Former Alaska Permanent Fund CEO shares her insights on long-term value, infrastructure, and future strategy.
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Show Notes:
In this Mission Matters episode, Adam Torres interviews Angela Rodell, Principal at Rodell Consulting. Angela shares insights from her time leading the Alaska Permanent Fund and her current mission to support large-scale infrastructure and energy projects through strategic capital consulting.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to mission matters.com and click on Be Our Guest to Apply. All right, so today my guest is Angela Rodell and she’s a principal over at Rodell Consulting.
And just so you know, this particular interview is part of our. Milken Global Conference coverage series where we interview attendees, participant speakers, and, you know, sponsors of the Milken Global Conference in Beverly Hills, California. Which we cover every year for the last three or four years.
So first thing, first, Angela, welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me, Adam. It’s a pleasure to be here. All right, so we got a lot to talk about here. So of course we’re gonna get into Del Consulting. Also talk about stewarding sovereign wealth and, you know, lessons learned and long-term thinking from the Alaska permanent funds.
We got a bunch of things to cover here. But just get us kicked off the Milken conference. I know we did meet in person. But how was your experience? Was this your first time going or have you been before? Like, like, talk to me. No. No. In fact, I think this was either my 11th or 12th year going, oh, you’re a veteran.
I love it. I love talking. That’s what I say. I know because every year you do it, you have a different experience. Right. It’s fantastic. Jokingly security year one versus security this year was amazing. What do you think? Oh, I know, I know. And I’m always amazed at the, quantity and quality of the conversations that mm-hmm.
They are able to put together. The more times you attend, the easier it gets to navigate. Mm-hmm. In terms of trying to make sure that you get to the content you wanna participate in. Have the meetings you wanna with the people that you need to meet with. And it’s just, yeah, it’s, such an innovative forward looking event that I look forward to it every year.
Now, do I’m always curious on the way people decide what they’re gonna go actually partake in and what they’re gonna ’cause it’s, you know, it’s only so many days and like literally there’s always a good keynote or panel or something going on. It’s like other guests that have been on the show have called it like Brain Candy or the Disneyland of conferences, like all kinds of things.
It’s kind of fun to hear people’s perception. How do you curate what you go to when you’re thinking? Do you like to explore, go because. Like see some things you wouldn’t normally see. Do you keep it in your, like, niche? Like what’s your game plan? Yeah. Well, um. you know, when I first started going, I was the CEO of the Alaska Permanent Fund.
Mm-hmm. And so I felt very compelled to make sure that everything I did, all the meetings I took were really centered around the work I did in that role. Mm-hmm. And now that I work for myself as a consultant, I’m able to broaden out what I wanna participate in, what I want to hear from the speakers I wanna hear from.
And getting to areas that are maybe a little bit more outside of Capital Finance directly. Mm-hmm. And thinking more strategically about where certain industries are going, like energy, like AI and things like that. Hmm. So I actually get to have more now. Sorry. No, no, no. You’re good. I love it. It’s great to hear.
It’s like now you’re, of course, I’m sure you love the work that you did prior, but it’s just a matter of now you get to explore a little bit more, it sounds like That’s fun. And take some other meetings that you maybe wouldn’t have been able to always have the, you know, the moment to do so. So that, that’s awesome.
11 years in let’s switch up the conversation a little bit here. I do wanna get into Rodell Consulting, so may maybe talk a little bit about what you’re working on present day. Yeah. So I work Del Consulting still based here in Juno, Alaska, which is where the Alaska Permanent Fund is also headquartered.
So I stayed in Juneau after I left, and what I’m working on is I’m working with on some big infrastructure projects. Alaska has a tremendous amount of. Infrastructure need and the way we think about the capital stack and how to, put that capital stack together strategically and make the most of leveraging those relationships lowering the cost of funds.
But we have probably 1.4 billion. With three major infrastructure projects going on here in Juno alone. So there’s a lot of economic activity and being able to stay in finance and think strategically about debt, about equity, the appropriate role of both mm-hmm. In these projects has been something I’ve been really interested in and been working on now.
I mean, obviously, so yeah, that strategic consulting. So a lot going on. Obviously we know in, politics today, like as if there isn’t always right. But I’m interested to hear about like on your end of being, you know, obviously on the, on the leading the fund at one point and now consulting, like how, how does one lead a public institution if they’re under political or even public pressure.
Like how do you even manage that? I’m just trying to put, wrap my head around it. Like as a podcaster, I got things coming at me from different angles, but I’m not leading, you know, a sovereign fund, sovereign wealth. Yeah, I know. And I think this is something that we’re talking more and more about because President Trump issued in February and executive order to start the plan for creation of a US sovereign fund.
Mm-hmm. So, you know, just in terms of thinking about governance and the role of politics plays in some of this, I think the need for transparency. About thinking about purpose, about mission of these sovereign funds is really important. A lot of times, you know, when we think about wealth management, we think about growing that wealth, but the purpose may be very different depending on who the customer is.
In the case of sovereign wealth, when you’re benefiting a broader population, potentially all Americans if that us fund comes to fruition, really. Thinking through how it creates the most benefit. The most long-term return, not just in monetary terms, but in real programmatic returns, whatever that program is supposed to look like.
Mm-hmm. And having that transparency of purpose that’s gonna carry it across different administrations. Here in Alaska, the Alaska permanent Fund has weathered, now it’s over 45 years old. It’s weathered many different types of administrations. And having that transparency of purpose, I think is what led to its success.
