YouSaid · the spoken record

Paula Volent

lines on the record: 45
first: 2021-10-25
most recent: 2021-10-25
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Would be To slow down a little bit. I am really passionate. I'm really fast. I think fast and all that. And sometimes you just need to slow down and smell the roses. And I think that's what I should have learned, taking a little more time and breaks. I love my daughter and we have had a lot of great times. Our best thing was going on a hiking trip in Iceland when she graduated from college. I'm like, why did I do this before? Why am I doing this? You know, when she's 18. Why haven't we done this before? So spending time with family and also taking a pause sometimes.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, my parents were, I don't want to say simple, but I think authenticity is what I drew in from them. They were who they were. They were very comfortable with who they were. And that's something that I learned to treasure authenticity. And I look for people and managers who have that characteristic, the authenticity that they're not trying to be someone that they're not.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The biggest mistake is not reading legal documents, but the other one is sort of thinking I can give a manager where I have a really bad feeling and something is happening or a person left one more chance and re-upped to their next fun, thinking I'll squeeze out the best thing and that's never a good idea.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“David and Stan obviously have had huge impact. Also, Barry Mills, who is my president for a long time, was amazingly supportive. Women need to be seen in leadership positions and all that. And, you know, Barry believed in me and he gave me a leadership position. He sort of made me senior vice president. I went up there. So he was very influential. It sounds like it's all men, but in my professional career, it sort of has been men because that's been the environment.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It is hubris undeserved. Know, like somebody who has a chip on their shoulder and they shouldn't have a chip on their shoulder. I just can't stand that. And then for my biggest investment pet peeve, I would say it is lack of transparency.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“One of the things that is really important to me is be outside in nature as much as I can so every morning I usually have a cup of coffee outside. I mean, now that I'm spending more time in New York, I'll have to figure that out. But I think that having some thing of nature, like whether it's a walk first thing in the morning or something like that is important.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I love Maine. It's like my home. And so I have a garden there, which is really beautiful. I run. I wish I could run more, but I was just looking in New York or running. So I love that. And then also in my house in Maine, I have a conservation studio where I actually restore damaged things that I find in flea markets. And not for anyone else, but just for myself.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I always remember when I went to Yale School of Management, I didn't know what a basis point was, but in conservation, I had gone up the learning curve and I was at the top of my field, and all of a sudden I'm at the bottom and I'm like crawling my way up. It's a whole different community and everything. So I think I was in a really comfortable rut in Bowdoin because I had been there for so long and it was automatic. And so this is exciting for me. But also I want to listen and learn and not change things that don't need to be changed.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I want people to say they don't understand something or to ask questions. Also, one of the things I learned about Stan and the Amazing Committee at Boden, you knew that you had to do your homework. You couldn't walk in there and BS pretty much. And if you didn't know what the answer was, you had to say, I want to get back to you.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Have a great team at Rockefeller, and I just met with all of them. I'm thinking of like, okay, you focus most of the time on absolute return. Okay, you're going to focus on private equity for a little while. I think shaking it up because I think people get in silos. When I first came to Boden, they had asset class committees, so they had a hedge fund committee, core equity, private equity. And it was interesting because there were overlaps, but there were also like on the long short fund, say they're a short Tesla, whereas in the long fund, they're long Tesla. So you're paying all this money for things that aren't canceling each other out. So for the team, I love people that are curious, good writers. I think writing is important because we need to convey our information to a board and an investment committee. I think a lot of times you have investment committee members that are really busy and they can't read a giant thing. So getting a succinct executive overview for something. And I also think”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“As a CIO, I'm a little bit different than people that delegate a lot and have teams and just say, you do it. I love to be involved in the research. I love to work with the team and Cinela and the reference calls and all that. I love to know positions in the portfolio. So I'll read the financial statements. So that's one thing and that's just because I am like a nerd or something and I read all the financial statements. My sensibility that came from the art history and the liberal arts has me look at things differently. I also think the relationships I develop with managers are really important. I feel like I want a manager where I can call them up and they will answer my question when I want it. I also love managers who give us money back when there's no opportunities and then they call when they're pounding the table. And not a lot of managers do that, you know, because it's all about asset gathering.