Photo credit: Carlyle
As a co-founder of The Carlyle Group, David Rubenstein is sitting atop a private equity giant that has $465 billion in assets under management. His current role at Carlyle is defined as ‘non-executive co-chairman,’ which means he’s in a top leadership position that doesn’t focus on day-to-day management, but rather governance and strategy. It’s a job that’s let him continue being one of the most important and defining voices in finance.
But Rubenstein’s influence extends far beyond private equity. He’s a fixture at major global gatherings like the World Economic Forum, where he helps shape conversations on democracy, geopolitics, and the global economy, an indication of how seriously world leaders take his perspective.
He also holds an unusually dense cluster of leadership positions across America’s top civic and cultural institutions, that include the Council on Foreign Relations and the National Gallery of Art. That gives him an outsized clout over the country’s intellectual and philanthropic direction.
