Who We Are

James R. Doty M.D.
Director of Project Respite | Director and Founder of CCARE | Clinical Professor of Neurosurgery | Stanford University

Dr. Doty is a Clinical Professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at Stanford University. He completed his undergraduate training at the University of CA, Irvine and medical school at Tulane University School of Medicine in New Orleans, LA. In addition to being a neurosurgeon, he is also an inventor, entrepreneur and philanthropist, having given support to a number of charitable organizations including Children as the Peacemakers, Global Healing and Family & Children Services. These charities support a variety of programs throughout the world including those for HIV/AIDS support, blood banks, medical care in third world countries and peace initiatives. Additionally, he has endowed chairs at major universities including Stanford University School of Medicine and his alma mater, Tulane University School of Medicine. As founder of Project Compassion, Dr. Doty works with both the Stanford Institute for Neuro-Innovation and Translational Neuroscience and a variety of scientists from a number of disciplines examining the neural bases for compassion and altruism. He is on the Board of Directors of a number of non-profit foundations including the University of Southern California Brain and Creativity Institute, the Dalai Lama Foundation and the Friends of New Orleans (FONO).

Chade Meng Tan, Ph.D.
Founder, Chairman of Project Respite | Founding Patron, CCARE | Jolly Good Fellow | Google University

Meng is Google's Jolly Good Fellow (which nobody can deny). His unusual job title started as a joke, but eventually became real.

Meng was one of Google's earliest engineers. Among many other things, he helped build Google's first mobile search service, and headed the team that evaluated and kept a vigilant eye on Google's search quality. After a successful 8-year stint in Engineering, he now serves with Google University, where he is the Head of the School of Personal Growth. One of his main projects is Search Inside Yourself - a Mindfulness-based Emotional Intelligence course, which he hopes will eventually contribute to world peace in a meaningful way.

Outside of Google, Meng is the Founder and (Jolly Good) President of the Tan Teo Charitable Foundation, a small foundation dedicated to promoting Peace, Liberty and Enlightenment in the world. He is also a Founding Patron of Stanford University's Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE).

Meng hopes to see every workplace in the world become a drinking fountain for happiness and enlightenment. When Meng grows up, he wants to save the world, and have lots of fun and laughter doing it. He feels if something is no laughing matter, it's probably not worth doing.

Joel Finkelstein
Founder, Program Coordinator for Project Respite | Program Coordinator CCARE | Stanford University

Joel is a full time student of neuroscience, full time husband and father of two and full time coordinator and researcher for CCARE when he is not busy launching philanthropic initiatives on the side... luckily, he is also a full time insomniac.

Thomas McGhan
Founder, Program Coordinator, Webmaster for Project Respite | Google, Inc. | Mad Hatter

Tom is an Engineer at Google, and has worked on projects ranging from Search to Gmail to Cluster Management. In his off time, he enjoys both playing and watching baseball, and collecting an obscene number of hats.

Oona Buckley
Associate, Project Respite | Associate, CCARE | Stanford University

Oona Buckley came to CCARE after working for private philanthropists in the Bay Area and google.org. She moved here from Nepal in 2006 where she was doing volunteer work in orphanages and in the prison system. Oona’s interest in meditation, compassion, and mindfulness stems from her upbringing in the Far East of Asia where she was born and raised. While most of her professional experience has been in Washington DC and New York City, it is her personal experiences that brought her to work on Project Compassion.