How do lay trustees vet investment managers? Chicago Teachers' Pension Fund trustee Vicki Kurzydlo on manager pitches, private equity, and labor principles.

Angelo talks with Vicki, a teacher trustee at the $14 billion Chicago Teachers' Pension Fund, about serving as a lay fiduciary rather than an investment professional. She walks through how managers should pitch to trustees, how fees get negotiated, and how managers get terminated. She also explains the fund's decision to back away from Verus after its acquisition by Cerity Partners — a reversal she attributes to incomplete disclosure about Cerity's influence, not just its private equity ownership.

She also discusses the CTU House of Delegates resolution that directly cited CTPF's private equity holdings, the labor principles the board is finalizing in response, and hard lines like no investment tied to child labor and a push for union-neutrality agreements from portfolio companies. She ties this to the fund's existing fossil fuel divestment, raises concerns about AI-driven job displacement, and closes on why she sees educating members about the pension fund as core to the job.

Vicki Kurzydlo is the Recording Secretary of the Chicago Teachers Union and a Teacher Trustee of the Chicago Teachers' Pension Fund. A lifelong Chicagoan and longtime CPS educator, she brings more than 30 years of experience in public education, union leadership, and advocacy for students, educators, and working people. She began as an elementary school librarian at Holden Elementary and spent more than two decades as a special education teacher at Sauganash Elementary. As a trustee, she believes pension investment decisions must recognize that CTPF is a labor fund.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Introduction of CTPF teacher trustee Vicki Kurzydlo and Chicago warm-up

(03:38) Lay trustees as fiduciaries on a 12-member pension board

(05:08) How managers should pitch non-expert trustees and earn trust

(10:35) Fee negotiations, manager terminations, and getting a first look

(15:57) The consultant's role and members' push for less private equity

(20:27) Why CTPF walked away from Verus after the Cerity merger

(21:26) Pro-labor lines: child labor, union neutrality, and moral compass

(25:41) The CTU resolution every prospective manager should know

(28:17) Climate concerns and the fund's long-running fossil fuel divestment

(30:06) AI investments, worker displacement, and the BP Whiting example

(37:33) Demystifying the pension fund and how Vicki became trustee

Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:

Vicki Kurzydlo, CTU officer bio:

Could your portfolio be over-diversified and under-diversified at the very same time?

Liquid alternatives, operational due diligence, and emerging managers: Dr. Ranjan Bhaduri, PhD, of Bodhi Research Group sits down with Angelo Calvello. Join us for a sharp, candid conversation about the evolution of liquid alternatives, the rise of transparency and governance after Madoff and the financial crisis, and why some strategies survived while others quietly disappeared. If you allocate to hedge funds, manage institutional capital, or build absolute-return portfolios, this episode addresses the challenges you face right now.

Ranjan discusses how liquid alts evolved from the pre-GFC era of a handful of dominant managers into a far more scrutinized market. He explains why the financial crisis created lasting demand for liquidity, transparency, managed accounts, and operational due diligence. He also explores which strategies gained ground and which lost relevance, including managed futures, insurance-linked securities, and convertible and merger arbitrage being absorbed into multi-strategy funds.

The conversation also explores how allocators are thinking about emerging managers, portfolio construction, and total portfolio alignment. Ranjan offers practical guidance on manager selection, including how to evaluate culture, research processes, governance, and fraud risk. He emphasizes that a strong track record is never enough if the underlying business is weak, and that operational due diligence should be a central part of the investment process rather than a checkbox.

The episode also turns to AI and the future of manager research and Total Portfolio Approach (TPA). This is essential listening for anyone seeking a clearer view of the evolution of liquid alts, the weaknesses in many portfolios, and how sophisticated allocators are approaching manager research, portfolio construction, and due diligence.

