Profile Magazine Q4/22

The IT Coach

Michelle Soares charges her tech team to play offense and transform the Portland Trail Blazers fan experience P75

SPORTS A New Era for

Meet the Guest Editor

When Jennifer Vasquez was young, she found herself having to advocate with parents who spoke little English at the time. She’s been using her voice to advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion ever since. Today, she’s the vice president of DEI for the Golden State Warriors and Chase Center. “Sports presents a tremendous opportunity to bridge communities and bring people together,” she says. “It gives us a publicfacing platform we can use to make a greater impact globally.”

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Proactive, Transparent Leadership

Insurance law expert Linda Lin drives change and advocates for diversity both at Coaction and within the legal community

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Two-Year Transformation

How Lee Dabberdt built a best-in-class accounting team at EverCommerce, while leading with a dedication for personal development

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A Builder, Not a Caretaker

Jeff McKibben brings his passion for guiding high-performing tech organizations to Ultra Clean Technology

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Purpose-Built Treasury Team

Beyond Money Transfers

Chief Data Architect Harveer Singh creates the data and tech road map that will help Western Union emerge as a leader in fintech

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One of a KIND

How Ozie Pela channels his point-guard perspective in tragic times to foster both personal and company growth at KIND

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Attracting Top Talent

Berdon CHRO Karen Bennett shares what today’s candidates want and how employment professionals can use that to drive new outcomes

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Caring for the Customer

Editor’s Letter P7

Index P117

BDP International’s Lilian Burke reveals how she developed the logistic company’s new treasury function from the ground up

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Smartsheet CISO Chris Peake knows the right experience will convince users to choose the company’s powerful cloud-based platform

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Courtesy of Jennifer Vasquez (Vasquez), Angela Zippi (Lin), Happy Hour Headshot (Dabberdt), Natalie Bell (Pela)

On the Cover

What Head Coach Chauncey Billups does for the Portland Trail Blazers on the court, Michelle Soares replicates in the IT department. Soares outlines her game plan to help her team play offense to transform operations and add value.

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From the Editor

Sports were a vital part of my upbringing. It was guaranteed, given that my namesake is former Minnesota Vikings quarterback Fran Tarkenton. My childhood was a blend of attending games and being an athlete. I was six months old when I attended my first Minnesota Twins game at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, and my first Nebraska Cornhuskers football game was Coach Tom Osborne’s 250th win. My mom taught me how to fill out the scorecard at baseball games, and we would take turns penciling in every play.

Soccer was the first team sport I played, followed by softball not long after. I eventually played in a traveling softball league, and my parents drove me to tournaments all over Minnesota. Then in junior high, I joined the swim team and continued through my senior year of high school.

I loved the energy at the games, whether I was competing or sitting in the stands. I still do. There’s nothing like watching a Hail Mary pass in the last five seconds of a football game. Or walking along the edge of the pool cheering on the last leg of the relay.

Then the pandemic happened. Teams across the country, at every level, had to pause and reassess how to move forward during a time when in-person gatherings weren’t safe. In a time of such uncertainty, we’ve seen technology and HR leaders step up to the plate to prepare their organizations for an even better fan experience.

That’s what we want to recognize in this year’s Sports issue. We brought in Jennifer Vasquez, vice president of diversity, equity, and inclusion for the Golden State Warriors, as our guest editor. She is dedicated to amplifying DEI to not only reach fans of all backgrounds but also to ensure entire organizations—not just the athletes—are reflective of their diverse fan bases.

Our cover star is Michelle Soares, vice president of technology for the Portland Trail Blazers. Soares’s career didn’t start in sports, but she brings decades of expertise to build out a fundamentals playbook for her team. As she puts it, “IT can partner with the business to really transform operations and add value, but only if there’s clear vision and a strong plan.”

The other four executives are just as impressive. Josh Lipscomb is elevating Varsity Brands’ employee experience by leveraging the company’s mission to elevate students through sport, spirit, and achievement. Ann Jackson is establishing strong HR foundations and strategies to support Oak View Group as it establishes its place in sports and entertainment.

In Las Vegas, Matthew Pasco is leading his IT team to build a best-in-class game day experience for fans and athletes alike at the Raiders’ new stadium. And at the Boston Red Sox, Jon Hay is diving into data and analytics to not only improve the experience at Fenway Stadium but also make the game more accessible to families.

I’m excited to see the innovations and strategies reverberate across sports organizations and trickle beyond the industry. Even with the new tech-based fan experience, I’ll be filling out the baseball scorecard with a pencil for nostalgia.

Frannie Sprouls Managing Editor

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Proactive, Transparent Leadership

Insurance law expert Linda Lin drives change and advocates for diversity both at Coaction and within the legal community

By BILLY YOST

It would be several roles into her career that Linda Lin was finally exposed to a proactive legal department in a field where the legal function is so often reactive. Unsurprisingly, it was an environment where Lin thrived.

“Being proactive makes us better lawyers for the business,” Lin explains. “It not only makes us accountable, but also it gives us a sense of ownership in what’s happening.”

The current executive vice president and general counsel at Coaction (formerly Prosight; the name changed after a successful go-private venture in August 2021) doesn’t wait for issues to come to her. That’s as true of her extensive insurance law work as it is of an Asian American woman unwilling to wait for equality to catch up with the times.

Lin’s long commitment to helping advance diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) is just as essential as her extensive and deep understanding of the insurance space.

The EVP knows that the conservative approach—waiting for change or work to come across her desk—doesn’t make for an effective in-house advisor. It also does little to help the legal space, so often maligned for its

lack of representation, seek out more diverse voices or experiences.

Lin drives the change.

While many parents would be thrilled with their daughter’s choice to go to law school, Lin’s Taiwanese father and Chinese mother weren’t as convinced. “I think as more traditional Asian parents, they would have preferred me to become a doctor or an engineer,” Lin remembers. “My dad would leave articles at my door about the stress and health issues that plagued lawyers.”

But Lin stayed the course. She landed a coveted clerkship position with the Honorable Dora L. Irizarry in New York’s Eastern District Court. Her parents remained unimpressed (though they eventually came around), but it didn’t deter her from taking a deep dive into the insurance space. It may be not the immediate dream job that comes to mind for lawyers.

“I don’t know if anyone has ever gone to school with the hopes of becoming an insurance lawyer,” Lin says, laughing. “But I find it fascinating. It’s quite complex and challenging. And it’s the backbone of our economy in so many ways.”

Lin says the insurance industry is at a crossroads, with the old guard of people who helped build the big names in insurance

Scan the QR code to be taken to the web story.

Linda Lin

EVP, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary Coaction

retiring. The huge shortage of talent at the junior and mid-level ranks makes it an ideal time to enter the space.

The EVP attributes much of her success and growth as a leader to the mentors and sponsors who took her under their wing and provided her with invaluable guidance, from her prior managers to a former four-time public company general counsel.

“I know people talk about being transparent, and I think that can get lost in translation,” Lin says. “I learned how effective it can be to lay out your leadership philosophy at the outset.”

The attorney also says it’s crucial to understand how different team members like to be managed. Every individual is different, but Lin stresses that one of the best moves a people manager can make is providing individuals with the tools and information they need when they need it.

It may sound rudimentary, but ensuring her people have the needed resources without

the extraneous noise runs a delicate balance that requires understanding how her team works best. “It’s a process,” says Lin.

“Obviously, there are issues we can’t always talk about, but I try to be as transparent with my team as I can,” Lin says. “That transparency earns you credibility, and it creates a communication channel that can help head off issues before they actually become issues.”

When it comes to her status as a woman and person of color, Lin advocates for DEI in a profession and industry not known for its diverse representation.

The attorney says she is well-accustomed to people assuming she is meek, unable to take on leadership roles simply because she is Asian American. She’s been confused for a court reporter while litigating in court, and a judge once exclusively addressed her more junior white male colleague during a discovery motion, assuming he was the one arguing the motion.

“I find [the insurance industry] fascinating. It’s quite complex and challenging. And it’s the backbone of our economy in so many ways.”

LINDA LIN

“Through all of this, I just injected my advocacy for diversity in my day-to-day life,” Lin explains. “I grew up in an immigrant family, where I was taught to assimilate at almost all costs. But I’ve been emboldened over the course of my career to speak up when I see things that aren’t right.”

Lin remembers a previous job where she discovered that all the senior women were being paid less than their male counterparts. Lin was willing to say something. Her approach, however, was far more strategic.

“I was told that I needed to find the money to make it right,” Lin says. While the response fails fundamentally on virtually every moral and ethical plane, she did it regardless. It was a chance to change things for the deserving female leaders, and Lin made it happen.

The EVP has worked with the Asian American Bar Association of New York since she left law school in increasingly senior roles, from chairing the Young Lawyers Committee to chairing the Judiciary Committee and becoming the youngest to serve as the organization’s president in 2011. Lin also proved integral to supporting diversity on the bench by advising and advocating for Asian American candidates for the New York federal and state benches.

She’s also the board president of the Sonia & Celina Sotomayor Judicial Internship Program, which seeks to increase diversity in the legal profession by empowering students from underserved communities and diverse backgrounds.

When Lin speaks about making diversity part of her day-to-day, she means it. There are those who wait for change. And then there are those, like Linda Lin, who drive change.

“I just injected my advocacy for diversity into my day-to-day life.”

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Washington, D.C.

Diversity of Experience

Throughout his tenure at American Express, Alan Gallo took risks to build his knowledge outside of finance. Now, he leverages that expertise as chief audit executive.

By DONALD LIEBENSON

Alan Gallo Chief Audit Executive American Express

Alan Gallo, chief audit executive at American Express, recalls a conversation he had with a recent hire. American Express, she told him, was different from other companies that she worked for when it came to leadership and employee opportunity.

“At other companies, if you have someone great on your team, the instinct is to hoard that person because they are a high performer,” she told him. She found it is the opposite at American Express. “The higher the performer, the more the company is asking what other jobs this person can do within the company.”

That, in a nutshell, is Gallo’s own story at American Express. He came to the company thirty-five years ago, right out of college. He initially worked in financial planning and analysis, but around twenty years ago, one of his mentors at the company gave him advice that he took to heart.

“He told me that I had done a good job in finance, but that if I wanted the top jobs, I had to take career risks,” Gallo recalls. “That meant doing something different and taking on roles for which I was not 100 percent qualified. That would force me to grow and evolve. In a sense, it was like being kicked out of the nest.”

He has been flying high ever since.

Gallo is a self-described “New York City guy.” He grew up in a blue-collar family and was the youngest of five brothers. His father worked in the garment industry, and his mother was a nurse. “The day each of my brothers and I turned fourteen, she took us down to get our working papers,” he says.

He held a variety of jobs as a teen, including flipping burgers at Wendy’s and working at Fotomat, the drive-through photo development kiosks that flourished in the days before digital photography. These different experiences, he believes, prepared him for working at American Express.

Finance was always the plan for Gallo. He worked for an accounting firm during his senior year at New York University. He assumed that he would stay with that firm, but American Express sent a recruiter to campus. A pamphlet caught Gallo’s attention. “It described a rotation

“I learned things working on those projects I never would have known if I had remained with the finance roles I had with the company early in my career.”

