Board of Directors

Len Janeski is the Chairman of the Board for the Center on Business and Poverty. He was a Senior Project Manager with the Illinois Manufacturing Extension Center and has served as a team member with the Department of the Navy (Office of Naval Research)/University of Maryland Best Manufacturing Practices program. He has also served as the Director of the Business and Industrial Development Center at Kishwaukee College as well as a Business Specialist for the Small Business Development Center.

John Hoffmire is the Chairman of Cadence Innova, a change management consulting firm based in London. He sold an investment bank that he started to American Capital where he acted as Senior Investment Officer. After he finished his Ph.D. at Stanford University, he was a consultant at Bain & Company. John’s major academic affiliation is as Research Associate at the Centre for Mutual and Co-owned Business, Kellogg College, University of Oxford. John holds the Carmen Porco Chair for Sustainable Business.

Tom Harms started working with the Center on Business and Poverty in 2006 prior to retiring from Staples, Inc. where he was the VP of Human Resource Administration. Before joining Staples in 1998, Tom worked for CVS Pharmacy as a VP in Human Resources. Before that Tom spent his career in department stores as a Human Resource Manager/Director working for Marshall Fields in Chicago and Target Corporation (Dayton’s and Hudson’s divisions).

…Creative leader …Implementer of ideas …Loves collaboration & teamwork .…Does her research

Tara Sabre Collier is an early stage impact investor, strategist, advisor and speaker. She is currently a Visiting Fellow at Said Business School, Oxford University (focusing on impact investment), strategic advisor to impact funds and development finance institutions and an angel investor in start-ups led by under-represented founders in USA, UK and Brazil.

Frank Cumberbatch is Vice President, Engagement, Bader Philanthropies, Inc. He has been a lobbyist, a Senior Assistant to the Mayor of Milwaukee, a candidate for Mayor, and part of management teams for several high tech companies. He has been a member of: the Wisconsin Regional Advisory Board, the Advisory Board of Wall Street Without Walls, the Board of Penfield Children’s Center, and the Wisconsin Institute for Public Policy and Service. He is currently Board Chair of BizStarts, an organization that helps minorities start businesses.

Imruwa Demissie is Partner in charge of International Development and COO at Aequalitas Capital Partners. Aequalitas Capital Partners, is a impact investing and ESG advisory firm with a bold vision to create sustainable growth with accountable capital, and actions that make a more impactful, inclusive economy.

Isi completed her law degree at the University of the West of England, Bristol, and her postgraduate degree at the Oxford Institute of Legal Practice. She has worked in various in-house commercial roles, most recently within the Procurement section of the European Space Agency. She has also been involved in establishing and promoting technology enhanced learning and commercial processes at a family-owned school in Nigeria.

Carmen Porco is executive director of Housing Ministries of American Baptists in Wisconsin, a partner of American Baptist Home Mission Societies’ (ABHMS) Community Outreach Ministries. An endowed chair has been named in honor of the Rev. Dr. Carmen Porco at the Center on Business and Poverty.

Geetha Tharmaratnam, the CEO and Founding Partner of Aequalitas Capital Partners, is an investment executive with 19+ years of experience in private equity, venture capital, development finance, impact investing and insurance in Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe. She has had a focus on Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), gender lens-investing, healthcare and financial services.