Lauren McKenna Surzyn '03
Education
Princeton University, B.S.E.; Columbia University, M.B.A.
Year joined SPS
2023

Lauren Surzyn earned a B.S.E. in operations research and financial engineering from Princeton University in 2007 and an M.B.A. from Columbia University in 2015. She graduated from Columbia with honors, having received the Feldberg Fellowship, a merit-based scholarship. Since 2019, she has served as COO, Americas at New York-based Kirkoswald Asset Management, a global macro hedge fund with a focus on emerging markets (AUM: $7.5 billion). Prior to that, she was an executive director at UBS Investment Bank in the Prime Brokerage Division, where she worked on several teams — business consulting, sales — focusing on fundamental and quantitative hedge funds, and capital introduction. She also spent a year on the Data Solutions team, where she sold proprietary data to hedge fund and asset manager clients.

While at UBS, Surzyn also held a leadership role in numerous cultural initiatives, including the Women in Equities Committee, intern and graduate recruiting, talent mobility opportunities, and a millennial fintech think tank initiative. She is the Board president and a founding member of Inspiring Girls USA, a nonprofit organization dedicated to raising the aspirations of young girls by connecting them with women role models across industries. Surzyn served as vice chair of the Princeton National Annual Giving Committee for 12 years, where she helped raise approximately $65 million annually; was a member of the Capital Campaign Executive Committee that raised $1.88 billion during 2007-12; was a board member in London for the Princeton U.K. chapter; and is the former chair of Princeton’s Alumni Schools Committee Bronx Chapter. She previously was a member of the Junior League, affiliated with both the NYC and London chapters.

Surzyn served as the Columbia Business School Class of 2015’s annual fund pledge chair and is a past president and treasurer of the Feldberg Fellows of Columbia alumni group. At SPS, she co-founded the XIX Society in 2016 and is currently the form director for 2003. She has served as a member of the SPS Alumni Executive Committee, on the SPS Alumni Association Nominating Committee, as a form director (2004-08), a form agent (2008-13), and currently as a main agent (2013-present). Her brother Ryan A. McKenna graduated with the Form of 2001. She lives with her family in Manhattan.