ALAN GALLO

Michael Hopkins

program through four different finance departments,” he remembers. “I read that, and I thought that seemed pretty cool. I interviewed on campus and got the job.”

Over the last ten years alone, Gallo has worked in strategy, operations, and consulting roles within the company. “I learned things working on those projects I never would have known if I had remained with the finance roles I had with the company early in my career,” he explains. “About three years ago, they asked me to be the company’s chief auditing executive, and so along with my basic training and finance background, I brought the diversity of perspective that these other roles gave me. It all comes together.”

Gallo leads the company’s internal audit group, whose mission he describes as protecting the company’s organizational value by providing independent assurance over risk and control. “We help the company to handle risk better,” he says. “The internal audit group is called the third line of defense behind the business and risk oversight.”

A current priority is hiring people able to use data analytics in a more sophisticated way to expand the company’s audit coverage and approach to risk management. “It expands the depth and breadth of our coverage to find more issues,” Gallo explains, “and frees up the human beings in the audit department to evaluate more sophisticated questions around risk management such as roles and responsibilities, who does what, and what might fall through the cracks.”

While he did not come into the company with audit experience, Gallo enjoys being a direct line to the company’s audit and compliance committee. “That means I can have an impact on the way the company manages risk,” he says. “I like being the leader of a large team, and I enjoy giving advice to younger people on the team and helping them navigate their careers.”

When asked if his younger self would recognize today’s American Express, Gallo notes that he would recognize it in terms of how it feels to work at the company. “Amex has always had a supportive culture,” he says.

He tells future American Express leaders what his mentors told him. “Diversity of experience gives you diversity of perspective, and diversity of perspective is what you need to tackle big challenges and difficult questions,” Gallo says. “Where does wisdom come from? It doesn’t come from doing the same thing over and over your whole life. That will give you expertise in one area, but it doesn’t give you the wisdom to tackle the big problems.”

Congratulations to Alan on his successful career. KPMG and American Express share a common view where earning and sustaining stakeholder trust is imperative to success. We appreciate our trusted partnership. KPMG provides innovative business solutions, audit, tax, advisory services, and industry insights to many of the world’s largest and most prestigious organizations. We wish Alan continued success!

“Diversity of experience gives you diversity of perspective, and diversity of perspective is what you need to tackle big challenges and difficult questions.”

ALAN GALLO

At KPMG, we never underestimate the power of passionate people who are committed to a success. We are proud to congratulate Alan Gallo for his inspired leadership, which has helped American Express achieve outstanding results.

Hate Raids, Bots, and Scams

The legal team at streaming platform Twitch takes on some of the world’s worst internet users

By WILL GRANT

The legal team at Twitch had their hands full with bad actors for part of 2021. The term “hate raid” probably isn’t one on your radar unless you spend a lot of time watching livestreams, but it’s one Twitch has had to spend more time combating in a high-profile battle that continues to play out on its platform.

The practice of hate raiding involves calculated attacks on a livestreamer’s channel, filling the chat function with homophobic, racist, and sexist comments, massively amplified by dozens, if not hundreds, of automated bots posting and reposting the comments.

The attacks against streamers of color and the LGBTQ community became so prevalent that the streamers organized “#ADayOffTwitch” to bring light to the controversy and seek more active involvement from the company.

Twitch responded by taking legal action against two users who are alleged to have commanded thousands of automated bots in hate and harassment campaigns.

“ We’ve seen a lot of conversation about botting, hate raids, and other forms of harassment targeting marginalized creators,” the company announced in a tweet thread. “You’re asking us to do better, and we know we need to do more to address these issues. That includes an open and ongoing dialogue about creator safety.”

Twitch has launched “channel-level band evasion detection” as well as account verification improvements to make it harder for users to create bot armies for hate raids, requiring a verified phone number in order to engage in the chat.

It’s a start, but certainly not the end goal for a problem that will likely continue to be an issue for content creators. It’s an issue that has become increasingly prevalent for deputy general counsel Jordan Gimbel, who has been with the company since 2016.

In that time, Gimbel has risen through two promotions to his present role in the San Francisco-headquartered company.

Gimbel has been instrumental in helping the company rethink systems and tools for Twitch—not only creators, but internal employees as well. He’s enhanced transparency efforts and resources for his teams and their business partners.

Twitch’s platform, which is expected to host 51.6 million users by 2024, and its young demographic have brought enhanced scrutiny from regulators seeking to strike a balance between protecting consumers and stifling innovation. A high-profile data breach on October 6, 2021, certainly didn’t help.

Gimbel has also had to tackle claims of a scam operation running on Twitch from actors in Turkey. The leader says it’s been incumbent on him to provide active leadership in a case that stretches nearly seven thousand miles from the San Francisco Bay.

When it comes to the wide-ranging regulatory work, the lawyer notes that if one wants to be respected and brought to the table to tackle difficult issues, they need to think about the synthesis between the spirit of the issue and the wider goals of the company.

It’s also imperative to deliver legal advice in the voice of an advisor, not a statement for the court. Gimbel says that the legal team should act as the glue of the broader organization and enable the business to get to the goal line.

It’s an important time at Twitch. The most popular host of livestreams on the internet isn’t just a platform for creators: it’s creating an entirely different way of interacting with content. More people will view a Twitch stream than some of the highest-rated weekly television shows on the planet. Lawyers at Twitch have to feel a heavy weight, but it’s the kind of weight that comes with being a front-runner on a trail they’re blazing themselves.

Face Challenges with Vision, Agility, and Care

At Dril-Quip, Elm Valle combines his military experience and faith-based leadership to manage supply-chain challenges

By FREDERICK JERANT

A common nightmare goes something like this: after a great build-up, you’re introduced to a large gathering of experts eager to hear your wisdom. And, as you approach the lectern, you suddenly realize that you’re no expert. In fact, you really have no clue at all about the matter at hand. Nothing.

Now imagine that nightmare coming true during a job interview. That’s pretty much what happened to Elm Valle.

Valle was interviewing with Arch Chemical, and it would be his first job after his departure from the Army. The interviewer, who had been an Army officer as well, set up a scenario: how would Valle set up eight grassroots distribution centers for Walmart and attain an expected 95 percent accuracy rate?

“I had no idea about business supply chains at this point,” Valle recalls. “So I looked at the situation through a military lens—that is, moving food, fuel, and other life-critical supplies to their destinations through areas with no infrastructure or roads, while getting shot at. I factored in all sorts of contingencies and drew up my plan on a whiteboard. [The interviewer] said it was the best answer he’d seen, and I was hired.”

Valle leveraged his military expertise and leadership to build a successful career within supply chain management, from Arch Chemical to his current role as director of

“I learned to trust the others in my military unit to do their jobs, and I look at my Dril-Quip team the same way.”

Elm Valle

Director of Operations & Supply Chain, Downhole Tools Dril-Quip

operations and supply chain for Dril-Quip’s Downhole Tools Business Unit.

Born in the Philippines while his father served in the US Army, Valle grew up in Italy, Germany, Switzerland, and many central European countries—amounting to about thirteen countries, fourteen US states, and every continent except Antarctica. The constant moving offered some unexpected benefits: Valle learned to communicate with people in many different cultures—and learned what motivates them.

When his father retired in California, Valle earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology at the University of California at Davis. While at Davis, he received an ROTC commission as a second lieutenant in the Army. He spent the next six years as a light cavalry scout with the 10th Mountain Division, the most versatile and deployed unit. He then earned an MBA from Central Michigan University during his service and left the Army in 2002 as a captain.

Valle cut his supply-chain-management teeth during his time at Arch Chemicals, and later worked in similar capacities for AmeriGas, Geokinetics Inc., Valaris Drilling, and Shell-Motiva Enterprises. He joined DrilQuip, a manufacturer of highly engineered equipment for oil and gas drilling, in 2019 as its director of materials management.

He was hired by Michael Wells, then vice president of supply chain, to organize and structure the company’s system. “I was on my own at the beginning,” Valle says, “but within a year, my group comprised six people, and we controlled the global inventory management, distribution, and the traceability of global inventory, the works.”

When Wells left Dril-Quip in 2021, Valle was promoted to director of global supply chain. In January 2022, Dril-Quip restructured

into business units, and he moved into his current role. Valle heads a team of forty-five that oversees procurement, inventory, contracts, planning, manufacturing, and other operations that span six countries.

“Our customers include Shell, Chevron, BP, and other major oil-industry companies, and timely delivery of equipment and supplies is crucial to them. Downtime can cost a drilling operation up to a million dollars a day,” he says.

The pandemic didn’t make anyone’s job any easier, but his team pulled together and maintained a 90 percent on-time delivery score. His key day-to-day challenges include availability (or the lack thereof) of materials, the logistics of finding the capacity to handle deliveries, and getting the products on-site when promised.

“We always take a team approach to these situations because no single person will have all the answers,” Valle says. He’s also big on building relationships with his carriers and other logistical supports—even competitors. “We can leverage each other’s strengths and make various trade-offs to get the job done. I like to remind them that we’re all in the same situation, so why not cooperate?”

Valle’s military career also influenced his leadership style. “I had good commanders and did my best work when I was given latitude to choose my own solutions,” he says. “I learned to trust the others in my military unit to do their jobs, and I look at my Dril-Quip team the same way. I give them directions and then let them execute the process.”

He also promotes a familial atmosphere in the department. “I always tell them that family comes first,” he explains. “I don’t count their minutes or hours on the job; if you don’t have a happy family at home, your

work will suffer.” The department also hosts baby showers, mini recognition ceremonies, potlucks, and other events.

“Elm is a dedicated leader that has the unique ability to turn complex problems into simple solutions,” notes James Burdine, TMX station owner at TFWW.

Valle’s deeply held faith—he’s pursuing a master’s degree in divinity and Christian leadership—also informs his professional life. “Many people see me as a sort of spiritual leader, not just a corporate leader,” he says. He’s quick to point out that he doesn’t push religion on anyone, but that he is always willing to offer insights to others when asked.

Valle expects to count on his team even more as supply chain issues continue. “I think the challenges—especially logistics and availability—will remain to some extent for the next five to ten years,” he predicts. “Even when the back orders are filled, there will still be pressure to perform because demand will always be ongoing.”

“We always take a team approach to these situations, because no single person will have all the answers.”

ELM VALLE

The Art of HR

Khara Julien shares how she helped guide Transportation Insight employees through the important transition designed to create a new and powerful brand

By ZACHARY BROWN

Although she originally studied chemical engineering, Khara Julien discovered a passion for empowering people to solve business problems. The revelation put her on a new career path, and she’s been flourishing in the world of human resources ever since.

But after working in large organizations, she truly found her niche establishing compensation structures and business processes at a midsized building company that had never had an internal HR function. “It’s almost like being handed a blank canvas and being told to paint,” she says.

Julien thrives when given the chance to add value by “creating something out of nothing.” She joined Transportation Insight in February 2021 to take on a challenging and critical assignment. When she first stepped in, Transportation Insight and Nolan Transportation Group were operating as two businesses.

