Advisory Board Chair
Chris Cardona
has worked in philanthropy and the nonprofit sector for eight years, serving as staff, board member and consultant to national and local membership networks. For three years, Chris led Hispanics in Philanthropy’s operations in the Northeast region, opening a New York office, hiring staff, raising funds, and managing a $1.6 million annual grantmaking portfolio. He has consulted with grantmaker affinity groups on a research publication, an online grantmaker survey, and a strategic planning document. Chris worked for three years in Hispanics in Philanthropy’s Northern California headquarters before starting graduate school. A PhD candidate at UC Berkeley, Chris will earn his doctorate in political science in December 2007, having focused on comparative politics, Latin America, and research methods. His dissertation is about the institutional design of security forces and its impact on regime stability in Latin America, with a focus on Colombia. The recipient of fellowships from the National Science Foundation, Fulbright/IIE, and the Ford-Mellon Minority Research Scholars Program, Chris has presented his research at national and international conferences, and participated in a four-country survey research project on interest regimes and participation in Latin America. Chris lives with his wife, Catherine Sumner, a fundraiser, in Battery Park City, and keeps the neighbors awake with his unfortunate guitar playing.

Jenny Everett is currently pursuing her MBA at NYU’s Stern School of Business, where she is specializing in Social Innovation and Impact. Prior to starting her MBA, Jenny was the Senior Program Manager, Membership and Individual Donors at Hispanics in Philanthropy (HIP), a non-profit organization that works to increase resources in Latino communities and to increase diversity in the field of philanthropy. Previously, she was an Account Director at DoubleClick and an International Marketing Associate at the Concha y Toro Winery in Santiago, Chile. Jenny is also the Cofounder of the GIG (Gals Investing in Girls) Fund which raises money for organizations supporting young women and girls in the San Francisco Bay Area. She holds a BA in Latin American Studies from Davidson College.

Lauren Russell Geskos is a Manager on the Strategic Initiatives Team at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, where she oversees the events, publications, website and strategic projects of the organization. A graduate of Stanford, she has eight years of experience in marketing and business development in technology, nonprofit and private wealth management. She is an active volunteer with environmental and poverty-related organizations, has founded a philanthropic venture in California, and organized and chaired a successful 2006 Carnegie Hall benefit concert for Doctors Without Borders.

Deepti Mathew has over 10 years of management experience across customer management and strategy in global blue chip organizations. She has held front-line leadership roles in sales, trade marketing and channel management with consumer products global market leaders like Johnson and Johnson and Unilever. Consistently recognized as a top performer, Deepti has developed deep consulting skills while at Capgemini and Accenture, as well as project management experience in marketing, sales and service strategy and transformation and complex change management. Deepti received her MBA Xavier Institute of Management and a MSc from the London School of Economics (LSE).

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