Angela Blanton

Vice President for Finance and Chief Financial Officer, Carnegie Mellon University

Angela Blanton is an award-winning finance executive and influential public company board director with three decades of experience leading financial strategy, organizational transformation, and risk management across higher education, financial services, and manufacturing. Recognized for her ability to navigate disruption, implement effective risk mitigation strategies and manage complex global compliance, she is a trusted advisor to boards and executive leadership. Purpose-driven and results-oriented, Angela combines financial acumen with a commitment to long-term societal impact. She brings deep corporate governance experience through her work with corporate boards, including audit and finance committees and is qualified to serve on audit committees as a financial expert.

As Vice President for Finance and CFO at Carnegie Mellon University, Angela, manages a $1.8 billion budget, leveraging advanced analytics and automation to align operations with institutional goals and drive strategic impact. Known for building agile, high-performing teams, she translates complex financial data into actionable insights, enabling leadership to seize opportunities, implement innovative strategies, and achieve sustainable growth. Angela collaborates with senior leadership, the Board of Trustees, and key stakeholders to advance over $800 million in capital investments, implement revenue-generating initiatives, and strengthen data effectiveness across the organization. Her leadership has balanced innovation with cost management, aligned capital allocation with financial targets, and reinforced internal controls. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Angela’s strategic foresight enabled CMU to navigate financial challenges while pursuing long-term priorities. She also oversees liquidity management and debt strategy, contributing to two S&P credit rating upgrades to AA+—the university’s highest in decades and CMU’s first Moody’s rating of Aa1— both demonstrating her fiscal discipline and vision.

In her prior role as Vice President and CFO for PNC Investments, Angela advised on growth and profitability for a $300 million brokerage business. She led major technology implementations for the mortgage business, oversaw financial integrations during the Royal Bank of Canada acquisition across 4,800 employees, and spearheaded PNC's Talent Framework initiative for the 800-person Finance organization. Her earlier leadership roles span finance and engineering at PPG Industries, Chrysler Corporation, and Delphi Corporation.

Angela serves on the board of GCM Grosvenor, Inc. (Nasdaq: GCMG), an alternative asset management firm with ~$80 billion in assets under management and played a key role through its transition to a public company after a SPAC merger in 2020. An active community and civic leader, Angela serves on the Thought Leadership Committee for Pittsburgh’s Allegheny Conference on Community Development. Further, as Board Chair of the Pittsburgh Public Theater, she successfully recruited a new Managing Director and launched initiatives for enhanced fundraising and financial sustainability analysis. She previously served as a Board Member of the Black Economic Advancement Mobility (BEAM) Collaborative, cultivating a strategic partnership between CMU and BEAM to foster growth in Black businesses in the Pittsburgh region. Additionally, Angela serves on the Board of Directors for Code for America, a nonprofit dedicated to leveraging technology and data to improve government services, enhance civic engagement, and drive equitable outcomes across the United States.

Angela was named a Pittsburgh Business Times C-Suite Award winner and a Pittsburgh Courier Women of Excellence. She shapes national higher education finance strategies through her leadership with the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO), having served as Vice Chair of the Finance Committee, as well as a keynote speaker and panelist at regional and national conferences, webinars, and podcasts. Angela is also a member of the CNBC CFO Council.

Angela holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan and a Master of Science in Industrial Administration (MSIA/MBA) from Carnegie Mellon University.