Although leaders saw value in uniting the complementary businesses, they wanted to do so in a slow and methodical way that would create one brand, one process, and one culture. Julien was given the important

task of guiding the companies and their employees through the entire experience.

Transportation Insight was a logistics provider and Nolan Transportation operated as a freight brokerage. Together, they served fifty thousand carriers and ten thousand clients to generate $4.3 billion in annual revenue.

“We were once an unknown secret with a lot of potential,” Julien explains. “Coming together as one brand and one team will make us known and help us reach our true potential.” The organization will grow as it provides seamless and holistic services to new and existing clients alike.

Julian set the stage for this expected growth by first focusing on administrative duties. She worked with her counterparts across the organization to consolidate all payroll functions for all employees regardless of which legacy company they worked for. Her team implemented Workday software and partnered with vendors like CapTrust to design and introduce new 401(k) plans as well as other improved benefits.

“My job is to bring the best-in-class partners and tech solutions that will help us create one efficient and effective organization,” Julien says.

As she and other leaders continue these steps, they’re changing the entire user experience. Customers with varying needs once had to hunt for the right division to engage. Now, Transportation Insight can leverage the power of its network to provide end-to-end supply chain management.

“We were once an unknown secret with a lot of potential. Coming together as one brand and one team will make us known and help us reach our true potential.”

KHARA JULIEN

One piece became especially important as Julien, Transportation Insight, and Nolan Transportation prepared for the transition: culture. The organizations had notable differences. Nolan was full of young and energetic salespeople while Transportation Insight employed traditional and experienced veterans.

Julien didn’t want to simply cobble together something made from the best parts of both legacy companies. Instead, she wanted to seize the opportunity to create something new. “Merging two companies isn’t about taking the best from both worlds and smashing them together,” she says. “It’s about defining what your customer needs in the future and supporting that.”

Julien used an analogy to explain this to the organizations’ employees. She invited them to throw out their preconceived notions and stop acting as if they were packing their bags and moving to a new place. Instead, she wanted them to see the company as a tropical island. They were invited to take only what they need and leave the rest behind. Once they reached the shore, they could start building the future together.

Leaders across the organization worked overtime to prepare for the move. In late 2021, they announced the acquisition of

SwanLeap, a software company whose technology will give Transportation Insight advanced visibility and control throughout the supply chain. This came as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic increased demand for the company’s services.

Julien’s recruiters are hiring more than one hundred sales brokers per month and onboarding them into a growing team of about two thousand employees. Competition for talent is fierce and Julien is relying on her head of sales—a former GM in Transportation Insights’ sales division—to bring in high performers.

Julien and others at Transportation Insight have spent the past year removing the barriers to growth and collaboration. Not so long ago, employees working on the same teams had different benefits, different email addresses, different messaging apps, different file sharing systems, different career opportunities, and different customers.

Now, they’re all united on one team working towards one clear vision. “We’re creating a powerful brand we can all be proud of as we contribute and serve our customers in new ways,” Julien says.

Editor’s note: At press time, Khara Julien was no longer at Transportation Insight.

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By BILLY YOST

In her twenty years working in public accounting, Lee Dabberdt spent half of it as a part-time all-star. She built out a decade of part-time managerial expertise at one of the most well-known firms in the world. And it was before the COVID-19 pandemic completely redefined the nature of work. Dabberdt made this choice to have more flexibility while raising her family and continuing her career.

“I remember being told the public accounting firm didn’t have any part-time managers,” Dabberdt recalls. “I said, ‘Well I’m going to work part-time, and I’m going to be a manager.’ They gave me that chance.”

Lee Dabberdt Chief Accounting Officer EverCommerce

Today, Dabberdt is the chief accounting officer (CAO) at EverCommerce. Just two years into the role, she has built a best-inclass accounting team, all while leading with the empathy of someone who has taken the nontraditional route.

THE CHALLENGE OF TRANSFORMATION

Since being promoted to chief accounting officer in May 2021, Dabberdt was able to tick off “going public” in short order. EverCommerce’s successful IPO in the summer of 2021 boosted valuations of the company well into the billions. Even during a pandemic, EverCommerce’s growth couldn’t be hampered.

“The executive team I work with is absolutely amazing here,” Dabberdt says. “None of us had taken a company public before from

Lee Dabberdt builds a best-in-class accounting team at EverCommerce while leading with a dedication to personal development

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this perspective, and everyone was so humble and collaborative.”

Dabberdt collaborated with CFO Marc Thompson, who provided capital markets and investment banking knowledge—not her wheelhouse. But with her accounting background, she says, they were able to be a great team and provide value to the process.

“It meant a lot to have the accounting perspective be valued and appreciated during the IPO process,” Dabberdt explains. “I was looked to as the subject-matter expert, and I loved the whole experience.”

The IPO, however, wasn’t the allure in joining EverCommerce. Dabberdt says she was motivated by the chance to build a best-inclass accounting department with the backing of the organization every step of the way.

Dabberdt was transparent in her early discussions with Thompson that to build a department right, she would need the latitude and resources to seek out talent and build the right systems to ensure long-term success.

“Marc has fulfilled that commitment to me 100 percent,” Dabberdt explains. “I’ve built a team of about seventy people, restructured it, done a full ERP implementation, and hired top talent. It’s been a complete transformation of the accounting department over two years in preparation of becoming a publicly traded company.”

Dabberdt’s own success, she believes, is just a further extension of what she calls a “human-first culture.” She calls the

EverCommerce culture the best she’s worked in over her twenty-six-year career.

Dabberdt says the company’s style of “management by objective” honors people’s lives outside of their work and aims to build trust and loyalty. Over half of her accounting team members are remote, and that flexibility is paid back by committed and passionate contributors.

BOTH FEET FORWARD

Given Dabberdt’s nontraditional path, it’s no surprise that she is dedicated to personal development. Her ability to navigate a decade of part-time managerial excellence is the result of leaders who saw Dabberdt’s value and were willing to make it work.

At EverCommerce, she’s brought in some familiar faces. In building her team, Dabberdt has hired several colleagues with whom she previously worked. It’s a testament to Dabberdt’s effective leadership that they’re willing to follow her.

“I believe in going to bat for my team,” Dabberdt explains. “If they’re high performers and they work hard, I’m always going to stand up for them and help develop them in their careers, even if that means they should leave my team.”

Dabberdt’s dedication to her teams doesn’t go unnoticed. “I have observed Lee develop a strong, versatile, and collaborative finance and accounting function,” says Caitlin Hughes, partner at RSM US. “Her success

is a testament to her dedication in investing, teaching, and caring for her team. She leads through example.”

Dabberdt is both a natural relationshipbuilder and a helping hand, especially for women developing their careers within the finance and accounting space. Even if you’re not in her Rolodex, this CAO still has actionable advice for anyone looking for a dynamic, fulfilling career in finance.

“There are so many statistics that show this, but women just aren’t always as willing to put themselves out there,” Dabberdt explains. “They want to make sure they meet every single qualification on the job description before they apply. If we’re going to challenge the equity landscape, people need to be more willing to take a chance and just go for it.”

To build confidence for making that leap, ask for feedback. It’s something that Dabberdt both preaches and practices. This is part of a broader process of learning from every experience, she explains, and it helps push you forward to try new things. The more you know about yourself and your expertise, the more willing you will be to seek out new challenges.

Dabberdt has one final piece of advice from someone who has redefined her career multiple times. “Don’t let age define you,” she says. “I’m well into my career, and there’s so much I still want to do and accomplish and contribute. Just jump in with both feet forward.”

“I believe in going to bat for my team. If they’re high performers and they work hard, I’m always going to stand up for them and help develop them in their careers, even if that means they should leave my team.”

LEE DABBERDT

Accounting for Time

How Joe Ciccarello leverages

By BILLY YOST

There’s a pattern among the finance group at Austin, Texas-headquartered technology company SolarWinds. A handful of finance professionals have been with the company for over ten years. Group Vice President of Tax and Treasury Joe Ciccarello has nearly fourteen years there under his belt, and his tax and treasury leaders have both been with the company almost as long.

“I’m sure the company is the big seller for those folks, but I think if they didn’t like me, they would have left a long time ago,” Ciccarello says, laughing.

Ciccarello is soft-spoken and easygoing, but that shouldn’t fool you. Throughout his tenure at SolarWinds, the VP has helped grow a company of two hundred people to thousands. He’s helped take the company public, then private, and then public again. He also helped spin off a third of the organization during 2021, but that still isn’t the high point—at least according to Ciccarello.

His most lasting contribution to the company was back in 2008 in a small, subleased office space, when SolarWinds was just two hundred-odd people. Ciccarello sat with the CFO and members of the finance team, figuring out how they were going to turn SolarWinds’s hopes for growth into reality.

“These were big, overarching questions,” Ciccarello remembers. “How are we going to set up the organization? Where will we be setting up outside of the US? How do we set up all those entities and operations?”

Fourteen years later, SolarWinds software is used by virtually every Fortune 500 company and the company has international operations in eighteen countries. But after all the growth, the operating structure that Ciccarello helped build and put in place is still the same in many ways.

That’s foresight. That’s planning. And that’s why Ciccarello is still at SolarWinds all these years later.

The long-term mindset that the SolarWinds finance team has demonstrated can be linked

“I’m proud to say I mindfully put structures in place along the way that anticipated that one day, we might need to sell or spin off businesses.”

JOE CICCARELLO

Joe Ciccarello Group VP of Tax & Treasury SolarWinds

Erny Mezas

to the 2021 spin-off of a third of the company into N-Able Inc. The cloud-based software provider was a huge transaction that few in-house accountants get a chance to tackle in their career.

N-Able accounted for a third of SolarWinds employees—a massive transition and evolution for any company. But Ciccarello says the planning his team did back in 2008 still found a way to prep for a move that wouldn’t be made until over a decade later.

“I’m proud to say I mindfully put structures in place along the way that anticipated that one day, we might need to sell or spin off businesses. If so, it could be done efficiently,” he explains. “Those structures were set up so we could carve out parts of the business without the effort that I’m sure other companies who have done this have gone through.”

The spin-off of N-Able has brought Ciccarello’s early planning full circle. With the company back to doing what it does best, SolarWinds is now operating the way it was designed to before it grew and evolved several times over. Ciccarello is back to where he started, but in a more highly elevated environment.

Ciccarello’s long-term planning and mind for detail goes hand in hand with his leadership style, which draws on his involvement in sports. Ciccarello played soccer at the University of Louisville and has continued to play and coach ever since. This year he’s serving as president of the high school soccer booster club for his sons’ team.

“I had great coaches and I had horrible coaches,” he says. “I’ve always tried to lead

by example and listen to my teammates to assure them that their voice is being heard. Compassion and empathy can go a long way.”

Ciccarello’s emphasis on teamwork might offer some insight into why his direct reports have been with him so long. He understands that people who are happy, motivated, and feel heard will ultimately make their organization more successful.

During his time playing, Ciccarello said that public service was part of the responsibility of being on the team. The college student would put on soccer clinics for kids, and that sense of civic commitment obviously stuck with him. Ciccarello has helped create the financial foundation for several nonprofits.

