start-ups and underperforming ventures as CEO, COO, and CFO, raising significant capital, managing pivots and turnarounds, and building companies in healthcare services, technology, real estate, and sustainable sectors such as energy management, food sustainability, and AgTech.

Jeffrey is known for his disciplined financial approach, hands-on leadership, and ability to execute in fast-changing environments. He combines operational rigor with strategic insight, having taken companies from launch to profitability and delivered strong returns for investors. His personal style is rooted in trust, sound judgment, and a strong sense of purpose—qualities that have enabled him to create value, build resilient teams, and consistently improve the probability of successful outcomes.

Henry Kwan ’05 MA is Director for Shared Interest Groups (SIGs) at the Yale Alumni Association. In this role, he engages and works with alumni cohorts and groups across the Yale community, including the Yale Veterans Association; Yale Blue Green, Yale’s environmental alumni group; Yale Alumni Nonprofit Alliance, Yale Alumni Educators, and more. Prior to joining YAA, he was a staff member at the Yale School of the Environment. In a previous life (before Yale), he held different positions in the nonprofit sector, tech industry, financial services, and the military. He is happy to share his experiences and whatever information may be helpful on navigating a haphazard, circuitous, and non-linear career path.

Elliot Zaret '91 MC may be your worst networking opportunity if you’re focused on career over life. Elliot got his master's in journalism from University of California at Berkeley (MJ 96) and covered local politics and crime at various newspapers (including being the first reporter on the scene at the JonBenet Ramsey murder in Boulder, Colorado) until moving to DC to cover Congress for newspapers in California and Colorado. Elliot was hired to cover the Microsoft Antitrust Trial for the San Jose Mercury News. Then covered the business of the then-nascent internet for MSNBC.com. Elliot left journalism full time in 2002 (though he continued to freelance for places such as CNN and Washington Lawyer Magazine) in order to pursue a career in art. Elliot was an award-winning artist who showed in many galleries in the Washington DC area in the early 2000s and taught art at both adult education and community college levels. Somewhere in there, Elliot learned to build 17th-19th century reproduction furniture, which he also does on the side. As his focus turned to being an at-home-Dad for his three children, born in 2005, 2006 and 2009, Elliot focused his “me time” on being a volunteer EMT and later an EMT instructor. Elliot was awarded Fairfax County (VA) Volunteer EMT of the Year in 2012 and Vienna (VA) Volunteer Fire Department Volunteer EMT of the Year in 2018. Elliot, a townie as well as a gownie, moved back to his hometown of neighboring Woodbridge, CT in 2023, where he is still raising his (now) high school and college aged children, two overachieving labradoodles, managing his wife’s career as a traveling OB-Gyn and studying guitar at Berklee College Online.