Melissa A Berman was the founding President and CEO of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, Inc., an innovative nonprofit philanthropy service launched by the Rockefeller family, from 2002 to 2024. Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors’ mission is to accelerate philanthropy in pursuit of a just world. Melissa built RPA into one of the world’s leading philanthropic advisory, grant-making, research and project management services, facilitating more than US$500 million per year across dozens of countries in all major issue areas. Under her leadership, RPA developed the 'Philanthropy Roadmap' series of donor guides with support from the Gates Foundation.  She also developed 'The Theory of the Foundation' research program and is the author of multiple reports in that initiative. A frequent speaker, Melissa has been a guest lecturer at universities across the US, Europe, Latin America and Asia. As a widely recognised expert in philanthropy, Melissa has been profiled and interviewed in major media. An adjunct Professor at Columbia University’s Business School, Melissa has also been appointed to the 2024-25 Visiting Faculty of Tsinghua University’s Schwarzman College. She is a board member of Candid (where she chairs the board), Equality Now, and the Adrian Brinkerhoff Poetry Foundation. In addition, she serves on the Advisory Board of the Tamer Center for Social Enterprise at Columbia University. In 2023, she was a Bellagio Center fellow. Melissa holds a BA from Harvard University and a PhD from Stanford University. 

At the Blavatnik School, Melissa is conducting research on knowledge centres for philanthropy around the world. She will also be developing programs on global philanthropy models for the 21st century.