Mina Pacheco Nazemi, head of diversified alternative equity team, Barings

Mina Pacheco Nazemi knew she excelled in math. She had a glimpse of the world of business from her dad, an immigrant from Tehran, Iran, who ran his own small company, and from her mom, an immigrant from Mexico City, who was a physician with her own practice.

But Ms. Pacheco Nazemi, who was born and raised in Los Angeles, said she really didn’t know much about the financial sector until she had an opportunity to land a summer internship at Prudential through Sponsors for Educational Opportunity, which provides professional development to Black, Latino and Native American students.

“I didn’t even know what asset management was in the way that I kind of practice it today, in terms of finance and institutional asset management,” said Ms. Pacheco Nazemi, who is based in Charlotte, N.C.

She added that she “fell in love with the concept of being a fiduciary just with my mom, having been a doctor, I saw her being an advocate and being a fiduciary for her patients. … It was like me taking care of my clients and making sure that they had the financial security but doing it obviously on a larger scale.”

In addition to her stint at Prudential, Ms. Pacheco Nazemi worked at GE Asset Management and as a partner at Credit Suisse and GCM Grosvenor; from 2016 to 2017, she was a founder and managing partner at Aldea Capital Partners until it joined Barings’ alternative investments platform in 2018.

Since joining Barings, she has built out a $5.7 billion Barings Diversified Alternative Equity platform, which is backed by an investment committee made up of 67% women and people of color and an investment team consisting of 55% women and people of color.