Dr. Ranjan Bhaduri, PhD, is the Founder and CEO of Bodhi Research Group, an independent, conflict-free firm dedicated to research and education in alternative investments. Under his leadership, Bodhi has served clients on five continents. His expertise spans hedge fund research, hedge fund factorization, portfolio management, and investment, operational, and structural due diligence. He previously served on an Investment Committee at Morgan Stanley and worked with two major Canadian investment banks. A CFA and CAIA charterholder, he has served on the AIMA Canada board and co-chaired its Managed Futures Committee.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Opening highlights and introduction of Dr. Ranjan Bhaduri, Bodhi Research Group
(04:11) How liquid alts evolved from early trend followers to today
(06:48) The GFC and Madoff spark demand for transparency and governance
(13:22) Which hedge fund strategies survived, and why managed futures stalled
(16:56) AI black box hypothetical and the hidden costs of swaps
(22:03) Why allocators are over-diversified and under-diversified at once
(30:26) AI, behavioral cues, and trust in operational due diligence
(38:34) Total Portfolio Approach: governance, culture, and Canadian pension leaders
(40:53) Worst pitch stories: locked doors and managers who turned fraudulent

Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award),...

Is "we have an AI strategy" the emptiest sentence in institutional investing right now?

On Against Consensus, host Angelo Calvello and PSPRS CIO Mark Steed return for a candid AI progress check. Steed grades himself at ~25% toward his original efficiency and decision-making goals. The OpenAI/Hugging Face incident and new value-misalignment research have made him warier of managers pushing agentic systems, and interpretability remains a hard blocker for a fiduciary. He leans on Bertrand Russell's inductivist-turkey story to explain why high confidence in AI can still fail when regimes shift, cites a KPMG stat on managers already running agents in production, and offers his best line yet: "bet on the filing clerk instead of the PM.

Mark Steed is Chief Investment Officer of PSPRS, the pension fund protecting the retirement security of Arizona's first responders. He has built and overseen portfolios across private equity, venture capital, real estate, public equity, absolute return, opportunistic credit, and global trading strategies. Institutional Investor and CIO Magazine have named him CIO of the Year, Asset Allocator of the Year, Innovator of the Year, and Rising Star. For four years, Mark served as a forecaster in Dr. Phil Tetlock's Good Judgment Project, shaping how he thinks about risk, decision-making under uncertainty.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Rapid-fire warm-up: data versus gut, speed, and beard maintenance
(04:14) One-year AI progress check: roughly 25% toward original two goals
(08:19) Build versus buy debate and outsourcing the data room problem
(11:24) Ahead or behind peers: cloud enterprise versus workflow-first strategy
(16:25) Agentic systems already in use, from inbox rules to briefings
(18:01) OpenAI/Hugging Face incident and the risk of agentic misalignment
(23:43) KPMG stat and tougher due diligence on managers using agents
(27:26) Fiduciary pushback, interpretability, and Bertrand Russell's inductivist turkey
(32:01) Future AI stack, advice for new CIOs, and closing thoughts

Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:
Produced by Castos Productions
Mark Steed's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-steed/
First episode with Mark (EP 2, prior Institutional Edge branding): https://youtu.be/ah8lN1TehTI?si=OePPtmoy5mjggVnD
KPMG AI Pulse Survey (cited stat — confirm Q1 vs Q2, see flag above):

The average diverse manager closes 8% of the calls they make — and Bob Greene says that's not a talent problem, it's a capital-access problem.

In this episode of Against Consensus, host Angelo Calvello sits down with Bob Greene, President & CEO of NAIC (the National Association of Investment Companies), for a data-backed case that diversity is a performance driver, not a trade-off. Bob and Angelo unpack research showing diverse-owned alternative managers have outperformed by 300 to 600 basis points over the last 25 years, and explore why capital still hasn't caught up: consultant gatekeeping, brand bias, and the politicization of DEI. They close with Bob's advice for emerging managers navigating their first fundraise.

Robert Greene is President & CEO of the National Association of Investment Companies (NAIC), the premier trade association for diverse-owned alternative investment managers spanning private equity, venture capital, hedge funds, and real estate. Bob previously served as Chairman of the Board of Trustees for the Virginia Retirement System, one of the nation's largest public pension plans. Earlier in his career, he was Director of Private Equity at Arthur Andersen's Transaction Advisory Services Practice, advising firms including Allied Capital, Texas Pacific Group, and The Carlyle Group.

