Mellody Hobson

FSB: Five Best Bosses

Mellody Hobson

Company: Ariel Capital Management, Chicago

Strategy: Ariel prides itself on its slow and steady approach to investing. The investment firm, which runs three mutual funds and has $17 billion in assets under management, uses the same strategy to advance its social mission: educating African-American kids about investing.

Its 97 employees reach out to Chicago children through Ariel Community Academy, a public school that the firm helped the city found and that it supports with help from two financial firms: John Nuveen and Lehman Brothers.

Each first-grade class receives $20,000, which Ariel invests equally in its Ariel fund and the Nuveen Rittenhouse Growth fund.

Hobson, the company's president, gives regular lectures at the school to both students and their parents on topics such as saving and investing, and she came up with the child-friendly statements that each student receives on the $20,000 investment.

Says Hobson: "Ariel Community Academy allows us to attract like-minded employees who have a sense of community."