“You need the people with the passion to do the charitable work, and then you need guys like me to be able to help them set up procedures, budgets, and frameworks,” Ciccarello says. “I’m just glad to be able to support great organizations in my own way, and I’m proud to have been able to do things for great causes.”

The coming year will be very similar to the last fourteen for Ciccarello in that there will inevitably be a new challenge he hasn’t seen before. It might be aiding the SolarWinds research and development or sales teams in a new country or territory. It might be continuing to adapt to what it means to be at SolarWinds after a massive divestiture.

No matter what happens, Ciccarello says his finance team is one of the best he’s ever seen, and it’s ready for whatever the wind may blow in.

“You need the people with the passion to do the charitable work, and then you need guys like me to be able to help them set up procedures, budgets, and frameworks.”

JOE CICCARELLO

STRATEGY

Subject-matter

A Builder, Not a Caretaker

Jeff McKibben brings his passion for guiding high-performing tech organizations to Ultra Clean Technology

By BILLY YOST

With over twenty-five years of experience building and leading at high-performing, global tech organizations, Jeff McKibben is the kind of person that is willing to stick around—as long as he can keep building. The chief information officer at Ultra Clean Technology (UCT) developed his breadth of experience through long stints at Hewlett Packard and onsemi, assuming increasingly more senior roles in both organizations by leading his teams through critical moments.

“A company always has these arcs of growth,” McKibben explains. “Those are the exciting times when you can help an organization grow and evolve to its next level. Those are always the moments I look for, and that’s what led me to UCT.”

In his previous role, McKibben helped grow onsemi from $1.6 billion to $6 billion in revenue. He was drawn to UCT because it is in the early stages of a prolonged ramp in the semiconductor industry and UCT is set to continue growing. In just two short years, UCT has doubled its revenue from $1 billion to $2 billion, and that expansive growth is leading the CIO to help create a business-wide standardization and efficiency of data management strategy to ensure business continuity within this rapidly accelerating digital environment.

Even decades into his career, McKibben’s passion for the build hasn’t diminished in the least.

From the tech side, McKibben says he was able to lay out his transformative plans early on in his interview process at UCT. “One of the first things I told the management team

Jeff McKibben CIO Ultra Clean Technology

was that we would need to hire a chief information security officer,” the CIO explains. “We had good [information security] in place, but as the company continues this massive growth, it’s just going to become a bigger target for the bad guys.”

McKibben says UCT is shifting to a higher-value strategy, one more dependent on its own proprietary information, practices, and know-how. That intellectual property becomes more critical to keep safe and protected.

Additionally, UCT had been implementing an ERP when McKibben arrived to address systems that needed more flexibility and scalability.

“As the company started rolling out SAP, the idea of having a common enterprise system was getting diluted by customizations at each site,” McKibben explains. “This presented a challenge.”

Any ERP implementation is long and ambitious, and McKibben says alignment with business functions, particularly finance and operations, has been critical to overhauling the process. Record-breaking demand has the company operating at peak performance, and the CIO is confident the reimagined implementation will allow the company to raise its own operating capabilities.

There are the operational and procedural evolutions, and then there are the cultural ones. McKibben quotes Peter Drucker’s phrase “Culture eats strategy for breakfast,” and the ways that axiom is being applied at UCT is precisely what helps differentiate it among its competition.

“We talk about ‘One UCT’ here in everything that we do,” the CIO says. “It’s essential, because if you’re not addressing the culture question, you’re never going to get the consistency of process that we want.”

McKibben says the commitment to culture building provided a strong allure in coming to UCT. Every all-hands meeting, led by CEO Jim Scholhamer, focuses on the company’s six core values. McKibben leads with those values when explaining things that may need to change. If adjustments are aligned with core values, they’ll be better understood, accepted, and adopted across the wider organization.

“You shouldn’t tie your identity to any one particular technology, because the landscape is always changing.”

JEFF MCKIBBEN

Smart Manufacturing. Empowered People.

Build

The success of the CIO’s leadership can be traced to several of the personal tenets that he has developed for himself over the years. He believes these standards can aid future tech leaders on their own paths.

“You shouldn’t tie your identity to any one particular technology, because the landscape is always changing,” McKibben says. “Your value should be about your understanding of how to use that technology, regardless of your position, to drive successful outcomes for the business.”

Additionally, one should pursue an organization that they can truly align with. It speaks to McKibben’s long tenures in his previous roles. By finding the right organization, one can make opportunities for the advancement of their own career and skill set within that organization. Or, as McKibben puts it, “make your organization successful, and the opportunities will follow.”

And no matter how driven one might be, the role a mentor can play in one’s development is incalculable. McKibben mentions former colleagues and mentors like Kevin Haskew, Paul Petersen, and Garry Gray whose leadership helped grow McKibben as a manager and executive in his own right.

“Western culture tends to focus on individual credit and achievement, but what about all of those people in Edison’s lab?” McKibben asks. “Every one of us is standing on the shoulders of giants, and those people always need to be appreciated.”

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Shaping Culture 60 Years In

How Derek Sarsfield leverages his unique skill set to establish a company culture by investing in leadership and development

By BILLY YOST

Derek Sarsfield understands that “engineer-turned-HRprofessional” seems almost like a complete about-face both in profession and approach. He illustrates this through the universal medium of the Sunday comics.

When Sarsfield informs people that he was once an engineer, their first reaction tends to be bewilderment, as in “how could that be?” There is Dilbert, the engineer who always goes up against his boss, and Catbert, “the evil HR director,” Sarsfield says with a laugh. “I think that comic went a long way in

Consultative. Easy.

Personal. Proven.

Congratulations, Derek!

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1 “2020 Defined Contribution Recordkeeping Survey,” PLANSPONSOR, 2020.

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MGTS-P- 316154-GE 04/22 316154

MGR0215222035577 | 316154

creating this perception of what seems like two very different worlds. People think they should be diametrically opposed.”

The current chief human resources officer at Deflecto’s global headquarters in Indianapolis provides a fascinating glimpse into just how far one can grow into an entirely different field. Sarsfield has been bolstered by skills that may not have initially seemed applicable but have proven invaluable as the definition of “effective HR professional” has grown and evolved over time.

The CHRO says his journey may be more unique than most, but his evolution into the HR space coincided perfectly with the growing body of work by University of Michigan professor Dave Ulrich, who was named BusinessWeek ’s “#1 Management Educator & Guru.” Ulrich championed HR leaders as more than what they were traditionally seen as—business partners and business enablers—during the 1990s and into the present.

“There was a growing movement that business acumen and a fundamental understanding of financial data was imperative to being an HR leader,” Sarsfield remembers. “Whereas some people who were already in the space may have found that uncomfortable, I felt like those were skills and abilities that I already possessed.”

It motivated Sarsfield to secure his MBA in management and leadership and set him down the HR path. He amassed progressively more senior roles in the HR space and in joining Deflecto in 2019, he was charged with helping build out company culture and modernizing the organization’s HR employee programs and initiatives, driven by data, metrics and analysis.

Deflecto is a sixty-year-old company, and the new CHRO knew he had his work cut out for him. While the company boasts many long-tenured employees—a sign of both culture and commitment—Sarsfield needed to bring Deflecto’s infrastructure, processes and policies into the twenty-first century and help it compete in one of the tightest job markets.

Organizational design has been fundamental with several leadership roles to fill, and Sarsfield recognized the need to get a pulse on the organization through

employee feedback to better understand how to address change management. The insights for the leadership team were invaluable and subsequently it introduced an annual employee engagement survey, along with recognition programs including its quarterly Core Values Awards.

“Understanding people is crucial and the first step to managing change. The company can’t tackle process or systematic change if we don’t first understand our employees and where they are in this journey,” Sarsfield explains. The team went beyond the survey and recognition programs by creating an online learning program. “Our digital learning platform has been expanded beyond the basics with content for skill development as well as tracks for those with aspirations into higher leadership levels.”

The tight job market is also an ongoing challenge. Deflecto has increased both its wages and benefits to stay competitive, but Sarsfield says there’s a groundswell with human capital today and it is not a one-sizefits-all model. It has to be personalized for the company, location, and the employees.

“Retention is the most significant aspect a company has to control,” Sarsfield explains. “We do this proactively by taking action on feedback, training our people leaders, having fun employee events, and connecting with our employees while considering the whole person. Post-COVID, we have all established a new level of empathy and flexibility.

“Ultimately,” he continues, “my mission is to make Deflecto a great place to work, with an actively engaged workforce who

work

our clients to ensure their plan is easy to manage, personal to the participant, and delivers proven results.1

“Understanding people is crucial and the first step to managing change.”

DEREK SARSFIELD

have the tools and capabilities to do great things.”

The CHRO says he is always mindful that most employees quit their manager, not their job or company. A reflection of that reality is Deflecto’s investment in developing its leaders. Once the company has spent the time, effort, and money on a quality candidate, it only makes sense to do everything to keep them.

In the coming year, Sarsfield says Deflecto may engage in some significant M&A activities, which can be incredibly time-consuming both on the due diligence side as well as all of the activities during the post-acquisition period.

“There are so many considerations, especially when you’re talking about integrating culture,” Sarsfield says. “And doing it right matters.” The idea of concurrently working to integrate a new company may seem daunting, but Sarsfield’s experience allows him a disposition much more attuned to a mantra of “all in good time.”

It’s yet another interesting component of the walking contradiction that is Derek Sarsfield. The engineer-turned-CHRO is as comfortable sorting through financials and data as he is on the softer side of employee interaction. He’s a culture builder whose knowledge of the ones and zeros can back him up every step of the way.

Derek Sarsfield CHRO Deflecto

PICKLEBALL, ANYONE?

While Derek Sarsfield spends three to four days a week in the gym, his real passion is found on the pickleball court. If you’re not sure what pickleball is, then think of a sport somewhere between tennis, badminton, and ping-pong.

Called the fastest-growing sport in the country by NPR, pickleball is an activity that can be enjoyed by all ages, with no discernible youth advantage for those skilled enough to pick their shots carefully.

Sarsfield recounts visiting his mother-in-law in Florida and seeing actual stadiums with dozens of courts filled with players. He is now a full convert, and his enthusiasm is infectious. “A year ago, I had never heard of it,” Sarsfield says. “I’ll warn you, though, it’s addicting.”

Courtesy of Derek Sarsfield

People Hold the Power

Jamie Moore shares his innovative recruiting philosophy that is taking Upstart to new heights

By ZACH BALIVA

Life today is filled with autonomous vehicles, virtual assistants, and advanced robotics. Artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the world, and Upstart is leveraging this new tool to revolutionize lending and increase consumers’ access to affordable credit. As vice president of recruiting, Jamie Moore applies an innovative philosophy to help Upstart onboard the right talent to take the business into the future.

Ex-Googlers started the company in 2012 and quickly built an AI-backed lending marketplace that pairs banks with borrowers.

Jamie Moore VP of Recruiting Upstart

“Upstart is an absolute rocket ship. Software engineering, machine learning, and products may lead the way, but it all rises or falls with people.”

