After four and a half years helping build Blair Search Partners into a national search firm, our Managing Director steps into a role she has long dreamed of — Foundation Director.
At Blair Search Partners, we spend our days helping mission-driven organizations find the leaders who will carry their work forward, and helping talented people find the chapter that’s right for them next. There’s a particular kind of joy when that story unfolds within our own team.
This fall, our Managing Director, Torrey Albertazzi, steps into a role she has long dreamed of: Foundation Director for Cal Coast Credit Union. It’s exactly the kind of career move we celebrate for the people we work with every day, and now we get to celebrate it for one of our own.
A Firm Ready to Grow
When Torrey joined Blair Search Partners four and a half years ago, the firm was at an inflection point. “We were at a place where we really needed to invest in our leadership capacity,” recalls Trevor Blair, BSP’s CEO. The firm was deepening its work in San Diego while looking toward national growth, and it needed someone who could help shape strategy and execute on it. This meant bringing in a leader with deep roots in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors and a real feel for regional dynamics.
“Torrey was all of that and more,” Trevor says. “She’d worked at the national level and the local level. She had the big picture, and she could also be very tactical. She knew how to balance the two.” As he likes to tell it, her onboarding took about two hours and she was off and running.
The Mark She Leaves Behind
In the years since, Torrey helped transform both how the firm works and how far its reach extends. She built much of BSP’s back-end infrastructure and overhauled the systems and procedures that made the firm more robust and scalable. She built the firm’s marketing and communications function from the ground up. She also extended BSP’s reputation into markets where it had no presence before, personally developing the firm’s foothold in Phoenix over three years. She hopped on planes to sponsor conferences, speak at gatherings, and build relationships on the ground.
“Torrey completely upgraded our systems and dramatically increased our capacity,” Trevor says, “not just to serve our current clients better, but to serve more clients and take our work national.”
Within two years of joining, Torrey was named Managing Director. But ask anyone on the team, and the title is only part of the story. “She’s the glue that binds us all together,” Trevor says. “She’s the hub through which great ideas, information, and relationships all flow.”
“Torrey has been the ultimate partner in this work—my constant sounding board, my right hand, and a deeply valued colleague,” said Sarah Thompson, Senior Director of Executive Search & Recruiting at Blair Search Partners. “She brought wisdom, clarity, and kindness to every challenge, leaving a permanent mark on our team and our culture. We will miss her immensely, but we are so proud to celebrate her next chapter.”
Relationships at the Center
Torrey’s instinct to build strong relationships was the throughline of her work, and it’s the value BSP is built on. Whether she was sitting with frontline program staff or the leaders of multi-billion-dollar organizations, presenting to a room of 300 at a national conference or meeting community stakeholders where the impact actually happens, Torrey brought the same warmth and authenticity.
“Deep relationships, looking at each other as partners and not just a vendor relationship – that’s something I’m very passionate about,” Torrey says. “It’s a shared value across our firm, our clients, and our partners. It made the work fun. It made it meaningful.”
It’s a value she hopes outlasts her tenure. “Something I hope to leave behind is to keep relationships at the center of every decision and every piece of the work,” she says.
When asked what she’s proudest of, Torrey points less to any single placement than to the arc of the whole. “I’m proud of the growth BSP has had, the deep brand recognition well beyond San Diego, the relationships we built in Arizona, the return clients and the new ones,” she says. “But most of all, I keep coming back to the privilege of being a thought partner to so many organizations and working with so many incredible leaders across the country. It’s been a tremendous joy.”
What she carries forward, she says, is “the power of partnership and collaboration, while owning and recognizing the contributions I bring to the table, both as an individual and as a team member.”
“I’m really grateful for my time at BSP and for the relationship I built there. BSP allowed me to grow both personally and professionally, broaden my perspective on organizations and leadership, and work with some great people. I’m excited to take those experiences with me as I begin this next chapter at Cal Coast.”
A New Chapter at Cal Coast Cares Foundation
That same commitment now heads to the Cal Coast Cares Foundation. Established in 2015 as an extension of Cal Coast Credit Union, the Foundation carries a commitment to the education community in its DNA. It awards scholarships to graduating high school seniors, college students and foster youth pursuing higher education, while also providing grants that help educators bring STREAM projects to life in their classrooms. Last year, the Foundation expanded its scholarship program to support students enrolled in trade certificate programs to cover costs for equipment and testing fees, as well as basic needs like transportation and childcare, that can otherwise create barriers to completion.
“This opportunity brings together so many of the things that have mattered to me throughout my career: leadership, relationships, and the opportunity to make a meaningful difference in the community. I feel that now is the right time for this next step, and I have no doubt that Cal Coast is the right place for me to do it,” she said. “I’m excited to bring my experience to the Foundation and, most importantly, to build relationships with Cal Coast’s staff, board, donors, volunteers, and community partners as we work together to make an even greater impact in the communities we serve. I’ve already had a glimpse of the culture, generosity, support, and leadership that make Cal Coast so special, and I’m incredibly excited for what’s ahead.”
For Torrey, this role represents a meaningful return to the work that first inspired her. “Early in my career, I worked at Price Charities [now Price Philanthropies], where I was first introduced to the work of philanthropy,” she says. “That experience sparked something in me, and working at a foundation has been something I’ve wanted to return to ever since. This opportunity truly feels like a dream.”
Kyra Seay, SVP of Community Relations & Business Development at California Coast Credit Union, had followed Torrey’s career long before this opportunity came together. “I’ve known of Torrey’s leadership going back to her time at United Way, and I kept up with her through her years at Blair Search Partners,” Kyra says. “Torrey is a very strategic leader, and I’m excited to bring on someone who has the ability to shape a vision collaboratively and then translate that vision into action.”
For Kyra, Torrey arrives at an inflection point. “We’ve built a strong foundation over the past decade, but it’s difficult to predict what the next ten years will look like, particularly with AI reshaping education and the way people prepare for the workforce. So, for us, long-term strategy has to be about more than setting a vision. It has to include the ability to adapt as the needs of students and our communities evolve,” Kyra says. “Having Torrey as a thought partner to help us ask the right questions and shape that strategy is one of the things I’m most excited about.”
Bob Scheid, Senior Director of Community & Public Relations, sees the same runway. “It’s been ten years of foundation-building, and Torrey is in a wonderful position to build on a strong foundation. The sky’s the limit,” he says. “She has so much potential, especially given her nonprofit and business experience and perspective.”
A Success Story
Trevor is the first to celebrate this opportunity for Torrey. “This is a huge success story,” he says. Torrey isn’t leaving the sector or the city. She’s staying in San Diego, staying in the nonprofit community, and stepping into a role at an organization BSP knows well. “It’s not goodbye,” Trevor says. “We’ll be crossing paths for years to come.”
Torrey feels the same. “I’ll always be an ambassador for the incredible work BSP does,” she says. “I’ll be rooting for the team and their wonderful clients for all the growth ahead. I am leaving here as a fan and supporter of a company that has given me an incredible opportunity to grow.”
And BSP will be cheering just as loudly for her. “If she can do for Cal Coast what she did for us,” Trevor says, “it’s going to be amazing.”
This isn’t a farewell, it’s a launch. The kind of next chapter we hope for everyone we work with, and one we’re proud to have had a hand in preparing her for.
Congratulations, Torrey. This is only the beginning.