Team

Yuwei Shi

Dr. Yuwei Shi is the founding director of the Frontier Market Scouts Program, and co-founder and board director of Sanghata. He is dean and professor of strategic management at Graduate School of International Policy and Management, Monterey Institute of International Studies. His expertise is in the areas of competitive strategy, venture and business model development and evaluation. Yuwei is board director of Scholarly Exchange, a web services company based in Brookline, MA, and advising partner at Indachin, an investment advisory firm with offices in Hong Kong, London, Geneva, and Silicon Valley, California. He earned his bachelor of engineering degree from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, master of comparative law from the Dedmen School of Law at Southern Methodist University, and PhD in organization, strategy and international management from University of Texas at Dallas School of Management. yshi@miis.edu

Carolyn Meyer

Carolyn Taylor Meyer, MA is Director of Immersive Professional Learning and Special Programs in the Graduate School of International Policy and Management at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. She has a BA in Journalism, International Relations, and Spanish, from Butler University and an MA in International Policy Studies from the Monterey Institute of International Studies; she works with Monterey Institute faculty and staff to offer professional certificate trainings, executive education courses, and semester-long internship/field assignment programs. Ms. Meyer has extensive experience working with academic communities, both as a staff and faculty member. She worked at Butler University’s Office of International Student Services in Indianapolis and in the creation of the Monterey College of Law’s Mandell-Gisnett Center for Conflict Management in Monterey, California. She has also served as a public relations consultant for four educational institutions and several start-ups in Central California. She manages the certification effort for the FMS program, ensuring that students across the world have access to FMS and can obtain relative credit. cmeyer@miis.edu; 831-647-6417 

Ross Baird

Ross Baird directs the Village Capital initiative, a global experiment in seed-stage investment for social enterprises. Ross will lead the placement of Scouts in new potential Village Capital sites and with enterprises in the Village Capital network, as well as manage the portion of the training focused on investment.  Ross began his work in impact investing as an investment analyst with First Light; in three years, Ross has helped build a portfolio of 20 seed-stage enterprises.  Before starting at First Light, he assisted in the establishment of the Indian School Finance Company, a for-profit social enterprise financing affordable private schools in Hyderabad, India. He completed his Master’s in Comparative Government as a Marshall Scholar at the University of Oxford, England. He graduated from the University of Virginia, where he was a Jefferson Scholar and a Truman Scholar. He has also started two independent initiatives focused on civic participation.

James Watson

James Watson is the Program Director for Village Capital based in Atlanta. James works closely with impact driven entrepreneurs to help them develop strong business models, successful ventures, and to connect to sources of funding. He has helped launch domestic and international Village Capital programs and developed program manuals and operating procedures. James has also taught Entrepreneurship, Accounting, Economics, and Mathematics, developed a music program at a small private high school in Atlanta, and serves on the board of the Atlanta Music Project. He recently completed Level 3 of the CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) program. James graduated from the University of St Andrews in Scotland with a BSc (Hons) in Mathematics, upon graduation was awarded the Robert T. Jones Memorial Scholarship for postgraduate study at Emory University.