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Oh, I think it's a good opportunity. I think that global macro has a position in the portfolio. You never hear about CTAs anymore, but I think there are patterns and like an interest rates and FX, especially as the world becomes less global, you know, we're sort of becoming more insular. I think there are macro themes that could be really interesting. Also, like commodities are interesting. So you have these supply and demand issues. And also then you have the electric vehicles, which copper and all that. And so if you have nimble managers that are working around that, I think it's a great addition to the portfolio.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“More transparent when their financial statements about what their carbon footprints are. So that's something I'm interested in.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Think Europe is interesting and overlooked. And so European equities, I think, are interesting. Everyone's doing fintech, but I think really qualified people in fintech. Biotech is interesting, but again, you have to find the right managers with the domain expertise. I'm doing a lot of work on crypto and trying to understand it. And is it a new asset class or how do we think about that? And then also ESG, even though I think that as endowments, we'll like roll our eyes. It's funny Jillian Tet used to say ESD was eye roll, sigh, and groan. That's what it meant. But now I think it's important. And so I think with the carbon initiatives, for instance, in our macro funds, one of our managers is making good money by trading carbon credits. So that's really interesting area. But I do think as time goes on, endowments are going to have to be”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I'm trying to learn of the portfolio construction. I think it's different from what I was at Boden. The market has changed. Also, you see venture capital. I've never seen funds come back to market so fast in my whole career. And so you're always doing these re-ups, where before you had a lot of time to do the due diligence and think about it. So I think I'll bring some of my babies over, but I think it's going to be a lot of new funds as well.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Oh, my babies. I know. I know. It's hard because I felt like I know them all so well. One of the things David taught me and Charlie Ellis taught me this too is could rebalancing. So when a couple of managers, they were having their totally worse time and everybody's redeeming and I put money in. And actually, if I look back, those were really good things. But I had built great networks with managers and I have to say the honesty and integrity of the Bowdoin managers in the portfolio is amazing. Yeah, that's my babies. I'm going to leave them behind. But I'm sure they're going to do well.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Amy falls did a fantastic job here. I mean, she was amazing. She's put together an amazing team. As I said, the institution is very different. I was trying to think today about who our benchmarks would be because we only have 35 students, no tuition, not a lot of gifts, a completely different risk profile. So it's not really like a university portfolio. The portfolio is high quality. I think there's things that could be better. I can use my networks to get access to things that Rockefeller didn't have before. The first six months I'm in a listening mode, I want to meet with the board. I'm meeting with the investment committee, which is amazing. Scott Bessant is the chair, and he's amazing. And then Bill Ford is the chair of the trustees. So lots of amazing knowledge on investments in this place. And Rick Lifton, who's the president, is amazing. I read the book.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, so Bowden and I had contracts that were multi-year. I left the portfolio in amazing shape. I gave them six-month notice and I was thinking about what I wanted to do. I wanted to do something a little different. I'm on a couple of corporate boards and then I've been volunteering a lot for things like girls who invest. I am a mentor for a young woman in Bangladesh for University of Asian women. So I have a lot of outside interests. And I wanted to sort of shake it up. You can get complacent. I think one of the wonderful Bodhams who I love is John Studinsky. And he said, you need occasionally to be repotted. And it was time for me to be repotted.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Drawdoves like in March after the COVID was starting to happen, the March drawdown, you want to make sure your manager is sitting back up on their chair and looking at their screen rather than under their desk. And so I'm always monitoring risk, but also taking risk. And I think I take educated risks and investing.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think partially my background in the liberal arts and art history. And I know it sounds really weird, but in my studio doing a priceless work of art, say I have a Rauschenberg transfer drawing, I'm going to repair a tear on it, or I'm going to take a stain out of it. I do so much work beforehand because this is a one-of-a-kind piece of work. I have to do testing under the microscope, this and that, and this. And then I come up with a plan. And I also come up with a plan if something happens, how I'm going to save myself. And I think in investing, you do lots of due diligence up front. And then you also have a plan. And I feel like I can take that over, you know, right brain, left brain. I feel like what I learned in conservation is absolutely critical in how I think about investments. And the other thing I think is knowing risk management, but also being able to take risk. I always remember like in big”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Reference calls on a couple of things, and we're also reaching out to the underlying companies. We're probably going to travel less because Zoom is working. But I do think there's a real value to kicking the tires on the ground. We invested with Nikolai Tangin. He was like in the Special forces of Norway, and he had this glass table because he would look at how people's reactions were, like the FBI. And he'd always go in there and he'd be nervous about what your reactions were going to tell them about you. But I do think it's important to see body language when you're meeting with a new team, especially.