Frans Tjallingii 

Board Co-Chair and Founder

Frans Tjallingii is the Co-Founder of Foundations for Social Change and Board Chair. He has extensive entrepreneurial, organizational leadership, and development and strategy experience in the technology, infrastructure, oil & gas, and marine industries. He is the CEO of 7 Generation Capital, a group that helps accelerate the adoption of medium and heavy-duty electric vehicles. In addition, he actively supports a number of clean technology companies and clean tech incubators as Advisor, Mentor and/or Investor. His career has primarily been in the maritime field serving the oil & gas and port industries globally. Frans is a Director and Board Chair of the Prince Rupert Port Authority and a Director at MeatMe.ca.

Frans has a master’s degree in Marine Biology from the University of Groningen (Groningen, the Netherlands) and a Master of Business Administration from the Rotterdam School of Management (Rotterdam, the Netherlands).

Praveen K. varshney

Board Member

Praveen has been a principal of Varshney Capital Corp., a Vancouver based merchant banking, venture capital and corporate advisory services firm since 1991.  He's also a Founding Director of Pyfera Growth Capital & a Founding Director of Humanitas Smart Planet Fund, both with a social impact focus.  Mr. Varshney obtained a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of British Columbia in 1987 and is a FCPA, FCA.

He has been a Director or Officer of many publicly traded companies over the years including one of Canada's largest fintech co., Mogo (Co-Founder).  He is also a Co-Founder of NEXE Innovations and of Little Kitchen Academy, and former CFO of Carmanah Technologies which became Canada's largest solar company and of The Plastic Bank.  He was also Co-Founder of a predecessor of Mountain Province Diamonds ("MPV") who's Gahcho Kue in September 2016 became the world's largest new diamond mine since 2003 & De Beer's (MPV's partner) second-largest producer behind its Jwaneng mine in Botswana.

Praveen is a member of Toniic, TiE Vancouver (Founding Director) & Silicon Valley Blockchain Society - Vancouver Chapter (Founding Director).  He's also on a number of non-profit boards such as The Varshney Family Charitable Foundation, Dalai Lama Center for Peace + Education & a Founding Member of Instruments Beyond Borders.  He's also an SVP Vancouver Partner, a Director of Foundations for Change, and on the Advisory Boards of Room to Read Vancouver and The Thomas Edison Innovation Foundation in New Jersey.  He also Co-Founded with his daughter, Jaiya, Down to the Last Straw, a global movement to reduce plastic waste with a major focus on single-use plastic straws.

Praveen is also a past recipient of Business in Vancouver's 40 Under 40 Awards and the 2020 Greater Vancouver Board of Trade Wendy McDonald Diversity Awards Outstanding Mentor recipient.

Jacqueline Koerner

Board Member

Jacqueline Koerner consistently brings evidence backed innovative thinking and best practices to support public benefit, in charitable organizations and in social enterprises. She is a Fellow in the Morris J. Wosk Centre for Dialogue, Simon Fraser University. She is a founder, and director of Ecotrust Canada; co-Vice-Chair, CIFAR (Toronto) and a director of 3 private foundations. Her work experience includes public and private foundation grant-making; microfinance in low income countries and in Canada; and doctoral research (UBC PhD, Geography) examining the charitable programs/social enterprises of BRAC (Bangladesh), the world’s top ranked NGO. She is driven by a belief that understanding is the start, collaboration is key, and that people in the places they call home matter.

She served as a Director and Vice-Chair of Ecotrust (Portland, OR), 1994-2005, and as an inaugural Advisory Committee member of UBC’s Museum of Anthropology, 2007-2014. She is a wife, mother, daughter, sister, aunt, cousin, friend and colleague who can nearly always be found drinking coffee, in her vegetable garden, hiking, or reading.

Jeremy Reinbolt

Board Member

Jeremy is an advisor to business families across Canada with expertise in Integrated Planning, Estate Planning, Insurance Planning, Risk Management, Asset Allocation, and Portfolio Management. Actively engaged in the Vancouver business community. He holds the Chartered Life Underwriter and Chartered Investment Manager designations. He is the founder and President of Videre Financers. Jeremy is also a member and past speaker at CALU, the Conference for Advanced Life Underwriting.

He lives in Vancouver with his spouse Gabriela, daughter Scotia and their dog and cat - Batman and Maven. He is passionate about making an impact to help people live their very best life. 

Natalie Michael

Board Member

Natalie Michael has over two decades of experience coaching CEOs through various stages of their careers. She has a deep understanding of the unique challenges faced in the C-Suite. As the chair of CEO forums with members leading organizations ranging from $10 million to $6 billion, she has cultivated a vast network and facilitated valuable peer-to-peer learning experiences.

