Rob Kozlowski
Rob Kozlowski follows the money as it moves through the institutional investment world, concentrating on how asset owners select, hire and replace external managers and advisers across pensions, endowments and foundations. He covers these decisions in real time for Pensions & Investments’ digital and print platforms, with particular attention to the mandate terms, strategic rationale and implications for the broader market. Alongside this transaction-focused reporting, he tracks developments in pension plan design and accounting, including market-based cash balance plans and other defined benefit arrangements.
Institutional money management moves
Kozlowski’s core beat is the flow of institutional mandates, especially searches and hires for money managers, investment consultants and other external providers chosen by asset owners. His stories regularly detail which pension fund or retirement system is reshaping its portfolio, who wins the business and on what terms, giving readers clear visibility into shifts across public and private markets. He has reported on decisions such as a Colorado public retirement plan hiring an outsourced chief investment officer provider, laying out the governance structure and responsibilities of the new mandate.
In covering these transactions, he consistently reports asset sizes, mandate scope and fee or cost implications when available, grounding each item in specific, verifiable changes to institutional portfolios.
Much of this work runs through Pensions & Investments’ daily digital products, where Kozlowski serves as an online reporter primarily contributing to the newsletter aimed at investment management and retirement plan executives. He also takes general assignment pieces for the print edition and the broader site, extending his mandate coverage into more thematic stories when institutional trends warrant it. Across formats, he keeps the focus on institutional decision-makers - boards, investment committees and chief investment officers - and the external firms they select to implement strategy.
The result is a steady file that maps which managers, consultants and service providers are gaining or losing ground among major asset owners.
Pensions, retirement plans and governance
Beyond individual hires, Kozlowski covers the structure and governance of large pension and retirement systems, particularly how those systems balance internal management with outsourced solutions. His reporting on the Pennsylvania Public School Employees’ Retirement System’s move to outsource a multibillion-dollar passive public equity program to a global asset manager illustrates this focus, highlighting both the scale of the mandate and the expected cost savings from the shift.
In pieces like this, he links board-level decisions to operational consequences, explaining how governance changes translate into fee outcomes, staffing implications and portfolio construction choices.
Coverage of retirement systems and other asset owners often sits at the intersection of finance and policy, and Kozlowski reflects that by noting how plan sponsors respond to regulatory, accounting and economic pressures. He reports on changes that affect beneficiaries and sponsors alike, including the adoption of outsourced CIO models, realignments in passive and active management, and adjustments to risk budgets across asset classes.
These stories help define his beat not just as finance in the abstract, but as the concrete mechanics of running large pools of long-term capital within formal governance frameworks.
Technical reporting on cash balance and defined benefit plans
Kozlowski also works at the technical end of the pensions beat, writing on the design and accounting treatment of cash balance and other defined benefit plans. His coverage of the Financial Accounting Standards Board’s proposal affecting market-based cash balance plans shows his ability to translate specialized accounting guidance into practical implications for plan sponsors and their advisers.
In that work, he explains how using market-based interest crediting rates in discounting benefit obligations changes reported liabilities and can alter the appeal of certain plan structures.
This more technical reporting complements his mandate coverage by tying funding and accounting rules back to employer decisions on plan sponsorship and design. He situates proposals and rule changes within the broader evolution of retirement provision, showing how accounting and regulatory detail can drive shifts in plan offerings, risk-sharing and investment strategy. Taken together, his stories on cash balance plans and defined benefit accounting give readers a clear view of where pension rules are moving and how those movements might affect institutional portfolios.
Tenure and output
Kozlowski has been with Pensions & Investments for many years, progressing from an editorial assistant role into a full reporting position and then into senior responsibilities on the news side. Over that time he has produced a large volume of stories focused on institutional money management, pension plans and retirement funds, building deep familiarity with the relationships between asset owners and their external providers. He writes primarily as a news reporter rather than a columnist, favoring concise, fact-heavy pieces that foreground mandates, hires and structural changes over opinion or commentary.
In addition to his journalism, he has authored non-fiction work, which reinforces his emphasis on clear, explanatory writing within a specialized subject area.
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