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's like we had a cup of coffee, I think, during the whole day. So then his assistant had actually scheduled us to go to the theater at like eight o'clock. So we literally got out of meeting at 7.30. We go to the theater and his assistant goes, oh my God, you haven't eaten yet. So I've made a reservation for you in the green room at the intermission. So we go to the green room at intermission and it was me and David and Mick Jagger and his daughter and another woman drinking gin out of a flask. But that's like one of the stories where you're just going meeting, meaning, meaning, and you don't even eat, but it's amazing. But I think also a lot of times going to conferences and using that as your base and going out from the conferences, like with Sequoia when they had the Beijing meeting, I did a lot of meetings. And then with our team doing due diligence, meeting with companies sometimes. And like right now we're doing due diligence. We're doing a lot of.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I have done it by finding a theme. Like, I think disruption across industries is really interesting. There's the theme of fintech. There's this theme of crypto. But I think A, meeting as many managers as you can on your home turf, whether it's going to the Breakers Conference and doing a million meetings or doing the other thing is collaboration and sharing, once you get trust with some of your peers, they're sharing. I think usually I would go to China twice a year. London probably four times a year. Latin America probably two or three times a year. Silicon Valley a lot. Now that travel has stopped, we'll see how that goes. But when you did that, you crammed as much as you can into a trip as possible. I always remember one time I was with David McFarland and we went to London. And so I landed in the airport in London. And then we go meeting, meeting, meeting, meeting, meeting.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Think endowments, especially the size of Bowdoin, and I still think like 3 billion, 2 billion, 3 billion is still a competitive size, you can do small investments that make a difference. So I really like the venture capital firms that are raising $250, $350 million. Scale doesn't work in many asset classes. And so the ability to invest small amounts of money, but it will make a big impact on the bottom line is important. Of course, you have disadvantages in that entrepreneurial in a smaller endowment. You have a smaller staff. You have to sort of be nimble and think across asset classes and all that. I think it's very exciting. I once talked to Jane Mandelo and she said running a small endowment is like being an entrepreneur because you're doing many things. You also are interacting with the finance department. There is spending. There's all these.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“One thing that I told my team here and that I tell students, and that we did at Yale on the Yale class, you meet with a lot of managers. And then all of a sudden you realize that all the managers are saying the same thing. They're investing in the same thing. And then sometimes you'll have a manager who has to have as young an analyst by him answering the questions that you're answering. I don't want to invest in that. But then you'll hear someone that's really different that has an amazing view on something and dares to be different. So I think a lot of it is pattern recognition and seeing good talent. Seeing talent is hard to do, but you get better at it.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So when you were at Bowdoin and you had Stan as the chairman of the investment committee, you have this particular expertise in macro investing, which is something that a lot of endowments don't participate in. I'm curious what you learned about how to discover which macro managers you want to allocate your capital to.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yeah, I think sourcing is one. I know a lot of firms have started these seed or scout funds where they're investing really early just to sort of throw the spaghetti at the wall and see who's going to come. You saw Y combinator was a source for that. I also think rational underwriting is important. Humility. Lately I've been thinking a lot about risk management because I've been thinking about China and some of the managers that were so overweight in some of the education companies and things like that. You can't really do that in venture capital because it's a long-term commitment. But I would say sourcing of networks are probably the most important and also the domain expertise of the team.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Is it about financial engineering? It's about real skill. And also, it's about identifying areas of disruption and diving deep into them. I think Silicon Valley changed a little bit with Andreessen Horowitz when they came on the block and they developed really into very successful investors. And I think that changed it. But I do think brands like Sequoia, where they have a great culture. And Mike Moorez and Douglione have done a fantastic job really instilling a culture at Sequoia that is amazing. And I think it continues to excel.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So, one of the things I did at Bowdoin and the hedge fund was start an emerging managers fund where we didn't take economics, but we would usually get capacity rights maybe a lower fee, like all that. So I think for Venture, I'm doing that now. I'm putting a little bit in. I want to learn about the managers, what their sourcing is. I think right now in venture capital, the sourcing is really interesting. What's your network? I do think right now the pace is really fast. I was really surprised when the pandemic happened, I thought everything would slow down. No, it sped up dramatically because no longer do they have to fly around. And right now, I think the pace is sort of ridiculous how fast these term sheets are going around. And a lot of things that I've learned is pattern recognition. I think venture capitalism is with real operating experience can be really interesting.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“All the industry has changed dramatically. The length of time till you get all your money back is much longer. They hold publics longer. There's a whole secondary market where people, and there's all these new solo VCs, and it's changed a lot. I used to go up and down Silicon Valley. I know when I got to Sequoia, they're like, please don't call us again. You know, we're going to give you this little piece and thank you, go away. It turned out to be a great relationship. But I think now, and actually for Rockefeller, I'm doing this as well. There's a whole new generation of venture capitalists. They talk to each other differently. They have different skills. Like, for instance, in crypto, a lot of the really talented crypto investors grew up gaming. And then there's people that have come out of things like Stripe or they have come out of companies where they have a differentiated skill set than the VCs of old.