In This Episode:
(00:00) The data: diverse managers outperform by 300-600 basis points
(12:12) Real friction points: market size, muscle memory, and brand bias
(19:07) Investment consultants as gatekeepers and the mandate problem
(26:48) DEI backlash, the Fearless Fund lawsuit, and manager labels
(32:09) Graduation stories: Vista, Clearlake, and the common thread of success
(35:17) The next five years and advice for emerging managers
(39:14) NextGen mentorship, A.G. Gaston's philosophy, and closing thoughts
Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:
Produced by Castos Productions
NAIC website: https://naicpe.com
Bob Greene's NAIC bio: https://naicpe.com/naic-leaders/robert-l-greene/
Bob Greene LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertgreene/
N...

What's the one thing every emerging manager gets wrong about hiring a placement agent?

In this episode of Against Consensus, Angelo sits down with Luke Hinshelwood, Managing Director at Middlemark Partners, to unpack what emerging managers should actually expect from a placement agent. Luke lays out the case for partnering with a placement agent — faster access to the right investors, sharper positioning, and an outside perspective that helps managers see themselves the way LPs do — while walking through the "quarterback" role his team plays in managing the process end-to-end: diligence, roadshows, LP mapping, and fee negotiation.

Luke Hinshelwood is the Managing Director of Middlemark Partners, where he focuses on capital raising for both emerging and more established fund managers in the alternatives space. In his role, he sources, diligences, and engages institutional investors on behalf of Middlemark's manager partners. Luke also works closely with Middlemark's Head of Advisory & Pensions on the firm's consulting engagements for the LP community. Before working in the alternative investment industry, Luke worked briefly in commercial banking in Washington, D.C. He earned a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Economics from Centre College.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Luke Hinshelwood on placement agent myths and AI-written pitchbooks
(02:30) Rapid-fire warmup questions
(04:39) Why emerging managers should partner with a placement agent
(07:49) What support to expect: diligence, positioning, and building roadshows
(13:08) Inside the room: a placement agent's role in LP meetings and follow-up
(19:21) Diligencing the manager, quarterbacking the process, and negotiating fees
(24:40) What not to expect, sourcing managers, and common manager mistakes
(36:14) Multi-strat platforms and the hot money risk for emerging managers
(41:55) Luke's worst pitch story: AI-generated pitchbooks and closing thoughts
Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:
Produced by Castos Productions
Middlemark Partners website: https://middlemarkpartners.com
Middlemark Partners team page: https://middlemarkpartners.com/team/
Middlemark Partners LinkedIn (company): ...

Would you let an AI agent cast a real vote on your investment committee?

Chris Schelling, CAIA, joins Angelo Calvello to revisit their 2018 article on AI in manager selection — and reveal that one large private equity firm now has an autonomous AI agent with an actual vote on its investment committee. The conversation pivots to defense tech as part of a broader "American dynamism" venture thesis, then turns to a cautionary tale: the recent blowup of Situational Awareness, driven by concentration and leverage. They close on the democratization of private markets and whether alternatives belong in a 401(k).

Chris Schelling, CAIA, is an author, advisor, and investor with degrees in psychology, business, and finance. As an institutional investor, he has allocated roughly $7 billion and met with over 4,000 managers across hedge funds, real assets, private credit, and private equity. He was most recently Managing Director on the Pan-Alts team at Aksia, and previously Managing Director of Private Markets at The Caprock Group, Chief Investment Strategist at Venturi Wealth Management, Director of Private Equity at Texas Municipal Retirement System, and Deputy CIO at Kentucky Retirement Systems. He is the author of Better Than Alpha.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Introduction of guest Chris Schelling
(03:18) Revisiting the 2018 article on AI in institutional manager selection
(09:12) Barriers to AI adoption and accountability in the decision loop
(13:02) Defense tech as one piece of a broader American dynamism thesis
(19:46) Ukraine, dual-use technology, talent pipelines, and procurement reform
(27:28) Situational Awareness blowup: concentration, leverage, and retail enthusiasm
(35:13) Democratization of private markets and the rise of SPV jockeys
(38:59) Bringing private markets into the 401(k) and safe harbor risk
Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:
Produced by Castos Productions
Chris Schelling LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-schelling/
Chris's newsletter, Alternatively Speaking: https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/alternatively-speaking-7021478570250166272/

Why TPA works for some asset owners and not others.

Could tokenization finally solve the liquidity problem private markets can't shake?