JAMIE MOORE

They started small, pursued aggressive growth, and closed an initial public offering in 2020. “Upstart is an absolute rocket ship. Software engineering, machine learning, and products may lead the way, but it all rises or falls with people,” says Moore, who joined in 2019 to help the company execute its long-term strategies.

California-native Moore has the right background of demonstrated experience building teams at high-growth start-ups to lead Upstart’s recruiting strategy. After building a solid foundation as a technical recruiter at Aerotek, Moore spent a number of years at Google during an important era of fast change.

He managed all staffing operations in Android, Chrome, Apps, and Social product areas and hired more than two hundred sourcers and recruiters while advising leaders on fulfilling their objectives. Moore brought in many of the world’s top software engineers and moved into a sourcing account manager position to act as a liaison between the product leaders and executives charged with successfully staffing to meet business goals.

As Moore consulted and built road maps for executives to meet their goals, he learned how to harness the power of analytics within the Google system. In the process, his teams uncovered some problems with high-volume hiring.

Most notably, Google was losing out on repurposing highly skilled candidates who were not an exact fit for narrow job descriptions. Moore learned JavaScript and basic coding to create a tool that flagged candidates for ongoing consideration. He took his design to engineers, who refined and implemented it into their hiring system.

When two of Moore’s colleagues started cybersecurity firm Shape Security in 2014, Moore joined them as director of recruiting. The move took him from the nirvana of Google to a one-room office filled with folding tables and laptops. He spent a year building a team of five recruiters and two sourcers who helped him onboard niche talent and open offices in London, Utah, and Ukraine.

Shape Security raised over $90 million in venture capital as Moore brought in the right workforce to help it mature and attract investors. In early 2020, F5 acquired Shape for $1 billion.

Today, Upstart is on a similar path, and Moore has spent the past three years helping the company’s leaders scale the operation while prioritizing high-quality candidate placement. “We’ve made recruiting a key function of the business,” he says. “Talent acquisition is more than a routine administrative arm. We have to be smart about bringing in the right people who will set us apart and help us do something special.”

Although Moore needs to attract and onboard many people in a hyper-growth phase, he refuses to sacrifice quality. A

success. Jamie’s dynamic leadership style and problem-solving approach is a driving force for the health of our partnership.”

A continuous focus on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) helps Upstart stay on the leading edge of tech and is especially important to fulfilling its mission. Upstart’s AI lending platform unlocks credit options for many people without access to affordable credit, and many come from under-represented communities. In 2020, Upstart’s model approved 30 percent more Black borrowers at interest rates that are 11 percent lower than traditional models and approved 27.2 percent more Hispanic borrowers at interest rates that are 10.5 percent lower than traditional models.

Moore is putting steps in place to drive sustainable results related to DEI. “I have zero interest in pursuing diversity for the optics,” he says. “We do it because diverse companies create strong products, and I want this company to do the right thing and be successful at the same time.”

Upstart has quarterly diversity training and twenty-three robust employee resource groups. These programs help ensure diverse candidates have the advancement opportunities they need to thrive. Additionally, Moore and his colleagues have created strong partnerships with outside groups like Techtonica (which helps women and non-binary adults overcome barriers into the tech industry) and Out in Tech (which unites the LGBTQ+ tech community) to create more opportunities and give back.

strong team keeps him accountable. “I’m not a natural recruiter,” Moore jokes. “So I make it a priority hire the best ones in the world.”

He’s built out Upstart’s sourcing division from seven to fifty-one people and expects to hit sixty-five by the end of the year. Two dozen Golden Hive staffing professionals complement their efforts. Together, Moore’s staff has taken Upstart from two hundred to two thousand employees.

“Multiple alignment factors go into developing a valuable RPO [recruitment process outsourcing] engagement,” says Kelly Guitilla, president of Golden Hive. “Strong and collaborative leadership is of the utmost importance for long term relationship

In February 2022, Upstart announced earnings for Q4 2021 and calendar year 2021. The company grew in terms of scale and revenue, as well as profits. Revenue grew to $849 million in 2021 from $233 million in 2020, which amounts to 264 percent year-over year. After attracting millions of customers and originating more than $20 billion in personal loans, the company is targeting new forms of lending.

In 2021, Upstart entered auto lending. Next, its leaders are targeting small business lending and mortgages. The Upstart rocket shows no signs of slowing down, and Moore’s teams are in place to make sure the organization has the right people in place to steer it on its ongoing rise.

“Talent acquisition is more than a routine administrative arm. We have to be smart about bringing in the right people who will set us apart and help us do something special.”

JAMIE MOORE

A Different Approach to Privacy

Elizabeth Hein draws on her expertise to build an effective program for the teams that drive innovation

By BILLY YOST

The chance to come to Foursquare was an exciting opportunity for Elizabeth Hein, an attorney with a passion for privacy and an incredible résumé of experience. She spent nine years at Alston & Bird, where she served as an international trade partner, then six years at HP Inc. as the senior compliance counsel responsible for global privacy and trade. Throughout her entire legal career, Hein has been advising clients on building compliance programs.

But Foursquare presented an opportunity of a different kind: a place where a culture of compliance was already embedded into the DNA of the organization and where she would have the chance to lead the organization into the future of privacy.

“It was a chance for me to truly build my vision for an effective privacy program,” explains Hein, who is Foursquare’s associate general counsel for privacy, product, and compliance. “In my previous experiences, I was just the lawyer supporting privacy and compliance. This was my chance to drive the whole program end-to-end.”

It’s been just over a year, but Hein has already made incredible gains. She’s spent time getting to know the business, understanding the processes of Foursquare’s engineers and product managers, and learning how privacy and compliance can be a partner in innovation when they’re working together from the onset of product development.

Hein says that when she came into the role, she spent significant time assessing the landscape and ultimately designed an approached that homed in on just a few key areas of focus to address immediately. “You can’t boil the ocean,” she explains. “It can be tempting from a compliance perspective, but you have to start by focusing on the most critical areas.”

Compliance efforts won’t be successful if they aren’t supporting the business, Hein notes. Assessing risk has to be balanced with the broader strategy of the organization. The key to a successful compliance

Elizabeth Hein Associate General Counsel for Privacy, Product & Compliance Foursquare

Think privacy programs have to be manual, slow, and inefficient? Think again.

With TerraTrue, you can identify risks, spot issues, and offer tailored guidance to product teams — all in real-time. Brands like Lyft Robinhood, Foursquare, and Roku use TerraTrue to do privacy right.

“We’ve got the core tools, processes, and team in place. . . . It’s really about evangelizing privacy throughout the entire organization.”

ELIZABETH HEIN

organization is understanding where one’s priorities lie and executing with the business in mind.

To build out her team, Hein was able to bring in some privacy and compliance experts with whom she had previously worked and who would complement the expertise of the existing team. But as someone who spent much of her career as an individual contributor, Hein says she’s focused on improving her ability to delegate and sharpen her management skills. In some cases, that means simply staying out of the way of her high-performing team so she is better able to focus on more strategic goals.

“Since I’ve been here, I’ve really focused on giving my team the opportunity and space to grow, learn, and lead in order to advance Foursquare’s mission without me getting in their way,” Hein explains. “I’m very clear about my goals and expectations, and I think the relationships we’ve built within the team makes execution easier.”

Another huge differentiator for Hein lies in Foursquare’s journey as a company. The company is at a unique inflection point, and Hein is leveraging transformation throughout the organization and taking privacy to the teams that drive innovation to ensure that privacy is at the core of all Foursquare does. This way, everyone plays a role in protecting privacy.

Hein says working to build out a program that is met with enthusiasm by the wider organization comes down to fitting with existing processes at the company and building relationships, especially with engineers and product teams. The privacy team worked with data privacy platform company TerraTrue to take privacy to the product and engineering organizations by embedding automated privacy reviews into the tools and processes that already exist. No calls to legal or privacy necessary. No proactive reach outs required. The privacy team is already there working with Foursquare innovators and builders.

“This has allowed the privacy team to work with the engineering and product organizations to align with their processes and schedule,” Hein explains. “We can be part of the process during the planning phase and support them as they work through their building cycles. Legal and compliance don’t usually work in two-week sprints, but we do now.”

That willingness to adapt is part of a broader strategy Hein and her team have employed to remove the onus of having to seek out privacy support. Instead, she’s bringing privacy to the engineering and product teams so that they are working in lockstep. If the team’s goal is to support

the broader business, it can’t be seen as imposing tools or processes that become roadblocks to innovation.

Hein says that because Foursquare has long been a leader in privacy, the organization is always hungry for more involvement from the privacy team. With increased involvement comes increased demand.

“People here are taking our new approach to privacy so well that it’s kind of exploded,” Hein admits. “I’m thinking about future growth and how we can work to scale this. We’ve got the core tools, processes, and team in place. Who else throughout the organization can take even more leadership when it comes to providing privacy guidance? It’s really about evangelizing privacy throughout the entire organization.”

It speaks again to the value of relationship-building that Hein says is essential for her team to be successful. She says that while her team is focused on a grassroots approach towards embedding new privacy processes, the kind of success she’s had over the last year wouldn’t have been made possible without fierce support from the top.

“We have strong support and clear direction from our CEO and executive team to continue to lean in on privacy,” Hein says. “It is a really exciting time and place to be advancing privacy initiatives.”

“I’m very clear about my goals and expectations, and I think the relationships we’ve built within the team makes execution easier.”

ELIZABETH HEIN

Working Capital

By ZACH BALIVA

BDP International and Lilian Burke were a perfect match when she joined in 2018. The company, which operates freight logistics centers in more than 135 countries, was in a growth phase and needed more structure to its financial operations. A veteran treasury executive and strategic thinker, Burke brought deep experience transforming global organizations.

BDP’s vice president and corporate treasurer spent nearly three decades contributing to teams and leading treasury functions in financial services, manufacturing, healthcare, pharmaceutical, and other complex sectors. Burke came to BDP for the chance to build its treasury department from the ground up. “I specialize in creating the right kind of a department to take an organization forward, and I knew I could make a real impact here,” she says.

In 2018, BDP’s growth had amassed nearly $3 billion in annual sales. Each day, its employees worked behind the scenes to manage the thousands of time-sensitive payments and confirmations to enable shipments and other activities.

Small, regional teams not only endured time-consuming manual processes to make it all work, but also navigated cumbersome and inefficient structures. At one point, BDP used sixty banks and five hundred different accounts. “Innovation is key,” Burke says. “A streamlined treasury department can reduce costs and help an organization thrive.”

That’s what she set out to do. Burke spent her first ninety days observing the current state to identify risk and align her goals with BDP’s overall strategy. After understanding

the cash cycle, payment process, and banking structure, she created a prioritized action plan.

That plan hinged on getting the right team in place. Burke hired three treasury managers, assigned them to different geographical regions, and spent time working with her counterparts across BDP to offer her support and solicit their input for her plan. She used what she learned from these important conversations to refine her initiatives, and then moved to simplify banking relationships. She negotiated better prices and reduced the number of BDP’s banking partners from sixty to three.

Burke also moved BDP’s payables to a cloud-based platform that sends payment files directly to banks over a secure system in accordance with international regulations. By replacing multiple bank portals with one uniform model, she’s given her team greater visibility over outgoing cash flows and increased their ability to manage and track all accounts. The new solution also reduces input errors, speeds up shipments, and increases client satisfaction.

These efforts have helped BDP maintain strong partnerships with banks and clients despite ongoing supply chain issues and challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic and other world events. “Our customers trust us to deliver, and a new treasury department has helped BDP do that even in uncertain times,” Burke says.

As she continues to refine the plan, the experienced treasury leader looks to give everyone on her team the chance to grow and evolve. “I don’t view leadership as a quest for title or power,” she says. “I’m here to help people get the resources they need to perform well and realize their full

“Innovation is key. A streamlined treasury department can reduce costs and help an organization thrive.”

LILIAN BURKE

potential.” BDP’s lean treasury function affords her colleagues the chance to develop new skills, and Burke hopes those working with her will go on to lead their own departments in the future.

Throughout her career, Burke benefited from bosses and leaders, who made similar investments in her own professional growth.

Born in Chile, she came to the United States at age twenty-one to continue her college education. After graduation, she started her career as a credit analyst at JPMorgan, and then moved to Tyco Toys, beginning her experience in treasury management.

As she moved through different industries and worked in companies owned by private equity firms, Burke learned how to work efficiently within different financial structures to bring the kind of value shareholders expect. During a five-year stint at Archroma, she developed the treasury management structure for the Americas region, formed all key banking relationships, and supported the chemicals company’s aggressive growth plan.

With all that she’s achieved in her long and distinguished career, Burke has her sights set on a new goal: board service. “We’re still seeing a huge lack of representation for women and diversity when it comes to leading corporations, and it’s time to change that,” she says. While she looks for new opportunities to leverage her skills, the VP remains committed to further aligning BDP’s treasury function to the organization’s overall goals.

Today, the company has emerged as one of the world’s biggest logistics providers, with 5,400 BDP employees serving over 5,000 customers. Burke and her high-performing treasury team will help drive continued growth.

Treasury Intelligence Solutions is reimagining the world of enterprise payments through a cloudbased platform uniquely designed to help global organizations optimize outbound payments. Organizations leverage TIS to transform how they connect global accounts, collaborate on payment processes, analyze cash flow, forecast, and manage risk. The TIS platform helps businesses improve operational efficiency, lower risk, manage liquidity, and gain a strategic advantage.

J.P. Morgan is proud to partner with Lilian Burke and BDP International

Chase Commercial Banking serves clients nationwide including corporations, municipalities, financial institutions and not-for-profit entities with annual revenue generally ranging from $20 million to $2 billion, and provides financing to real estate investors and owners.

With offices in the top 50 US metropolitan areas, and a coverage model that expands internationally, Chase Commercial Banking provides clients access to dependable local banking solutions and global financial capabilities.

By partnering with the firm’s other businesses, Chase Commercial Banking provides a variety of comprehensive solutions to meet our clients’ domestic and international financial needs.

We love success stories. Let us help build yours.

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2022 Chase, J.P. Morgan, and JPMorgan Chase are marketing names for certain businesses of JPMorgan Chase & Co. and its affiliates and subsidiaries worldwide (collectively, “JPMC”).1259631

Rethink Retail

In a competitive and changing world, Scott Rankin leads KPMG’s launch of Elevate to bring data-driven performance transformation to clients worldwide

By ZACH BALIVA

KPMG’s capabilities can tell leaders from the world’s largest multinational consumer goods companies how much money they made on a single item sold in a mom-and-pop store in Lexington, Kentucky, last Tuesday.

The need to quickly pinpoint precise information might seem like overkill, but there is a huge value in specificity. Rankin is a principal and the national advisory industry leader for KPMG’s consumer and retail practice and service leader for performance transformation. He partners with senior executives of the world’s largest consumer goods and retail brands.

Companies who understand exactly where and how they make money can target focused changes to drive improved results. “Our new capabilities to bring a data-driven approach is changing everything,” Rankin says. “We have complete visibility to help clients identify the best opportunities to create value for their organizations.”

The KPMG Elevate offering can now leverage advanced analytic tools, big data, and industry expertise to integrate every single transaction from retail stores, e-commerce sites, and wholesale purchases into a single data repository. That information, synthesized with cost data, employee census reports, shipping and logistics information, and go-to-market expenses, creates a fully allocated view of profitability. They then run

Courtesy of Scott Rankin

Scott Rankin Principal and National Advisory Leader, Consumer & Retail KPMG

proprietary algorithms to generate detailed dashboards that highlight key business performance metrics.

The process—unheard of and unattainable five years ago—now takes less than six weeks from start to finish.

Rankin joined KPMG in 2015 to build a new performance transformation group dedicated to giving leading companies what they need to take the next step in a changing and uncertain retail landscape. The endeavor, known as KPMG Elevate, is based on the next-generation KPMG analytics platform.

“This is a results-driven model,” Rankin says. “Once we find issues to address, we work closely with clients to create measurable goals and tangible implementation plans that accelerate profitability.”

The methodology often leads to dramatic results. Rankin and his KPMG colleagues approach most large projects in two phases. First, they capture disparate data sets and identify value opportunities. Then they develop a targeted and rapid implementation plan. Last year, they helped a multibillion-dollar manufacturer and retailer understand where and how to optimize profitability across forty countries, multiple channels, and dozens of brands.

Deep and varied experience gives Rankin the ability to connect with his clients in meaningful ways. He earned a degree in finance, started consulting, went to business school, and then spent many years at Staples driving corporate strategy and merchandising groups. Taking a series of different roles with increasing responsibility in retail, e-commerce, and business-to-business units provided Rankin with the chance to implement the suggestions he once made as a consultant and helped him appreciate all the challenges his retail clients face.

After a decade in leadership, Rankin left the corporate world for the chance to help a small start-up launch a cross-retail mobile wallet for payments, coupons, and offers. Instead of working in a nice office at a publicly traded company, he spent his days raising money and hiring new talent to take a concept to the market.

The time Rankin spent as an industry and start-up executive has made him into a better consultant. “I’ve seen the unique struggles of a start-up, and I’ve felt the intense pressure of running a large team inside a multinational public entity,” says Rankin, who ran a multibillion-dollar portfolio at Staples. “And that means I

can help our clients tackle the problems they face.”

The problems retail clients face seem greater than ever before. In fact, Rankin says that retailers face a “challenging new reality” in the post-COVID world. He expects a shifting and increasingly tight labor force, coupled with concerns around inflation, to make it even more challenging to navigate these times. Meanwhile, delivery options and shifting trends in consumer preferences post-pandemic are making e-commerce options more standard.

As some retailers face challenges and others consider strategic alternatives, only the bold and agile competitors will survive. “Retail and consumer goods companies have to move forward in this environment. Historically, our clients wanted insight, but now they want impact. They want clear results,” Rankin says.

Rankin and his team give clients the information they need to respond to today’s changing world. The unique multidisciplinary and data-driven approach lets clients navigate the new normal and elevate their business to the next level. That’s what the KPMG Elevate platform is built to provide.

“Our new capabilities to bring a data-driven approach is changing everything. We have complete visibility to help clients identify the best opportunities to create value for their organizations.”

SCOTT RANKIN

COMPANY

A look behind the scenes of company-wide initiatives and goals, acquisitions, and brand development

Harveer Singh, Western Union

Marie-Jeanne Matei, Ferrero USA

Brian Downs, Shift4

Barry Gardner, MSD Wayne Township

Ozie Pela, KIND

Beyond Money Transfers

Chief Data Architect Harveer Singh is leading a digital transformation with data to reinvent Western Union as an agile leader in fintech

By ZACH BALIVA

Harveer Singh

Chief Data Architect and Global Head of Data Engineering & Architecture Western Union

Many customers associate Western Union (WU) with money orders and wire transfers, but the New York-based business has a broad history of innovation dating back to 1851. That’s when Samuel Selden, Hiram Sibley, and others started their company. Ten years later, they finished the nation’s first transcontinental telegraph. Money transfers came in 1871, followed by products like charge cards, singing telegrams, faxes, and commercial email. Western Union introduced a mobile money transfer service in 2008 and launched its transfer app in 2011.

These efforts have made Western Union a global financial services powerhouse with 150 million customers in 200 countries, and now, the company has new ambitions. Western Union wants to leverage the scope of its respected network to reinvent itself as a leader in fintech.

Harveer Singh is chief data architect and global head of data engineering and architecture. He’s leading a full-scale, comprehensive digital transformation project designed to help the 170-year-old company compete with agile start-ups and savvy disruptors like Wise, Remitly, Azimo, and Xoom.

Singh’s interests, background, and experience make him the perfect person to

take on the high-stakes task. He was born in India and studied computer science in Punjab but left his home country to escape genocides that targeted its Sikh community. Australia became home, and as Singh pursued a master’s in engineering at Sydney’s University of Technology, he deepened his knowledge of computers and coding.

“I taught myself to build websites and that led me to experiment with ways I could take this developing passion even further,” he explains.

It didn’t take long for Singh to realize his emerging talent could not only set him apart as a student but also give him the foundation for a business. He started assembling computers and selling them to other students to earn money for room and board. Singh developed a good reputation on campus, and business started to pick up.

But there was just one issue—he needed a streamlined way to price, order, track, and manage the dozens of components required to maintain his operation. As Singh wrote his own C++ application to handle the inventory management challenges, he understood the power of technology to solve business problems.

The exercise put Singh on a new path and solidified his commitment to software engineering. He joined Accenture as an information management consultant and spent six years traveling the world

to implement data projects in various countries. He then went to Deloitte to lead an enterprise data management practice before consulting on business transformation at IBM and leading key digital groups at EY. Singh transitioned to his current role at Western Union in 2020.

As a leader at the multinational corporation, Singh owns data platforms that support customer-facing applications. His teams are responsible for marketing technology, cloud data operations, data privacy, digital banking integrations, conversational chatbots, and a customer loyalty platform that is live in thirty-three countries worldwide.

The global COVID-19 pandemic made modernization an imperative. Revenue from Western Union’s digital money transfer services spiked from $600 million in 2019 to over $850 million in 2020. Over the last two years, Singh has been accelerating Western Union’s tech plan.

“As users turn to our services in bigger numbers and as many new digital players come to the market, we know we have to change,” he says. “We don’t want to simply offer some new services or engage our customers with some new features. We want to be a true fintech player.”

The journey began with a move away from expensive and outdated data warehouses. Singh prioritized this transition and moved quickly to take the entire WU data

platform to the cloud in just nine months. The migration, driven by a company called Snowflake, reduced Western Union’s costs by 50 percent.

During this process, Singh and his colleagues kept an eye on emerging trends and moved to respond to changing needs. “We realized that we wanted to engage our customers on their terms with a single voice,” he says.

To accomplish that goal, Singh’s teams started investing in an omnichannel platform, centralized data, and personalized marketing efforts.

As part of this effort, Western Union began leveraging the customer data platform mParticle. “mParticle helps companies improve overall data agility and quality while easily connecting their data sources to activation partners,” says Jillian Burnett, senior vice president of customer success at mParticle. Western Union also launched an artificial intelligence chatbot in dozens of countries to reduce wait times.

But if Western Union wants to lead in the fintech space, the company will have to add value and build new products to embed itself into the life of each customer. “Millions of customers already come to us for money transfer, but we’re showing that we can do so much more,” Singh says.

He’s recruiting new partners to Western Union’s loyalty program and collaborating with other leaders to introduce complementary options like cashback products while investigating the possible use of digital assets.

In 2021, Western Union launched an integrated digital banking pilot in Germany and Romania. The money transfer platform offers a multicurrency account and debit

card, allowing customers to load, transfer, and use funds in any of sixteen currencies.

Western Union’s system showed its potential power when international conflicts broke out across Ukraine in early 2022: while the war paralyzed traditional banks, refugees were able to use WU’s network most effectively and make money transfers free of cost to Ukraine.

Even in a frenetic and fragmented world, Singh is prioritizing teams and relationships. He values diversity and knows that empowered coworkers will help him build Western Union’s future. “To lead is to learn and to learn is to commune,” he says. He takes time to socialize with everyone on his team so they can build trust and drive better results together.

The digital transformation is helping Western Union emerge from a challenging two-year era. Although retail business declined during the pandemic, digital sales remained strong. In fact, the company saw double-digit growth in the space in its most recent quarter.

Now, with a global reach, robust platform, refined features, and renewed commitment to customer experience, the iconic company is set to compete in the exciting world of financial technology.

“Millions of customers already come to us for money transfer, but we’re showing that we can do so much more.”

HARVEER SINGH

mParticle makes it easy to manage customer data along the entire product and customer life cycle. Teams across companies like NBCUniversal, Spotify, and Airbnb use mParticle to turn data chaos into data order, stay agile amidst market and regulatory changes, and personalize every step of the customer journey. Founded in 2013, mParticle is headquartered in New York City with offices in San Francisco, Seattle, Sydney, and London.

With Many Sweet Returns

Marie-Jeanne Matei brings an ideal mix of e-commerce and marketing experience to Ferrero’s digital platforms

By BILLY YOST

If you don’t remember the moment when Nutella fundamentally changed the perception of what is allowed to go on toast, you haven’t tried it yet. The hazelnut and cocoa spread that seemed to appear out of nowhere to US consumers in the early 2010s was one of Europe’s best-kept secrets for decades.

Pietro Ferrero concocted a formula he would tinker with for years in his hometown of Alba, Italy, after attempting to return to a more normal life following World War II. Today, his family-owned company boasts some of the most well-known brands in the world: Nutella, Tic Tac, Ferrero Rocher, Kinder, Butterfinger, Crunch, Baby Ruth, Fannie May, and more.

One might think the product sells itself. But veteran marketer and e-commerce expert Marie-Jeanne Matei and her team have doubled the online business in just two short years—and she’s pushing to triple it in just a few more.

It’s an incredible impact to make, especially since she joined the company just a few months before the COVID-19 lockdown and welcoming her first child into the world. Matei’s impressive track record bears investigation, but her own recipe for success isn’t nearly as closely-guarded as those for the sweets she markets.

RISING FAST

“I’m an immigrant who had to figure everything out from scratch,” Matei says simply. “I just had to learn to be agile, nimble, and

to persevere. I worked really hard and created those growth opportunities for myself, but was also fortunate enough to have a few people along the way who believed in me and gave me a fighting chance.”

Matei spent the entirety of her early years in Romania, where she was born and raised and where she studied and accumulated her early marketing experience. Matei completed her MBA at Northeastern University and joined IBM through the company’s graduate internship program. She would spend six formative years at IBM, constantly moving into new roles and more senior positions.

“Almost everything I do now has its entry point at IBM,” the VP explains. “As a consultant, I had the opportunity to work on a variety of different projects with really

great teams and experts in their field, which helped me develop a very solid foundation of cross-industry expertise.”

Matei collaborated with Fortune 500 companies to help them understand their opportunities and challenges in the digital space while developing strategies and digital capabilities to help achieve market growth and internal efficiencies.

Ferrero isn’t Matei’s first dip into the chocolate world, either. Prior to joining the company, she spent almost three years at the Hershey Company, where annual promotions seemed to be customary for the rising executive. It was an ideal time to join the company, as the new CEO was focused on utilizing digital capabilities to boost revenue. It would lay the groundwork for the extensive growth she would help drive at Ferrero.

“Everything is so new, and we have so much happening that it’s vital for me to make sure our team is connected to every part of the company.”

MARIE-JEANNE MATEI

Marie-Jeanne Matei VP of E-Commerce Ferrero USA

Courtesy of Marie-Jeanne Matei

WE ARE THE

The challenges that marketers lose sleep over are the very things we dream about: uncovering, creating and sustaining Growth for the brands we work with. We believe in the power of data-driven intelligence to uncover the most rewarding Growth opportunities with our clients and to fuel creativity that delivers results. Our work starts conversations, creates connections and drives conversion that can be measured and optimized in real time through our core capabilities: Retail Experience Design, Retail Marketing, eCommerce & Social Commerce, Connected Commerce Media, Brand Communications & Activation, and Technology & Innovation.

At Ferrero, Matei doesn’t just help develop the business’s digital capabilities. She oversees the long-term e-commerce strategy and online business performance. At the same time, she’s built out a highperforming team of e-commerce experts that continues to grow.

“I’ve been here two years, and I’m the veteran of the team,” says Matei, who is currently vice president of e-commerce for the US market. “Everything is so new, and we have so much happening that it’s vital for me to make sure our team is connected to every part of the company.”

A DIGITAL SHELF FRAMEWORK

OUR SERVICES:

Retail Experience Design

Retial Marketing

eCommerce & Social Commerce

Connected Commerce Media

Brand Communications & Activation

Technology & Innovation

A significant contributor to Matei’s early success at Ferrero was her development of a very simple but comprehensive framework that identifies the key enablers of the digital shelf.

“I always go back to this ‘digital shelf framework’ to reground my team and the rest of the organization in what are the must-haves to drive sales online and guide our prioritization in terms of resources and time,” she says.

wherever the consumer is in their online shopping journey.

It’s a gross generalization of an incredibly detailed and assembled road map that has been built out and implemented. But even in those details, Matei stresses the need for adaptability.

“I appreciate leadership supporting this initiative because it allows us to achieve aggressive goals with the autonomy to move quickly and with agility,” the VP explains. “We need to work cross-functionally while also being nimble. It’s a difficult balance, but my team has performed incredibly.”

That delicate balance isn’t new for Ferrero. Matei says the company nurtures all the benefits of a family-owned company while still executing ambitious growth strategies. Ferrero is now in its third generation of family leadership, and Matei is keenly aware of the love that the company’s brands command for its consumers across the world.

For more information about our services, visit: integer.com/services/

The framework is supported by three main pillars: portfolio, content, and paid media. Broadly speaking, the portfolio piece ensures the right pack is on hand for online shopping. Content is built to inform and inspire consumers to try the product. And paid media helps get eyes on the product

That family atmosphere is important for the VP, whose entire extended family still resides in Romania. Now, with a family of her own, Matei has a renewed appreciation for the value of being somewhere that can feel like home.

“Packing a bag and moving halfway across the world isn’t for everyone,” Matei admits. “You need to feel that you are part of something bigger. That’s the culture here, and I’m excited to continue leveraging my experiences into new and exciting projects.”

“You need to feel that you are part of something bigger. That’s the culture here.”

MARIE-JEANNE MATEI

Fueling the Shift4 Rocket Ship

By BILLY YOST

In the words of Brian Downs, Shift4 is a rocket ship. The integrated payments and commerce technology company has processed billions of transactions for its massive customer base since its 1999 founding in the garage of then-sixteen-year-old Jared Isaacman. The company has acquired thirteen companies in an effort to create a seamless end-to-end payment system, gone public, and even sponsored a seat on last year’s Inspiration4 mission, the first all-civilian mission to orbit, commanded by its company founder, literally, to raise money for St. Jude’s Hospital.

The kind of exponential growth and evolution required by Shift4 seems like it would have blown through executives in its tenure. The rapidity of pace and stretching

Brian Downs has been part of Shift4’s explosive growth every step of the way, from building financial foundations to the company’s IPO

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Brian Downs SVP of Finance & Treasury

required by even the most agile of business practitioners seems like it would be too much for any person to manage.

Enter the seventeen-year tenure of Downs, who is currently senior vice president of finance and treasury. The executive has grown up at Shift4 in more ways than one. The company that was founded by his friend since middle school also became his first employer straight out of Penn State. The finance operations and procedures that Downs helped to employ early on have grown in scope and framework, but his fingerprints are all over the success of Shift4.

“So much has changed since we were using Quickbooks,” Downs says. “I’ve also tried to build for growth here, and I’ve had the chance to do just about everything someone in my position would hope for in a career.”

Downs is only thirty-nine, and he’s absolutely correct. Whatever special skill set can be expected of a high-performing executive officer, Downs has built it by doing it. It’s an imperative distinction. Downs didn’t land an established position that needed simple oversight and maintenance. For every herculean leap Shift4 has made, Downs has helped build the road map to get there.

The most shining example of Downs’s evolution as a senior financial leader is Shift4’s 2020 initial public offering (IPO). The SVP is quick to point out that an IPO requires far more than a single contributor, but his contributions cannot be overlooked. Downs owned the financial model build and was a major contributor to Sarbanes-Oxley

“I’ve had the chance to do just about everything someone in my position would hope for in a career.”

BRIAN DOWNS

Creative Lens Photography

readiness, analyst presentations, revenue recognition and segment memos, and management discussion and analysis work.

“The auditing we had to undergo using the PCAOB [Public Company Accounting Oversight Board] standards was new for us as a private company and really hit our finance teams hard,” Downs recalls. “My team and I really worked to assist the process. It was ‘all hands on deck’ in virtually every way.”

At the same time, the accounting team was still implementing elements of Oracle that would aid future financial disclosures. The SVP and his team leveraged their Vena Solutions planning and budgeting tool to help aid the transition and act as a check and balance to make sure finance and accounting were on the same page.

Those additional checks and balances, the SVP says, are imperative for a private company going public. “When you become an operator in a public company, the lights are a little brighter and the stakes are obviously a little higher,” Downs explains. “When it comes to a minor mistake or error [in reporting], you just have to treat those issues as intolerable.”

The SVP is incredibly proud of his team and says the caliber of work across the board has matched the demands of a public company. The new depth and management reporting infrastructure in the post-IPO life makes many new demands, but Downs says he’s gotten to go through a process that very few encounter in their whole careers before the age of forty.

“My success here isn’t just mine,” Downs says. “Out of everything I’ve had the opportunity to do, building the team that helped take us public is probably the most meaningful.”

Going public is the dream, but it’s almost just a byproduct of all the smaller successes that Downs has aided: securing Shift4’s first true private equity sponsor in 2016 in Searchlight Capital, helping cement Shift4’s status as a true end-to-end payment solutions company through multiple mergers, and continuing to build infrastructure that will serve the company long after his tenure ends.