Hmm. That’s interesting. And I guess taking it a step further balancing fiduciary responsibility with public expectation. Like, like what, what does that look like? Oh, I mean, Adam, I’m sure you can imagine, if you watch the market at all. You know, you’ll see big swings, s and p 500 index goes way up.
It goes down and you’re always getting feedback when you’re in these public funds that you should be investing in X or in Y or doing more to, to benefit, you know, benefit Alaskans in this case, or be in the oil and gas industry, or, you know, just fill in the blank. What I think what you have to do with that fiduciary responsibility is it gets back to that articulation of purpose of the need to provide long-term value and stability across multiple market dynamics, across multiple political governance dynamics that might be going on.
And you know, we get caught in short-termism a lot, right? We want immediate returns, instant gratification. Maybe we want social impacts. With these funds. And so having the ability to engage with those expectations honestly, and then staying rooted in, in your core obligation, which is managing those assets prudently and independently mm-hmm.
Does serve the public interest over decades, not election cycles. And that’s what I think is so important to be thinking about. What, what are you following right now? Like what, what excites you and like what kind of trends? And this by way, this could be in finance, it could be related to funds, it could be related to technology, whatever.
I’m just curious from your vantage point, because coming from, you know, running something like Alaska permanent fund, a lot of things come across your decks to having conversations and kind of, I shouldn’t say kind of, but basically being at the forefront of what’s interesting right now today regarding funds, which is if the, you know, sovereign fund comes to be like, what, what trends are you following or what are you following?
So I I’m doing a lot of work in the energy space. I chair a nonprofit here in the state called Launch Alaska, which is an accelerator for energy innovations tech startup. Mm-hmm. And when you see what’s happening in the, in that space especially with renewables or alternative sources of energy and how we can deploy.
In a meaningful way across a geography that’s as diverse as Alaska, and then you start to tack on the needs of things like AI to that and the data center needs and how you power the data center needs. I think there’s just so much I. Opportunity for both investment and for innovation in this, in this arena.
Hmm. And it’s something that does excite me because in a place like Alaska that has a lot of remote villages areas is not on the grid in the lower 48 as we say. Looking at what the opportunity provides for a state like ours with a small population. Is tremendous. And I do get really excited about the equity that gets generated when we lean into solving the, the, you know, broadband tech desert that exists out there.
And it exists in the United States. It exists up here. It exists down in the lower 48. In a lot of places and being able to solve that in a meaningful, low cost, low energy way yeah. I think is huge for the future. And so I get excited about that. Amazing. Speaking of the future Angela, first off, this has been great having you on the show and learning more about your work and your perspective from, from, either from running the fund and what you’re following.
, But what’s next? I mean, what’s next for you? What’s next for Adell Consulting? Well, isn’t that the magic question all the time? That is, you know, I, you know, I look at what’s happening and there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of. Fear and concern right now about all the different things that are happening, but out of crisis comes tremendous opportunity and for me, I, I think that there’s gonna be a lot of innovation and that there’s gonna be a lot of need for skills for, for people to come together, figure out how to collaborate effectively together.
To hold, to get their institutions back to accountability and transparency and good governance. Hmm. And so I am excited to be a part of that and how we, how we move forward. Not just here in Alaska, , but just more generally, because I think that’s gonna be so needed moving forward.
Alright, well first off, Angela, this has been great. I can’t let anybody off of my show that’s from Alaska or in Alaska without bringing up the Alaska Raceway Park. And the reason why is because I, I have to, one of our authors, one of the things we do is we publish books. So Michelle Lackey, she’s I always bring her up whenever somebody’s from Alaska.
’cause she’s a multiple generation racetrack owner there. Women owned racetrack, just FYI And it’s over in, oh. Where’s it at? I can’t remember the exact, I it’s not it’s a couple hours outside of the main city, so that’s why. But Alaska Raceway. Yeah, it’s outside of Anchorage. I wanna say it’s you up Mat Sioux Valley.
Yeah, I have to always give her a shout out ’cause it’s fun and then it’s amazing her, like the view of that racetrack, for anybody listening that’s in Alaska or whoever’s ever wanted to go to Alaska, I’ve only seen it on Instagram, but I promise you I’m gonna make it out there for one of these race seasons.
Yeah, you definitely have to come up. Yeah, I’ve never been, it’s just one of my dreams to go to Alaska. ’cause I just haven’t, I haven’t been booked yet. I’m like some, there’s gotta be a conference. There’s somebody out there that wants me. I just haven’t found them yet. So, we’ll, we’ll see. But I’ll find an excuse to go.
We’ll work on that. We’ll definitely work on that. So Angela last thing as I derail your interview talking about Alaska Raceway Park. Last thing, can I if somebody wants to follow up and if they wanna connect and they wanna learn more about Rodale Consulting, how, how do they do that? How do they connect with you and your team?
Best way to get ahold of me is through LinkedIn. Just send me a message and we will, we will connect up. I don’t have a website, so that’s the easiest way to find me. Perfect, but I appreciate the shout out Adam. Absolutely. And for everybody listening, just so you know, we’ll definitely link Angela’s LinkedIn to, to the show notes that you can just click on it and head right on over and hit the connect button.
And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time with Mission Matters and you haven’t done it yet, hit that subscribe or follow button. This is a daily show. Each and every day we’re bringing you new content, new ideas, and hopefully new inspiration to help you along the way on your journey as well.
So again, hit that subscribe or follow button. And Angela, thanks again for coming on the show. Thank you.