In Part 2 of a two-part conversation, host Angelo Calvello presses John Bowman, CEO of the CAIA Association, on the Total Portfolio Approach: why CAIA is committing real resources to it, who resists it, and what that resistance reveals about governance and incentive structures at asset owners. Bowman argues U.S. public pension funds face the steepest climb of all, thanks to politically appointed boards, while endowments and sovereign wealth funds move faster. The conversation closes on tokenization, a theme CAIA has tracked since 2019, and where Bowman sees it finally solving real liquidity problems for illiquid assets.

John Bowman was appointed CEO of the CAIA Association in January 2025. He has devoted over 25 years to the asset management industry, advocating for market integrity, long-termism, investor outcomes, diversity, human dignity, and educational standards. John previously served as Managing Director for the Americas at CFA Institute and, before that, as a portfolio manager for non-US equity strategies at Boston Company and SSgA. A prolific speaker and writer, he has appeared in the Wall Street Journal. John earned a BS from Mary Washington College and is a CFA Charterholder.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Angelo recaps part one and previews today's topics
(02:33) Why CAIA is putting real resources behind TPA
(07:02) Breaking down silos without forcing everyone to generalize
(10:21) Public funds face TPA's steepest climb, endowments lead
(12:30) Tokenization's origin story and its role in solving illiquidity]
(16:11) Where tokenization goes next, and why adoption has stalled
Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:
CAIA Association: https://caia.org
John Bowman's CAIA contact page: https://caia.org/contact/john-l-bowman-cfa-0
John Bowman on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnlbowmancfa/
Vision 2035: https://caia.org/vision-2035/

"The more people that take part in the service or the product, the more valuable the product becomes over time." — John Bowman

In Part I of this interview, host Angelo Calvello sits down with John Bowman, CEO of the CAIA Association, to unpack Vision 2035, CAIA's strategic plan built from a listening tour of 120 executives worldwide. Bowman argues investing's siloed career paths are relics of a calmer era, making the case for historians and machine learning experts to sit with investment teams from day one.

John Bowman was appointed CEO of the CAIA Association in January 2025. He has devoted over 25 years to the asset management industry, advocating for market integrity, long-termism, investor outcomes, diversity, human dignity, and educational standards. John previously served as Managing Director for the Americas at CFA Institute and, before that, as a portfolio manager for non-US equity strategies at Boston Company and SSgA. A prolific speaker and writer, he has appeared in the Wall Street Journal. John earned a BS from Mary Washington College and is a CFA Charterholder.

In This Episode:
(00:00) Rapid-fire warm-up questions and CFA versus CAIA
(06:47) The global listening tour behind CAIA's Vision 2035
(12:12) Lessons learned eighteen months into the four pillars
(14:49) Systems-level thinking replaces investing's siloed career paths
(20:24) CAIA's new systems thinking paper and AI's role
(29:04) Rebuilding the CAIA curriculum for an AI-augmented analyst
(30:48) Building a multidisciplinary investment team and fair compensation
(37:38) Closing thoughts and a preview of part two
Like, subscribe, and share this episode with someone who might be interested, and please take time to leave us a review!

Dr. Angelo Calvello is a serial innovator and co-founder of multiple investment firms, including Rosetta Analytics and Blue Diamond Asset Management. He leverages his extensive professional network and reputation for authentic thought leadership to curate conversations with genuinely innovative allocators and thinkers.

As the "Dissident" columnist for Institutional Investor and former "Doctor Is In" columnist for Chief Investment Officer (winner of the 2016 Jesse H. Neal Award), Calvello has become a leading voice challenging conventional investment wisdom.

Beyond his professional pursuits, Calvello serves as Chairman of the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System's Climate Advisory Panel, Chairman of the Board of Outreach with Lacrosse and Schools (OWLS Lacrosse), a nonprofit organization creating opportunities for at-risk youths in Chicago, and trustee for a Chicago-area police pension fund. His career-long focus on leveraging innovation to deliver superior client outcomes makes him the ideal host for cutting-edge institutional investing conversations.

Resources:
CAIA Association: https://caia.org
John Bowman's CAIA contact page: https://caia.org/contact/john-l-bowman-cfa-0
John Bowman on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnlbowmancfa/
Vision 2035: https://caia.org/vision-2035/
The World Rewired Report: