Maria Kim is the president and CEO of REDF. Prior to REDF, Maria served as CEO of Cara Collective, a nationally recognized employment social enterprise helping people experiencing homelessness and poverty get back to hope, jobs, and opportunity.
Maria serves on the board of the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, and the advisory boards of CASE Center of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, Procure Impact, First Women’s Bank, and the Leadership Society Initiative. Her previous service includes the US Small Business Association’s Investment Capital Advisory Committee and the California Office of the Small Business Advocate Entrepreneurship and Economic Mobility Task Force. She is a 2008 Leadership Greater Chicago Fellow, a 2012 American Marshall Memorial Fellow, a 2018 Vital Voices Global Ambassador, and a 2020 Presidential Leadership Scholar.
She received her MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, from which she was honored in 2022 with the Distinguished Alumni Award.
A social impact enthusiast, advocate, and entrepreneur, Maria knows firsthand we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us; and our job – or more like our opportunity – is to pave the way for others to stand on ours. She writes about that journey as it relates to her time leading Cara in Voice and Vocation: A workforce practitioner’s guide to building hope, jobs, and opportunity.