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Put managers. I sometimes told my interns it was like baking a cake. So you had the SP 500 as the flour. And then you put stuff around and you might add some really amazing spice, which could be a really volatile hedge fund. But as long as you have a diversified portfolio and you think about how it's structured, I think that you'll have an advantage in outperforming.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“All the impossible ones, and I started going to Silicon Valley and making appointments. And Boden, people said Bodoim, they thought we were in the North Pole because we have a polar bear as a mascot. No one had ever built the brand of Boden as an investor. And I think that's really crucial to build the brand, to tell the story of the institution. You know, we were need-blind raising money for financial aid, doing all this amazing work. And no one had ever met anyone from Boden. And so I spent a lot of time building networks. And I think that is one of the things that really helped Bowden. And as you know, it's this closed system where you have to get into the top tier managers. And so what I really focused on was building relationships with managers. And then with Bowdoin, we did a core satellite portfolio. So we did a core sort of sleep at night in each asset class. And then around that.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But then the second year I started doing research, and I was just telling someone this we had no venture capital at Bowden when I got there. Zero. And actually, when I got there the first day, I opened this desk drawer and there was a note and it said, would Bowden like an allocation to Greylock and Kleiner Perkins? And someone wrote no, a college has no business in that asset class. So we had nothing. And actually I started July 17, 2000 was my first day at Bowden. If you remember the dot-com bubble was just starting to collapse. So I walked into like the worst time to start an endowment. But in some ways, we weren't hurt that much by the dot-com bubble. Cambridge Associates posts a thing of fundraising of all that private funds that are out fundraising. And on one side, they have a thing that says whether you can get into it. It will say very likely, likely, impossible. So of course I took.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There were certain areas we had no expertise. We didn't do timber. I don't know if you remember it. If you went on that timber trip that we did at Yale with Randy and we all wore Dartmouth t-shirts because we didn't know what Yale to know we were doing timber stuff. But like at Boden and Maine, we didn't have any expertise there. It was sort of a asset class where the state was struggling from the demise of the timber industry. So we didn't do timber. No passive investing, all active and believing in active management. And if you look back on the attribution of our performance over the years, it's all manager selection. And I think asset allocation is important. But as like even today, asset allocation gets blurry. You have privates and public funds and publics and private funds. And I think one of the things that I did was I hired nimble managers who could who were really smart. The first year I didn't make many changes.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Impact was figure out where your competitive edges are. So, for instance, at Bowden, since we had Stan Druckenmiller and a really great alumni in the global macro world, we added that. And when I first got there, David would look over my shoulder and say, no one can anticipate interest rates. You should get rid of these investments in global macro. However, those have been a signature part of Bowden's portfolio. Another thing is no question is too silly. David loved teaching, as you know. I remember once I asked him what basis risk was and everybody looked at me and he thought that was great. He told me. And so I hate it when you're in an investment meeting and someone's using this esoteric acronym and no one raises their hand and asks what does that mean, you know, because they're afraid to look silly. But that was something that I learned. And also I learned sort of a passion and a”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I think that the Yale model, quote unquote, is not a recipe that can be transferred. It's different for every organization, so it's more the key tenants of thinking about long-term investing rather than a recipe. You can't bring it. So when I went to Bowden, the first thing I did, I took a year to get to know the risk profile of the college, which was very different than Yale. So understanding sort of your clients, who is your board of trustees as well as your president is a really integral part of it. But from David, I think you learn in some ways that managers, they were very talented managers that you could access. Also, in some of the cases and some asset classes, for instance, venture capital, unless you had access to the very best managers, it wasn't worth doing at all. And one of the things that I learned at Bowden through David's”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I wasn't even invited to the investment committee meetings because I was sort of doing the work behind the curtain. Amazingly, Stanley Druckenmiller was the chair of the committee at that time. He had just left Soros and was doing Duquesne. And he has been such an instrumental person in my life. He's like such a wonderful person. But he kept asking, where's Paula? And so I got pulled into the committee and was given more responsibility.