Sheryl Mejia

Sheryl Mejía is a Partner and Chair of the Investment Committee at Steward Asset Management, a New York–based anchor investor that provides catalyst capital and GP-economics participation to launching and emerging private-equity managers. In that role she oversees investment diligence, reporting, and monitoring across the firm's portfolio and specializes in building strategic partnerships with private fund managers and independent sponsors. Steward's "Anchor Strategy" builds diversified portfolios of small buyout, growth equity, special situations, and infrastructure funds, aiming to improve the risk-return equation by participating in the economics of the general partners it seeds.

Before Steward, Mejía was Director of Emerging Managers at the New York State Common Retirement Fund, one of the largest U.S. public pension plans, where she oversaw commitments to more than 120 managers. Earlier she was Managing Partner of Decagon Advisors, an investment-consulting practice, and served as a Director at Deutsche Bank (formerly Bankers Trust Asset Management). She began her career in the Financial Services practice at KPMG.

She holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Honors) from Queen's University in Canada and an M.B.A. from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. She is a CFA charterholder and a Canadian Chartered Accountant (CPA CA). Beyond her investing work, she serves as a Director of the Levy vonWald Foundation, which supports literacy initiatives in New York State.

• Anchors and seeds emerging private-equity managers — typically first- and second-generation funds — rather than operating companies; provides early capital plus a "Mentor-Anchor Program" of value-added support.
• Focuses on the large and inefficient U.S. middle market, where she argues emerging managers can generate differentiated returns.
• Sector emphasis on healthcare, consumer, industrial, technology, and infrastructure, favoring managers exposed to innovation and disruption.
• Seeks GP-economics participation and favorable fee/capacity terms for early anchor LPs, framing the approach as "institutionalizing anchor investing."
• Says yes to managers where she can build a long-term strategic partnership — evaluating team, strategy fit to the middle market, and alignment on economics — across buyout, growth equity, special situations, infrastructure, real estate, and opportunistic strategies.