Master Class: Lessons in Leadership

MODERATOR

Melis­sa Radic, CFA, CAIA is the Man­ag­ing Direc­tor of Investor Rela­tions and Cap­i­tal Mar­kets at IMPACT Com­mu­ni­ty Cap­i­tal. Melis­sa joined IMPACT Com­mu­ni­ty Cap­i­tal in 2020 and is respon­si­ble for rela­tion­ship man­age­ment and the deliv­ery of invest­ment solu­tions to IMPACT’s insti­tu­tion­al clients. Pri­or to join­ing IMPACT, Melis­sa was the head of BlackRock’s insur­ance busi­ness for the West Coast, where she was respon­si­ble for devel­op­ing and main­tain­ing rela­tion­ships with insur­ance com­pa­ny clients. Before this role, Melis­sa was a Vice Pres­i­dent in BlackRock’s Retire­ment Group, where she sup­port­ed BlackRock’s vari­able annu­ity sub­ac­count man­dates for BlackRock’s life insur­ance clients.

Melis­sa received her under­grad­u­ate degree in Oper­a­tions Research and Finan­cial Engi­neer­ing from Prince­ton Uni­ver­si­ty and Exec­u­tive MBA from The Whar­ton School at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Penn­syl­va­nia. She also serves as Imme­di­ate Past Pres­i­dent of the Board for the Finan­cial Women of San Fran­cis­co, a non­prof­it ded­i­cat­ed to the advance­ment of women in finance in the Bay Area. Melis­sa cur­rent­ly lives in Berke­ley, CA and enjoys explor­ing North­ern Cal­i­for­nia with her hus­band and two sons.

PANELISTS

Alice Cho has over 25 years of experience in financial services, public policy, and corporate and nonprofit boards. Currently, she is a Senior Advisor at Boston Consulting Group and serves on the board of directors at Globe Life, Inc. (NYSE: GL), where she is a member of its Audit Committee. In addition, she serves on the board of directors at First Interstate BancSystem (Nasdaq: FIBK), as a member of its Audit, Risk, and Technology Committees. She is a designated audit committee financial expert and a risk expert.
Previously, Alice served as Company Advisor to Varo, the nation’s first digital fintech bank with over 3 million accounts and a mission to improve the financial health of consumers. At Varo, Alice was instrumental in designing compliance and risk management programs suitable for the digital banking model and in helping the company become the first fintech to obtain a federal banking license, which was key to raising $240 million in Series D funding.

Prior, Alice was a Managing Director at Promontory Financial Group and the head of its West Coast Practice. In that capacity, she was responsible for advising boards and top executives of global financial institutions and fintechs on issues relating to risk management, compliance, corporate governance, and regulatory strategy. Previously, Alice was director at BITS, the technology arm of the Bank Policy Institute where she worked with the CIOs and CTOs of financial services companies on early industry initiatives to facilitate internet banking and e-payments.

Alice also served as Special Assistant to Vice Chair Alice M. Rivlin at the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, D.C. In that role, Alice provided analysis and recommendations on board issues relating to financial markets, banking regulations, and payments. Earlier, she served in the White House Office of Management and Budget where she was responsible for coordinating banking policy initiatives in consultation with senior Treasury and White House officials.

Alice earned a B.A. in Economics from Whitman College and an A.M in Public Policy from the University of Chicago. She has published articles at the Brookings Institution and in American Banker and Western Independent Bankers. Reflecting her longtime interest in mentoring students and young professionals, she currently serves on the Harris Council at the University of Chicago and the Council of Korean-Americans. She is a member of Extraordinary Women on Boards and a co-founder of ALLRISE SF, a Bay Area organization dedicated to women’s leadership in financial services and technology.

Alana Knowles is vice president and controller for Chevron Corporation, a position she assumed in 2023. In this role, Knowles is responsible for corporatewide accounting, financial reporting and analysis, internal controls, accounting policy, and digital finance. She previously served as vice president, finance, Downstream & Chemicals, and Midstream.

Knowles has held positions of increasing responsibility within the finance function. Prior positions include manager, Money Markets Group, Corporate Treasury; finance manager, Richmond Refinery; manager, Investor Relations; vice president, finance, Chevron Gas & Midstream; comptroller, Global Downstream & Chemicals; and assistant treasurer Operating Company Financing. She joined Chevron in 1988 supporting North America Upstream in an accounting and finance capacity.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in business administration from California State University, Sacramento.

Sonja Velez is CFO of The San Francisco Foundation, where she oversees financial planning and analysis, accounting, and investments. One of the most rewarding aspects of this role has been the opportunity to expand impact investing strategies in support of the Foundation’s mission.

Sonja previously worked in Myanmar and Thailand while serving as CFO of DVB Multimedia / The Democratic Voice of Burma. Before that, she held a variety of finance roles during her 13 year tenure at Charles Schwab, including VP of Treasury Balance Sheet Management, VP of Individual Investor Finance, and VP of Corporate Planning and Analysis.

She currently serves on the boards of Aeris Insight and Financial Women of San Francisco.

She holds an MBA from UC Berkeley, an MFA from the University of San Francisco, and a bachelor's degree in International Relations from UC Davis.