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He's going to do prop masting. And David said, Oh, could you stay a couple more weeks? Because I want to write this book. So he asked me to stay. The book ended up taking like 18 months and I ended up staying at Yale, which was a fabulous experience. We were involved in issuing debt. We were traveling around to emerging markets and working in all different things. Yale was sort of a pioneer in going into alternative asset classes. So I was there and then I got approached by Ellen Schumann, who worked with us. And she mentioned that Bowden didn't have anyone watching the endowment. And they were thinking about it. So I interviewed with the different people and I took a job at Bowden. I took a pay cut from Yale and I came in as a associate treasurer and I reported to the treasurer.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I took a six month break from Yale to be with my daughter. So I knocked on the door of the old investment office and I met with David and I said, I want to work with you. I want to learn about endowments. And he looked at my resume and he's like, there is nothing on here that is pertinent. But okay, you can file. And if you remember, there were all these files in the basement. It was like a mess. So I work part-time filing. And then little by little, David asked me to get involved in projects. And as you know, at Yale at that time, people were coming through all the time, managers. It was really interesting. And it was great. And so then when school came back, I went back to Yale, to SOM, but I worked part-time at the investment office, as you remember, all my way through school. And so then I was graduating and I got a job at Disney. And my husband and I were going to move back to California.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Which is conservation of works of art on paper, prints, and drawings. Moved to Washington, D.C., worked there for about a year and a half. The endowment didn't do very well, I think at that time. But anyway, so my project wasn't going to go anywhere. And Tom Krenz, who was at the Guggenheim at that time, had graduated from Yale School of Management, talked to me and said, you should go. You could be a museum director. This is going to be open your head to a million things. So I went to Yale. I had to take baby math. I did not know what a basis point was. And then my husband and I had been trying to get pregnant. We gave up because it wasn't happening and I went to Yale. And of course, I was pregnant. And so I went to Yale for my first semester and my beautiful daughter, Vanessa, I was born the February after I started at Yale. That was fabulous. But then I was like, well, I want to know about endowments because I'm going to be a museum director and what better time to learn about it than when I have this break.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I had a job offer from Brown University and Bowdoin College to work as a curatorial assistant in their college museums. And I went to Boden because that's where my family was. I was a curatorial assistant working on really interesting things. But I became more and more interested in art conservation. And so I got a master's degree in art history. And then I got a certificate, which is like a master's degree in chemistry as it applies to art and artifacts. And it was really interesting. I was living in New York. I lived in a loft in Soho. And this is in the days when Dean and DeLuca had just started. And at night you would see rats running through the streets with baguettes in their teeth. It was really fun. You know, I lived in New York at a really great time. I studied paper conservation.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Professor that would dress up as a painting every class, and he told me to, we had to assignment where we had to go to the fog art museum over in Cambridge and write a paper on a work of art. And I, by mistake, got up in the conservation lab and I was looking in on this woman, Jerry Cohn, who's a famous paper conservator, who was just about to dip a old master drawing into a bath of water. And I was looking in and she said, don't just stand there. Come on in if you're interested and close the door. And so she like, I didn't even know people did that. There are so many serendipitous moments that you have that you have to take advantage. You know, had I not stood on that threshold, who knows, I would be a speech therapist or something. So I left Emerson. I waitressed for the summer, and then I went to University of New Hampshire Estate School, and I got in-state tuition and financial aid. I studied art history and chemistry. When I graduated...”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Father's parents came over from Lithuania. His last name was Volan Gavigis, and he cut it to Volent. He had serious dyslexia, so he only went to the third grade in school. And then he and his brother started autobody shop, and they were like 15 and 16. My father was very creative, and he was sort of an inventor. He invented a lot of things. My mom's family came from Ireland, Irish, and settled in Portland, Maine, which is a real connection for me and part of my family. And so I was the first generation college student. My parents didn't really know that much about college. I applied for one school. I went to Emerson College to start. My dad wanted me to go to Katie Gibbs to learn how to type, but I didn't want to do that. So I always are rebel during those days. I went to Emerson College and I took this art history class with this crazy.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's great to see you too. I think the first time I met you, you were just out of undergrad at Yale and you were the hero of the Yale office.”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“My guest on today's show is Paula Valent, the recently named Chief Investment Officer for Rockefeller University's $2.5 billion endowment. Paula previously oversaw Bowdoin College's endowment for 20 years as it grew from $450 million to $2 billion during her tenure and generated returns at the very top of the industry. Bowden's investment committee chair Stan Druckenmiller describes Paula as an innovative outside-the-box thinker and aggressive risk taker and a workaholic whose passion is unlike anyone he has ever seen. Paula is also one of my oldest friends in the business from our time crossing paths at Yale in the mid-90s. Our conversation covers Paula's unique career path from art conservation to endowment management and the transferable lessons she learned along the way. In the process, we discussed”
2021-10-25 · Capital Allocators · Paula Volent – Star Endowment Manager's Next Act at Rockefeller University (Capital Allocators, EP.219) · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source