The Fiftyfaces Podcast

Matthew Kentridge, a strategy consultant with over 30 years experience, who is a trustee and advisor and also works as an executive coach. We were both at INSEAD together, and I have followed his career ever since – and am delighted now to bring some of his learnings to our audience.  Our conversation starts with his early consulting career and the experience that growing up in South Africa genera...

Sally Bridgeland, was one of the first 5 guests on this podcast back in 2020, and needs no introduction in London institutional investing circles.  Her original podcast is here :  since then there have been many exciting career updates to mention – including the fact that the chess and drama club that Sally talked about in 2020 have now made their way into their own book – entitled: Chess Club and...

Kirstie Sneyd is an organizational psychologist, executive coach and the author of “Returning Well”, a practical, evidence-based guide for working parents and their managers. We were both at INSEAD together, and I have followed her career ever since – and am delighted now to bring some of her learnings to our audience. Our conversation starts with Kirstie’s roots in consulting, and what drew her t...

James Mitchell was a director at Goldman Sachs, Barclays and Phoenix Group before developing a portfolio career including a strategic advisory role with Re-wired Earth as well as Empathy, a company committed to supporting families through bereavement. He holds a number of other advisory and director roles. Our conversation traces James's career through various roles and some of the realisations th...

We are delighted to bring you Series 3 of the 2026 Fiftyfaces Podcast. This set of 10 compelling conversations takes a slightly different tack to usual with a particular focus on some of the building blocks behind firms - such as strategy (as described by Matthew Kentridge), motivation (Kirstie Sneyd) and planning (Brett Hickey). We look at what happens when institutions such as public pension fun...

This podcast is released as part of a collaboration between Fiftyfaces Productions and the Always a Pensions Angle Podcast produced by DG Publishing.  Nick Dixon is Head of Pensions, Avon Pension Fund, which he has led since 2022.  Avon Pension Fund serves c.140,000 members in the public sector across Bristol, Bath and surrounding areas and is now a partner fund of Local Pensions Partnership.  Pre...

This podcast is the latest in our collaboration with the Always a Pensions Angle podcast produced by DG Publishing.  Peter Wallach is Director of Pensions at Merseyside Pension Fund, a position he took up in April 2007. He started his career in private banking, where he worked in the City for 12 years. In 1997 he joined Close Wealth Management as an investment manager, and in 2004 he joined Mersey...

Richard Law-Deeks is Chief Executive Officer of LGPS Central, which, following its current expansion, will be responsible for over 100 bn GBP in pooled local authority pension fund assets. Prior to joining LGPS Central in 2024 he was CEO of the Royal Mail Pensions Trustees Ltd. and prior to that held a series of financial roles, mostly within the local government sphere.  We start our discussion w...

Ami Galani is Co-founder and Managing Partner of Tipt Ventures, a venture capital firm investing in companies “reimagining sports, starting with her”. She is a board member of Beauty by Imagination BB, a PE backed beauty platform, a strategic advisor to Elysian Park Ventures, a venture capital firm backed by the ownership group of the LA Dodgers and holds a number of other board roles. She spent o...

Richard Tomlinson is Chief Investment Officer at Local Pensions Partnership Investments. He was previously head of portfolio advisory and partner at Albourne, where he spent over 6 years, and prior to that managed was Head of Multi Strategy and Absolute Return at Old Mutual Asset Managers. This podcast builds on the themes recently shared in the Always a Pensions Angle collaboration which featured...

Carolina (Carol) Strobel, is based in Sao Paolo and a founding partner at Antler Brasil. She is also a Founder and Operational Partner at Redpoint eventures and holds a number of Board Roles, including of public companies in Brazil. Our conversation starts with her original career as a lawyer, and how the deal-level detail naturally led her towards venture investing.  We speak then about the ventu...

A special bonus episode brought to you in conjunction with the Always a Pensions Angle Podcast, by D G Publishing. This podcast was recorded in January 2026 at their conference in Windsor. Richard Tomlinson has responsibility for management of all investment and client activity at LPPI. He has more than 20 years of investment experience. Prior to joining LPPI in 2017, Richard was Head of Portfolio...

