Our Leadership Team

Kurt J. Tesh, CFA, has over thirty-five years of experience in the investment industry.  He has served in analyst, investment officer and portfolio manager roles in broker-dealers, registered investment advisors, institutional consulting firms, and bank trust companies.  Mr. Tesh is a Charterholder member of the CFA Institute, has served as an officer and director of two of its constituent chapters, and volunteered as a mentor to teams of college students competing in  in the Southeast Regional qualifying round of the CFA Institute Research Challenge.  He has served in leadership roles in industry organizations, and been recognized as one of the top DDOs in the country by industry publications.  He also participates in FINRA’s dispute resolution program.  Kurt is a graduate of Stetson University where he was recognized as an Outstanding Scholar and guest lecturer in the Roland George Investment Program.

Mayuko Hamazaki is an entrepreneur and seasoned financial professional. She is a partner at Kingsdel Real Estate, a private equity firm focused on developing condominiums in Brooklyn, New York, and providing financing solutions for real estate projects.

Prior to this, she served as the Director of Project Finance at the New York branch of Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), Japan’s leading bank. While at SMBC, she was involved in structuring and executing 34 financing transactions totaling over USD $9 billion for large utility-scale infrastructure projects, including renewables in North and South America. Three of the transactions she worked on received nine 'Deal of the Year' awards from leading industry publishers.

Before joining SMBC, she worked as a marketing officer for Vodafone Japan (now SoftBank Mobile) in Tokyo, where she supported the Chief Marketing Officer in developing the country’s marketing strategy and led various online English promotional campaigns, including the iPhone 3 launch.

Mayuko majored in Development Economics and participated in NGO and Japan Official Development Assistance activities during her undergraduate studies. She also published a research paper on immigrant workers in the university’s academic journal. Passionate about women’s empowerment, she spearheaded the External Relationship Committee of SMBC’s Women’s Inclusion Network and is an alumna of the Pacesetter (leadership) program of the Financial Women’s Association of New York.

Mayuko holds a Master of Business Administration from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, a Bachelor of Arts degree from Hitotsubashi University, Japan, and FINRA Series 79, 65, and 63 licenses.

Trudy Brennan, from rural Jamaica, boasts a robust academic background and a diverse career. She holds both a BSc and MSc in Business Administration and is currently pursuing doctoral studies in Law and Politics. With over two decades of experience, Trudy has made significant contributions to the justice, health, local government, and education government sectors.

As a Justice of the Peace, she is a passionate advocate for equal rights and justice. Her commitment to youth development is highlighted by her role as a global youth mentor. Additionally, Trudy is an accomplished author, having penned books on personal and leadership development as well as spiritual awakening.

Her career spans various fields, including finance and accounting, administration, strategic leadership, and policy. Furthermore, Trudy is a career coach, guiding individuals in their professional journeys with her extensive expertise and insight.

Affiliations: 

- Member, An honoured member of the Worldwide Association of Female Professionals

- Mentor, Global Mentorship Initiative (GMI)

Anita Tuch is a senior executive with 30+ years of experience in medical device and high technology industries focused on operations, engineering, and process improvement.   She successfully develops and executes strategies to scale new growth opportunities both internally, and through M&A, and also creates the infrastructure to drive an efficient, effective, and compliant business processes and a highly engaged workforce.  Anita optimizes financial performance by operationalizing capital allocation, talent management, program management, and overall collaboration.  She has broad business experience, being on the staff of multiple large businesses within both GE and Medtronic.  

Most recently, Anita served as the Corporate Vice President of Enterprise Risk, Facilities, Real Estate and

EHS for Medtronic PLC, the leading company in Medical Device development and manufacturing with $30B in revenue.  With overall responsibility for the $500M+ real estate and facilities services operations in over 150 counties, she drove a $50M portfolio rationalization, and cost efficiencies while constructing new campuses including Lafayette Colorado, Memphis Tennessee, and San Jose Costa Rica.   She also revamped the Enterprise Risk Management program, a key Board requirement, co-led the Crisis Management function including COVID response, and regularly presented strategies and impact to Board and Executive Committee.  As a strong proponent of Environmental Sustainability, Anita spearheaded the first Carbon Neutral Commitment for the organization.

Prior to this role, Anita has also led Supply Chain and Manufacturing organizations over a 12-year span for multiple businesses within Medtronic including Neuromodulation, Cardiac Rhythm, Cardiac Surgery, Spine, and Structural Heart where she consistently drove 5% annual cost down and inventory optimization, developed and implemented manufacturing network strategy closing multiple sites and building a new machining center of excellence in Costa Rosa.  She has also, actively participated in due diligence and integration for M&A in the businesses, and led process development for new products including the new battery technology for the world’s smallest pacemaker.  She also was a member of the Business Unit staff in these roles being a key contributor to business strategy, M&A decisions, P&L execution, and talent development.

