Tharangi Cumaranatunge

Tharangi is the finance director and treasurer for the Bush Foundation. She provides strategic and day-to-day leadership for finance, accounting and investments operations, and manages the finance team.

Tharangi ensures that the policies, controls and services that protect Bush’s grantmaking assets are in place. With the finance team, she also works on staff benefits and payroll, risk / insurance and retirement benefits and supports effective operations. She serves as a member of Bush’s management team.

Tharangi joined Bush in 2022. She has been a leader in strategic and finance systems and transformative change. Her experiences span the nonprofit and corporate fields. She spent nearly a decade at ALIGHT (formerly American Refugee Committee) serving refugees, displaced and marginalized communities, and worked almost as long in various corporate positions at Ecolab.

Tharangi grew up in Sri Lanka and came to Minnesota on a Fullbright scholarship to earn her MBA. She has a deep connection to nature and spends time outdoors biking and hiking with her husband, Milo. She is also an avid reader and writes poetry.

Additional experiences and leadership

• Fullbright scholar
• MBA, Carlson School of Management—University of Minnesota
• Stretch Expeditions with the Prouty Project, which serves and learns about diverse societies around the globe