Versatility in a Time of Change

A new CIO award recognizes collaboration, innovation and leadership in an evolving industry.


Chief Investment Officer has always focused on the dynamics of institutional asset allocation, and those dynamics are changing. This year, with that in mind, we are presenting a new periodic award—the Versatility Award—to two industry leaders whose careers have changed as a result of the ongoing transformation.

Ernie Caballero

We are presenting the inaugural CIO Versatility Awards to two leaders in the industry. One winner is Ernie Caballero, who, along with his team, joined Goldman Sachs Asset Management in May, when Goldman Sachs was hired to run the pension funds of UPS, where Cabellero had been CIO. The other winner is Jeanmarie Grisi, CIO of pension investments at Nokia, which last month outsourced its pension investing to Mercer.

The awards will be presented on December 10 at CIO’s Industry Innovation Awards Dinner in New York City.

Jeanmarie Grisi

Caballero and Grisi have been described by peers as possessing the characteristics CIO has honored with our awards for the last 14 years. During their tenures, they have demonstrated leadership in innovation, talent development and collaboration, and we think those tasks will be even more important—and challenging—as institutional investing’s evolution continues.

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In 2024, as corporate pension funds worldwide are increasingly being sold to insurance companies or outsourced to discretionary investment managers, the pace of change feels like it is gathering speed. What will not change is the need for people to be thoughtful and engaged with the reinvention of institutional asset allocation, regardless of who is making the decisions.

Our honorees exemplify that approach.

Caballero, who spent 35 years at UPS and this year transitioned his in-house investment team to GSAM, is coming to terms with changes in the industry that he sees as an inflection point for pensions overall. He points to the demise of internal pension fund management in U.S. companies as a signal that defined benefit pensions no longer are a material part of the country’s retirement platform. As a result, he says the future will need to include the best aspects of DB and defined contribution systems. 

Grisi, who plans to retire next year from Nokia after more than 25 years, continues to chair the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation’s Advisory Committee and is contemplating how an industry of colleagues who often have problem-solved together will evolve when OCIO providers might see competitors, rather than collaborators, among those managing the largest pools of pension assets.

These leaders are the kinds of creative, thoughtful people the industry is going to need to continue attracting the best and brightest to the challenging field of institutional asset allocation. We believe both our honorees—through their thoughtfulness and desire to contemplate what comes next for the retirement and allocator industries—exemplify the versatility this award celebrates.

Related Stories:

Olivia Mitchell to Receive CIO’s 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award

Nokia Named Mercer as OCIO for US Retirement Plans

UPS Hires Goldman Sachs Asset Management as OCIO for $43.4 Billion Pension Plans


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STRS Ohio Names Interim Executive Director

Aaron F. Hood has been named to the role amid ongoing turmoil at the pension fund.

The board of the State Teachers’ Retirement System of Ohio named Aaron F. Hood as its new interim executive director. Hood’s appointment is effective today, November 18. Executive search firm Korn Ferry assisted in the search. 

Hood is currently a finance senior fellow in the department of social sciences at the United States Military Academy at West Point. He was previously chief financial officer of Summit Carbon Solutions, following his tenure as a founding partner in Perella Weinberg Partners, where he served separate stints as chief financial officer, chief operating officer and head of asset management.  

“Mr. Hood will provide a seamless transition as the Board searches for STRS Ohio’s next permanent leader,” STRS Board Chair Rudy Fichtenbaum said in a statement. “I can ensure the more than 500,000 members of STRS Ohio that the board and all staff remain dedicated to continuing to provide Ohio’s public educators with a foundation for their financial security.” 

Hood earned a B.S. in theoretical economics and political science from the U.S. Military Academy, served five years and rose to the rank of captain in the Army Corps of Engineers, and earned an MBA at Harvard Business School.  

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STRS Ohio has dealt with high-profile turnover resulting from severe governance issues. In September, CIO Matt Worley and Acting Executive Director Lynn Hoover announced their resignations, although Worley’s does not take effect until March 31, 2025. 

Hoover, whose resignation is effective December 1, is acting in place of Bill Neville, who had been on leave from the fund since November 2023 amidst reports of harassment against STRS staff and was ultimately removed in September. 

The 11-member board of STRS is split, with a “reformer” faction controlling a majority of board seats. The reformers, including Fichtenbaum, want the fund to increase cost-of-living adjustments for beneficiaries and are calling for passive investing through index funds.  

STRS beneficiaries and board reformers have criticized the fund for not providing cost-of-living adjustments—they were suspended between 2017 and 2022, then reinstated, but STRS did not provide back pay for the suspended years, drawing the ire of beneficiaries.  

The ascendancy of the reformer faction led to Ohio Governor Mike DeWine removing Wade Steen, a reformer board member who was later reinstated by the state’s supreme court. Steen had originally been appointed as the board’s investment expert by former Governor John Kasich and was then reappointed by DeWine; Steen’s appointment expired in September. DeWine named Columbus-based attorney Jon Allison, expected to side with the “status quo” faction, to the board in his place. 

The attorney general of Ohio, Dave Yost, opened an investigation into the reformers, accusing them of planning to allocate tens of billions of dollars of the pension’s assets into an investment management firm named QED, which Yost alleged had ties to the reformers, had a shoddy investment record and lacked experienced staff. 

 Related Stories: 

STRS Ohio CIO, Acting Executive Director Resign 

Ohio State Representative Proposes Consolidation of State Pension Systems 

Ohio Attorney General Calls for Removal of Two Teachers’ Pension Board Members 

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