With a strong passion for DEI, Anita founded and chaired the Women in Operations Organization within Medtronic increasing female leadership across the organization by 15% over two years, with key strategies to attract, develop, and retain top talent women from inside and outside the organization.  She is also a long-term member of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), has been a steering team member of the Medtronic Women’s Network, a Board member of the Hope 4 Youth non-profit in the Minneapolis area for at-risk youth, and was the Chairperson of the GE Twin Cities Volunteers organization.  

She holds a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering with Honors from the University of Nebraska, is Master Black Belt Certified with GE, and has completed coursework towards an MBA at the University of Minnesota.

George is a finance and accounting executive with more than 20 years of experience in financial accounting and reporting, technical accounting, internal controls, and financial planning & analysis.

George is currently a consultant at 8020 Consulting.  He previously served as the Chief Accounting

Officer for Change Home Mortgage and was previously the Controller for Western Asset Mortgage Capital Corp, a publicly traded REIT. He also served as the Assistant Financial Officer for PIMCO’s private equity funds. Prior to PIMCO he was with Newbridge Consulting Services, where he was Director of Finance and Accounting. Earlier in George’s career he was an assistant controller with the JE Robert Companies, a real estate private equity firm and he was an auditor then a consultant at Ernst and Young LLP. He currently serves on the Board at Foundation for Early Childhood Education.

George is a CPA and has an MBA from the Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland and a B.A. in accounting from The Catholic University of America.

Ms. Smith is currently the Head of Monitoring for Fedora Intertech, LLC, a security integrator based in Pittsburg, PA.  With over 20 years of experience as a security industry operations leader with a proven track record of developing teams that provide an excellent customer experience. Cindy has a demonstrated track record of providing innovative solutions for improving operations, meeting key performance indicators, and ensuring customer satisfaction. Cindy is experienced with monitoring operations, professional services, technical support, and interactive video solutions. Cindy was part of the management team at Checkpoint Systems, Inc. (Nasdaq: CKP) and held leadership positions at Westec Interactive Security and RSI Video Technologies. Currently a founding board member of Give A Hand Charity board.

Minna is a seasoned executive who has led and managed innovation, marketing and digital companies for over 25 years at places like Razorfish, Organic, frog, Zeta Interactive, Born, Viant, and Accenture. At these firms, she has led company strategy, operations, sales, marketing and delivery across global markets. Furthermore, she has been a product leader on the client side, as well, determining go-to-market strategy, building and rolling out new products, building and managing a data capability and overseeing the product, data, technology, marketing and customer services teams.

Minna was most recently Chief Strategy and Commercial Officer at Catalyte, a mission based software workforce development company, where she revamped their strategy and professionalized and transformed their organization to become profitable and oriented for growth. Before joining Catalyte, Minna was President of the Born Group, an eCommerce agency, managing a global business across North America, Europe and Asia. Previous to that role, she was at frog, a product innovation company, as their Chief Revenue Officer. Minna was also the Chief Digital, Product and Marketing Officer at SourceMedia, a B2B Media company, where she managed and grew all aspects of the digital business across over 20+ titles. Prior to that role, she was the CEO of Zeta Interactive, a full-service digital marketing and email services agency.  She has also held a number of other leadership roles including Senior Vice President and General Manager of Organic managing the New York and London businesses, and senior executive positions at Razorfish and Viant, where she led the life sciences practices.

She holds an AB from Harvard University and an MBA from The Wharton School

Santiago is originally from Argentina. Completed his MBA at Thunderbird in 2005. 

He worked at Honeywell, JetBlue and Currently at Edgio at various Finance leadership roles.

Santiago currently lives in New Jersey with his wife Julie and his three children Catalina Santiago Jr and Mateo

Ajit Narang is a seasoned lawyer with Medtronic, the largest medical device company in the world. With two decades of experience, Ajit has been instrumental in supporting businesses through various facets of product development, sales & marketing, strategic partnerships, mergers & acquisitions, healthcare & regulatory compliance, intellectual property, litigation, and risk management. His extensive expertise and strategic acumen have been pivotal in driving Medtronic's mission to innovate and deliver life-changing healthcare solutions globally.

Ajit's commitment to service and helping others has been a lifelong mission. Early in his career, he dedicated his efforts to supporting religious organizations, facilitating alternative rehabilitation programs for youth incarceration, and assisting domestic violence survivors. His passion for inclusion, diversity, and equity (ID&E) is evident through his ongoing mentorship of individuals across various disciplines and his engagement on the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD) as a 2014 Fellow. Ajit’s dedication to fostering a more inclusive and equitable professional environment underscores his belief in the power of diverse perspectives to drive meaningful change.

Ajit obtained his law degree from Santa Clara University, School of Law, and graduated from the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) with a degree in Mechanical Engineering.