ACG NY Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Roundtable Series: The Power of Diverse Teams to Drive Success

Adam J. Miller is the Founder and Managing Partner of HYGGE Capital Partners. Adam has over a decade of human capital experience with top-tier financial firms and the proven ability to help domestic and international companies maximize organizational performance.

Adam comes to work every day with a single mission: align people, companies and strategies.

Prior to founding HYGGE, Adam was a Managing Director at The Riverside Company, a leading global investment firm focused on providing private capital options for investors, business owners, and employees at the smaller end of the middle market. Prior to his time at Riverside, Adam spent 6 years at First Reserve, a leading global private equity investment firm exclusively focused on energy.

In these capacities and other historical roles, Adam has partnered with business leaders and managers to attract and retain talent. He has developed HR-related internal infrastructure and processes. And, he has powered international human capital strategies, including living in London for over 3 years.

Adam holds a B.B.A. in Human Capital Management from Western Michigan University and an M.S. in Organizational Leadership. Adam also is a Certified Integral Development Coach from New Ventures, an internationally recognized accredited coach training program based in San Francisco, CA.

Adam lives in Old Greenwich, CT, with his wife Christine and their two French Bulldogs, Rupert and Rosie.

He enjoys travelling and has visited over 60 countries in his ongoing pursuit of hygge.

Charles Corpening is Senior Managing Director of Ariel Alternatives, LLC and Project Black Management Company, LLC. He was formerly a longtime Co-Investor and Senior Advisor to APC Holdings, and has over 30 years of private equity experience. He is formerly the Founder and Chairman of Joshua Partners and is a former Senior Partner in the General Industrial buyouts group at Court Square Capital Partners, with $8 billion in AUM. Charles is the former partner with Citigroup Venture Capital Equity Partners (predecessor to Court Square Capital Partners), with $10 billion in AUM. He has consummated transactions in excess of $3 billion and served on numerous public and private company boards.

Previously, he was a private equity executive with The Rockefeller Group and Roundtree Capital, after beginning his career as an investment banker with PaineWebber in the M&A and Merchant Banking groups. Charles is a former Board member of Mastery Charter Schools in Philadelphia and the current Chairman of the Board of Trustees of First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens. He holds an AB from Princeton University and a MBA from Columbia Business School.

Engin Okaya is the Managing Director of Prudential Private Capital's New York Corporate Finance office.  She oversees the private placement and mezzanine activity in our Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic territories (including Bermuda) and Eastern Canada, which consists of a $7.6 billion portfolio (as of 12.31.20) of senior debt, mezzanine debt and private equity investments. Prior to this, Engin served as Senior Vice President responsible for the New York office-based territories: Eastern Canada and New England. She joined Prudential in 1998 and has worked in several different Prudential Private Capital offices, including our Chicago Corporate Finance office, Mezzanine team, and Corporate and Project Workouts. 

Engin received a BS from Boston College and an MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management. 

Christina is a Partner at Fort Point Capital, a private equity firm focused on investing in promising, business services companies in the lower middle market.  Since joining Fort Point in 2011, she has been responsible for sourcing, evaluating and executing investments, as well as driving value creation initiatives for her portfolio companies in the tech-enabled business services, software and transportation/logistics industries.  Christina currently serves as the Chair of the Board for AMS Fulfillment and Barrington Media Group and was the former Chair of WolfePak Software and Van Pool Transportation;  she also currently serves on the boards of Eventlink and Sullivans. 

Prior to joining Fort Point, Christina was a principal at Swift River Investments in Boston and an associate at FdG Associates.  She started her career at JPMorgan, focusing on mergers and acquisitions in the Consumer/Healthcare industries.  Christina has a B.A. in Economics from Dartmouth College. 

James Ward is a Partner and CEO at Artemis, the Boston-based PE firm focused on buying and building exceptional manufacturers of Industrial Technologies.

As a member of Artemis’s Leadership team, James works closely with Artemis’s operating partners and portfolio executives to develop demand-and-technology driven platform theses, source and execute acquisitions, and support execution of PortCo value-creation plans. In addition, he oversees the day-to-day operations of the firm, and is instrumental in setting, and executing, on the vision for Artemis.

James is currently a Board member at BioDot, StanChem Polymers (parent of the Albi Protective Coatings division), STC, and Ohio Tool Works.

Prior to joining Artemis at its outset, James served as an investment banker at Odeon Capital Group in New York. James holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder and a master’s degree from the Harvard Kennedy School.