Charles Van Vleet is the CIO of Textron, where he manages $10 billion in defined benefit assets and $5 billion of defined contribution assets. Charles joined Textron a decade ago after eight years at the pension fund of United Technologies and is widely respected as one of the most thoughtful and outspoken CIOs in the space. Our conversation covers Charles’ background and turns to the objectives of corporate pension funds, Textron’s strategic asset allocation, and Charles’ creative implementation of value-added opportunities across asset classes. Along the way, he shares a host of opinions about what works and doesn’t for institutional investors. Access Stream by AlphaSense Free Trial   For full show notes, visit the episode webpage here.   Learn More​ Follow Ted on Twitter at @tseides or LinkedIn​ Subscribe to the mailing list​ Access Transcript with Premium Membership ​

Frank Brosens is a co-founder of Taconic Capital, an $8 billion event-driven, multi-strategy hedge fund founded in 1999. Frank started his career at Goldman Sachs, where he joined and later ran Bob Rubin’s legendary risk arbitrage desk. That group became one of the top breeding grounds for hedge fund founders, including among its ranks Tom Steyer at Farallon, Richard Perry at Perry Partners, Danny Och at Och-Ziff Capital, Eddie Lampert at ESL, Eric Mindich at Eton Park, and Dinakar Singh at TPG-Axon. Our conversation covers Frank’s path to the Goldman risk arb desk, the culture that made it a success, and his eventual decision to leave the firm. We then discuss the founding of Taconic, its partnership and investment philosophy, and its approach to risk management, capital allocation, and the pursuit of opportunities. Along the way, Frank highlights examples that demonstrate the benefits of a carefully aligned culture for teammates and clients across organizational structure, portfolio management, and compensation. Access Stream by AlphaSense Free Trial   For full show notes, visit the episode webpage here.  Learn More Follow Ted on Twitter at @tseides or LinkedIn Subscribe to the mailing list Access Transcript with Premium Membership