Ryan McCorvie Biography

After graduating university, Ryan joined the investment bank Goldman, Sachs & Co. as a Strategist in New York City.  His role centered on mathematical modeling of financial products.  In a career spanning more than 13 years he helped build software systems to manage the risk exposures of large portfolios of derivatives and other financial instruments.  In the course of his tenure, he worked on many different trading desks, including foreign exchange and interest rates.  During the depths of the credit crisis, Ryan was responsible for the team modeling bankruptcy risk for the corporate bond trading desks.  At this time, Ryan managed a global team of more than 20 programmers and modelers.  In 2008 he was promoted to Managing Director, the firm's highest official title, attained by fewer than 5% of employees.  

While at Goldman Sachs, he split his time between New York City and London. Ryan enjoys international travel, and he's been to more than a dozen countries.  After leaving Goldman Sachs, Ryan spent part of a year living in Japan, attending Japanese language school and studying Zen Buddhism.  This was his third trip to Japan, and he attained enough language proficiency to pass the JLPT level 5.  He loved taking his family on tours of the ancient and modern parts of Tokyo, to Meiji Shrine and to Shinjuku's trendy department stores.  While there, he developed a passion for Japanese cooking, especially for yakitori, a kind of grilled chicken.  He frequented Omoide Yokocho, a small street famous for its yakitori stalls.  Upon returning to the United States, he has participated in classes on Japanese street cooking, and watched Japanese language cooking shows.

Ryan is married to Lisa McCorvie, whom he met in 2006 and wed in 2008.  Lisa is also an alumna of Caltech but, despite it being a relatively small school, Ryan and Lisa did not meet until years later via a mutual acquaintance.  She regularly beats Ryan playing backgammon.  Ryan dotes on his two children, twin girls who are about to enter kindergarten.  Lisa and Ryan want them to have a global orientation, so they have enrolled their children in a Mandarin-immersion school.  Ryan is grateful that during his graduate studies he's had a job with flexible working hours.  He's been able to be very involved in raising his children.

Ryan supports a number of charitable organizations.  Some organizations like Wikipedia and NumFocus help develop software tools and websites for the common good. Others like the Institute for Justice and the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education are active in litigating on behalf of the rights of individuals.  Ryan and Lisa also support a number of Oakland-based organizations which benefit the local community, such as Friends of the Oakland Public Library, the homeless aid organization St Vincent de Paul, the Alameda County Foodbank, and the Five Keys school for the incarcerated.  Ryan is a member of Alcoholics Anonymous, and for several years was the leader of a local meeting group at the Rockridge Fellowship.  He is a practicing Christian, and a member of the Piedmont Community Church.

In his free time, Ryan enjoys several hobbies. He is an avid cyclist, both indoors and outdoors.  Ryan also enjoys exploring the natural beauty of the San Francisco Bay area by going on extended