Outstanding Alum: Exceptional Professional Success
Ryan Gardner is a founding partner of Fiducient Advisors, an investment consulting firm and registered investment advisor. Since the firm’s inception in 2006, Gardner has played a key role in its growth and development, serving as managing partner, head of defined contribution and member of the firm's executive committee. In his role, Gardner services some of the firm's largest institutional clients by providing fiduciary governance oversight. Today, Fiducient Advisors has grown into one of the largest retirement plan consulting firms in the country.
As a leading expert in his field, Gardner also serves as a member of the pension committee at the Women’s Tennis Benefit Association, which administers the pension plan for professional women’s tennis players. He is a past member of the board of directors of the Connecticut Chapter of the National Institute of Pension Administrators, and remains active with several professional and business groups, including the Research Committee of the Plan Sponsor Council of America and the Connecticut Society of Certified Public Accountants’ Employee Benefit Plans Special Interests Group.
A proud UHart alum, Gardner received his bachelor’s degree in business administration from UHart’s Barney School of Business in 2001 and has served on the Barney Board of Visitors since 2016. As a student, he was a member of the baseball team and tutored for Educational Main Street. Gardner has returned to campus several times, both to present in business classes and as a panelist for the Hawk Nation Network event for student-athletes.
Among his many honors, Gardner was named to the Hartford Business Journal’s 40 Under Forty in 2015, and was recognized as a Top Retirement Plan Advisor Under 40 by the National Association of Plan Advisors in 2016. He resides in South Glastonbury, Conn., with his wife, Erin, and their three children.