Her expertise extends to chairing the Vancouver Group for Tiger 21, a peer group for ultra-high-net-worth individuals focused on wealth stewardship and family legacy planning. Through her consulting practice, she works with select clients committed to developing their leaders and CEO succession strategy, resulting in career advancement for CEO candidates, increased business value, and successful exits with industry-leading multiples.

Her passion for social change and business as a force for good is reflected in her board membership with Foundations for Social Change and her founding of the first social purpose-oriented CEO forum with Mackay CEO Forums. She has a Master's in Organizational Development, a BA in Psychology, and she is a certified executive and team coach, as well as a Master Certified Forum Chair. She is also the co-author of Your CEO Succession Playbook: How to Pass the Torch so Everyone Wins.

Mike harris

Board Member

Mike is a business advisor and board leader with a focus on financial leadership, governance and risk management, and ESG in particular.  In his 38-year career with PwC, he had the opportunity to work with some of their most significant clients across a variety of industries.  In addition to leading the ESG  practice nationally and the Risk practice in BC, Mike was on the Board of PwC and was Board Chair for 4 years towards the end of his career with the firm.  He was also responsible for the development and operation of PwC Canada's Net Zero program 

Mike continues to work with PwC as an advisor and focuses his remaining efforts on making an impact in the community through board and not-for-profit work.  He's on the Board of CPA Canada's Auditing and Assurance Standards Board and Chair of the Sustainability Assurance Committee - setting the future ESG auditing standards in Canada.  He's a founding board member of the Capture Photography Festival and Finance Committee Chair of JWest Corp, responsible for the major 200,000 square foot real estate development in Vancouver for the future redeveloped Jewish Community Centre;  and a second phase to redevelop the King David High School and mixed-use housing project for the community.  

Mike is an avid hiker, tennis player, and enjoys photography, travel, and playing the drums to his diverse jazz record collection.

BEIER CAI

Board Member

Beier Cai is an experienced technology entrepreneur, executive, investor, and advisor. He is currently the co-founder and CTO at Commit Solutions, a global talent distribution platform bringing world-class technology talents and world-changing startups together.

DR. JIAYING ZHAO

Principal Investigator & Professor, UBC

Dr. Jiaying Zhao is a Canada Research Chair and Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability at the University of British Columbia. She uses psychological principles to design behavioural solutions to address financial and environmental sustainability challenges. Her paper “Poverty Impedes Cognitive Function”, published along with several colleagues in Science, drew significant attention from such media outlets at the New York Times, Associated Press, Washington Post, NBC, and TIME magazine.

Dr. Zhao earned her PhD from Princeton University in Cognitive Psychology and has a master’s in Cognitive Psychology (Princeton) and a master’s in Cognitive Science (University College Dublin). She is the current Canada Research Chair in Behavioural Sustainability and is a Researcher with the Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability.

In 2015, she received the BX Award for Outstanding Research which recognizes outstanding research in the behavioural sciences and policy combining originality, rigour, a demonstrated or potential practical application, and the potential for lasting impact. Most recently, Dr. Zhao has received research grants in the areas of climate change, sustainability in US forestry, and COVID-19.

Dr. Zhao led the research portion of the New Leaf Project. She became interested in studying how direct cash transfers can contribute to individual development in people experiencing homelessness in developed countries and recognized the high likelihood of success from this innovative approach.

ANITA PALEPU

Advisor, Professor of Medicine, University of British Columbia

Anita Palepu, MD, MPH, FRCPC, MACP is the Providence Health Care Head of Medicine and a Professor and Eric Hamber Chair of Medicine at the University of British Columbia. She is a General Internal Medicine Specialist and conducts her research at the Centre for Health Evaluation and Outcome Sciences. Dr. Palepu has a research program that falls under the broad umbrella of urban health research with particular interest in populations who are vulnerable to poor health outcomes such as individuals who experience homelessness and persons who use substances. She is passionate about health advocacy and is an associate editor for the Annals of Internal Medicine.

Par Pishrobat

Data Manager

As Data Manager, Par oversees the integrity and accuracy of data collection and performs research analysis to infer the objectives of the New Leaf Study Project. Par is a PhD student at UBC, Department of Statistics. His research focus is on emulating dynamical systems through statistical modelling. His work is currently applied to environmental problems such as flood forecasting and understanding land use change but has application in other areas such as finance and engineering. Outside work and school, he enjoys watching movies, reading books, and spending time in nature, either hiking or camping.