Michael Davis, is Head of Global Retirement Strategy at T. Rowe Price and former Deputy Assistant Secretary at the U.S. Department of Labor (2009–2012),  and will be retiring in May of 2026. He has had a long career in finance interspersed with spells of public service, including in particular a role as Assistant Secretary in the US Department of Labor, from 2009 to 2012. He has a Masters in Publi...

Ryan Boothroyd is Head of External Management at Border to Coast Pensions Partnership. We start by learning about his path into finance - some of his early interests that were from far outside finance.  from a non-finance background, early career “wobbles,” and formative mentors.  Ryan explains his investment beliefs: skepticism about consistent active outperformance, whey to have a high bar for m...

What are the challenges of growth? What are opportunities? What if you get to create a client advisory function from scratch? Where would you start? In this special bonus episode - one of five that we will be launching every Friday for the next four weeks - is part of a special collaboration with Always a Pensions Angle Podcast by DG publishing. A few months ago at a conference hosted by DB Publis...

Lin Yue, previously led the strategic trustees business at Goldman Sachs Asset Management in London where she was responsible for key relationships in the UK institutional market. She has been recognized in the HERoes 100 Women Future Leaders by Yahoo Finance for three consecutive years and a finalist as Asian Women of Achievement Award.   Our conversation covers her life journey from China throug...

We are delighted to bring you this special conversation with John Harney who is a former guest on the show and a  prominent writer and thinker on pensions as well as career and wellness topics. Our conversation picks up with where we left off - John's former discussion on the podcast in which he described his unconventional career journey as well as a love of baking, nurtured during Covid. We move...

We are thrilled to launch Series 2 of the 2026 Fiftyfaces Podcast with a bumper collection of guests featuring three senior professionals at UK LGPS pools  - Richard Tomlinson (CIO at LPPI), Richard Law-Deeks (CEO at LGPS Central) and Ryan Boothroyd (Head of External Management at Border to Coast). We also feature titan of the industry Michael Davis of T Rowe Price on the cusp of his retirement fr...

Alex Ambroz is CEO of the Allocator Training Institute, which grew out of a career-long observation of the gap in the market for the kind of training that allocators need. Our podcast discussion starts with his own upbringing and he describes how he grew up in foster care and moved around a lot during his childhood in the US North East. The US Army was then a natural place to find his bearings giv...

Jennifer Marques is Head of Strategy and Structuring for Structured Credit and Asset-Backed Finance at Oaktree, based in Los Angeles. She started her career as a corporate lawyer, first in private practice and then within Oaktree.  She discussed her career journey from law to finance, emphasizing the importance of resilience.  She highlights Oaktree's focus on asset-backed finance, which involves...

Adam Blitz is CEO and Co-CIO at Evanston Capital, where he has spent 24 years. He previously worked as a trader at AQR and in the prime brokerage division at Goldman Sachs. Our conversation starts with the serendipitous turn that saw Adam move from the prime brokerage division into the very early days of Evanston capital at the heyday of hedge funds going mainstream. We speak about the risk that t...

Matthew Rice is Chief Investment Officer of Vistamark Investments LLC where he leads the creation and execution of innovative, research-driven investment strategies anchored in disciplined portfolio management .He launched the firm in June of 2025 after a long career at Fiducient Advsors.    Our conversation starts with his career as a college and then professional athlete and the way that this ex...

Welcome to Series 1 of 2026 – we are now approaching the age of 6 – if we were a person we would be entering school, so we have come of age, and we are going deep. Tune in to a series in which we question what it is to stick to one’s investment beliefs, hear about the changing world of OCIOs and take a different take on pension fund thinking. Our guests are: Kirsty Gibson of Baillie Gifford who di...

Alison Taylor is Clinical Professor at the NY Stern School of Business – her Linkedin profile describes her as having “lots of other hats and even more opinions”. She is the author of “Higher Ground – How Business can do the right thing in a Turbulent World”, and has a successful Substack as well as being a member of multiple governance oriented boards such as the FT Moral Money Advisory Board as...

Larissa Herczeg is Founder and Managing Partner of 1 Seed Partners. One Seed Partners backs rising stars across the real estate complex Prior to founding 1 Seed she was Head of Seeding at Blue Owl, and prior to that CIO at Oak Street Capital before which she had series of financial roles. She was a 2025 Honoree for the Influential Women in Institutional Investing Awards.   Our conversation traces...