It seems like Downs has already done it all, but there is still more to accomplish. He has amassed every experience at every step of Shift4’s growth, and Downs is eager to keep building toward something bigger, whatever that may be.

PUT HIM IN, COACH

Brian Downs has a talent for team building that isn’t confined to Shift4. The lifelong athlete now acts as coach for some of his children’s athletics, while still staying active on his own. Downs was a player/ manager with the Telford Mariners, a baseball team in the Bux-Mont Men’s Adult Baseball League. After his move to Florida, he quickly earned a roster spot with the Jacksonville MABL Angels.

“Finding competitive baseball again has been one of my favorite things in my life,” Downs says. He may not be turning double plays in the infield anymore, but the thirty-nine-year-old can still run down a ball in center field right quick.

“When you become an operator in a public company, the lights are a little brighter and the stakes are obviously a little higher.”

BRIAN DOWNS

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A+ Adaptation

Barry Gardener explains the complexities of the CFO role in public education in just five words: “You can’t just raise prices.”

Regardless of the climate, skyrocketing inflation, dips in the economy, and an ongoing pandemic, those working to keep their organizations afloat in the public sphere rarely have access to the kinds of measures that other businesses can take in uncertain times.

The kids are coming to school, and there need to be people and programs ready for their arrival each and every day. Gardner, a fourthgeneration educator who spent eight years in the classroom, knows better than most.

Classes have gone through an extensive evolution over the past two years of the pandemic, and the Metropolitan School District of Wayne Township (MSD Wayne Township) in Indianapolis is no different. The district ramped up availability of its remote platform, Wayne At Home. About 4,500 students used the platform in 2021, but only 300 have

used it in 2022, as COVID-19 positivity numbers have declined and more students have returned to in-person instruction.

Gardner has had to keep an eye on the “return to normal” that doesn’t involve funds from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act or Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER). These have been helpful in the short term, but will eventually run out. Gardner must make positive use of those funds, while not sending the district off a financial cliff when the funds run out.

The CFO, the MSD Wayne leadership, and the MSD Wayne School Board team have made an unprecedented move by letting an operating referendum passed in 2015 expire. There were many reasons behind that decision, and Gardner’s progressive push to help offset the revenue loss is providing the school district with a decade of planning and preparation to adapt to what comes next.

The referendum brought $10 million to $12 million to the district every year. “We

How CFO Barry Gardner challenges the status quo and invests in the future of MSD Wayne Township

By BILLY YOST

“We were able to come up with a number of strategies that give us about ten years to build out capabilities and efficiencies.”

BARRY GARDNER

Barry Gardner

CFO

MSD Wayne Township

Allen Underwood

would have had to put it to a vote in May 2022, and it’s just not the ideal time to be going out and asking for an operating referendum,” explains Gardner, who is in his fourth year as CFO. “People’s financial situations have changed drastically during the last couple of years.”

Additionally, the trust that the school builds with the community through events, after-school programs, and other interaction just couldn’t happen during the pandemic.

It certainly didn’t help that Indiana legislators elected to change the language of the referendum, including the word “increase”

multiple times, despite the district planning to ask for less than it had previously.

For those reasons, superintendent Jeff Butts proposed what many districts might consider impossible: could they live without the funds? That was the question posed in July 2021, and since then, Gardner, wider leadership, and the district’s financial, tax, and legal advisors have spent countless hours brainstorming and planning for a way to make it happen.

“We were able to come up with a number of strategies that give us about ten years to build out capabilities and efficiencies,”

Gardner explains. “There are a lot of moving parts to this, but a big part of that is our energy management plan.”

Wayne Township has made some incredible improvements to its energy policies that will have long-ranging positive impacts on the district’s bottom line without cutting corners. By converting to propane-fueled buses, the district will save $250,000 a year in fuel costs. At the same time, maintenance costs on those buses are reduced by another $150,000 annually.

New LED lighting across the district, along with a solar field at the high school, will offset its electric costs by another $600,000 annually. The district will invest in more solar technology and energy-efficient infrastructure, such as boilers and chillers, to lessen the reliance on utilities moving forward.

“We’re going to have to pay the piper on those boilers and chillers down the road, but by going at it this way, we’re not only taking care of those capital costs, but also creating ongoing efficiencies,” Gardner explains.

The district-wide project will cost about $30 million, but will generate around $1.2 million of savings every year.

“We really understand what is important to the administration: saving energy and creating additional funding for the district,” says Kurt Schneider, Veregy partner. “Improving energy efficiency puts essential funding back into the classrooms.”

“I think it’s important to ask the questions that can push that change and challenge the status quo.”

BARRY GARDNER

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As the district invests in its infrastructure, it has seen the assessed value of its assets rise significantly. Additionally, Gardner has helped restructure its debt and approach to levying its revenue, allowing it to issue around $25 million for building repair, as opposed to the $4 million it issued previously. The school district will sell approximately $90 million in bonds for the 2022 year, which will continue to go toward infrastructure and a new transportation center.

It’s not magic, and it’s not easy. Municipal finances are always capable of undergoing huge changes by legislators, often with no understanding of how the schools actually work. But Gardner, referring to Adam Bryant’s book The Corner Office: Indispensable and Unexpected Lessons from CEOs on How to Lead and Succeed , says that the same wisdom from a hotel executive applies to municipal finances.

“The most expensive thing in business is doing things the way we’ve always done them,” Gardner explains. “I think it’s important to ask the questions that can push that change and challenge the status quo.”

Before the day starts, the CFO finds time to challenge himself in different ways. When he’s not preparing for a marathon, he spends time in prayer and keeps a gratitude journal, starting every day with five things he’s grateful for. It includes his wife, his twin daughters, and young son. Through his work in Wayne Township, Gardner supports families like his own and makes sure that the future of education is secure.

As a proud partner of MSD Wayne Township Schools and CFO Barry Gardner, Apex Benefits has had the privilege to share in Barry’s vision for maximizing opportunities to improve their employee benefits program. Together, we’ve optimized cost savings opportunities for the district and expanded their employee wellness program.

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One of a KIND

A point-guard perspective galvanizes

It’s Ozie Pela’s job to see all the angles. Running point guard for his college team, the architect and captain of the court, informed his vision. “You were forced to lead, to direct, to know about everything that’s happening,” the current senior director of logistics at KIND remembers. “You figure out what makes your team click. You have to learn what people were going to do before they did it.”

After taking time to adjust the family to its new reality, Pela returned to work, where KIND’s mission gives him purpose and drive. Though still grieving, he is ready to continue leading the company’s focus of changing the world for the better, one small moment at a time.

DEFINING MOMENTS

By BILLY YOST

Such perspective elevated Pela to his transformational presence in his role at KIND. In 2020, he stood up two new facilities, while helping offline another—all during a time when the global pandemic exposed every potential weakness in the global supply chain. It was an unfortunate reality documented over and over.

The accomplishment sadly paled in comparison to Pela’s looming challenges when the unthinkable occurred in late 2021. The unexpected passing of his wife, Jennifer, left the father of four to run point again for his own home team. This time the stakes were far higher than any game imaginable.

While speaking to Pela about his own professional success, it’s easy to feel that whatever his accomplishments, his own personal losses eclipse just about everything. But Pela’s achievements at KIND denote the very same qualities keeping the rock of his family a steady and positive presence.

Pela joined KIND inspired by the opportunity to transform its distribution and logistics network and keep its healthy products as close to customers as possible. “I want to make sure our shelves are full, and people can get what they want, when they want it, as quickly as possible,” Pela says. “When I arrived, we decided it was time to open up a new warehouse to further that mission.”

Though necessary for KIND’s increasing needs, the timing of expansion couldn’t

Ozie Pela’s strength during his hardest times, a strength he channels for KIND

Scan the QR code to be taken to the web story.

Ozie Pela Senior Director of Logistics KIND

Natalie Bell

have been worse. Just as the warehouse was set to go online, the COVID-19 pandemic stepped onto the international court, boxing out many of the company’s standard operating procedures.

“We had to do every single meeting via Zoom,” Pela explains. “That includes all of our training and all of our strategy sessions. In hindsight, you would probably ask yourself why anybody would do this. But it’s just how the timing worked out.”

The project coincided with an additional repacking facility breaking ground in Southern California, and a third being phased out. The workload was so much that Pela clearly remembers being at church on Sunday, ducking out to take calls. But he says the company priority for its customers was well-understood by everyone involved.

ACT IN KIND

The company’s priorities are exactly the kind that matter to Pela. The executive serves as the cochair of the company’s diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) group, noting that his employer’s “top-of-mind” and proactive stance to DEI has been inspiring.

“Diversity is invaluable when it comes to building teams,” Pela says. The executive has spent a great deal of time building his own and making sure that strengths and weaknesses are well-complemented. “Diversity can create challenges and friction,

but I think that friction can be incredibly healthy and a positive that helps move us all forward.”

Pela’s team currently works on transforming KIND’s transportation wing. While still in the early stages, the senior director says that rethinking its repack network will fundamentally shift the way the organization serves its customers.

Additionally, the team places a high priority on stabilizing its warehouse network, looking forward to the benefits unlocked by the process.

SUPPORT WHEN IT COUNTS MOST

As Pela continues to build out his own threeto-five-year plan at KIND, he’s living much more in the present when it comes to time at home. Pela says KIND’s support, its mental health resources, and his high-performing team have all proved imperative to his family’s adaptation to life without a wife and mother.

“My organization gave me the mental health support and the space to work through this,” Pela says. Coming back to work has helped, but it also upset the rhythm he’d worked so hard to establish for his children. He’s still mastering the art of juggling the schedule of four daughters, including one who was just months old when Pela’s wife died.

As he continues to define his own new normal, Pela doesn’t want his own struggles

to impact his leadership. “I work for a firstclass organization who has been there for me,” he says. “I want to feel that I’m contributing here and supporting those who are coming up in the company. I want to be very deliberate about how I’m delivering, and at the end of the day, I want to be treated like anyone else.”

The moment could not be more crucial. Outside of work, four little lives are counting on his leadership, his support, and his ability to control the play through every defense. Every game.

It’s what Ozie Pela has always done best, and he’s got a world-class organization backing him every step of the way.

“You figure out what makes your team click. You have to learn what people were going to do before they did it.”

OZIE PELA

A New Era for SPORTS

The past two years have spurred innovation and progress across the industry. Led by Guest Editor Jennifer Vasquez, five executives within sports and entertainment share how they are expanding IT infrastructure, protecting data, and building out a front-office reflective of the diverse fan bases across the country.

AnnetteShaff (Trophy)/, Alex Staroseltsev (Baseball)/, Msari (Baseball bat)/, Lightspring (Basketball), R-studio (Paper texture)/Shutterstock.com, Kiwihug/Unsplash.com (Paper texture)

Most Valuable Practice

Vasquez shares why DEI matters in the NBA and how she’s creating opportunities for female fans and employees alike at the Golden State Warriors

By Zach Baliva

Guest Editor Jennifer

years old when she first real ized that she was treated differently based on her race and ethnicity. Her parents immigrated to the United States from El Salvador before she was born. Vasquez was in first grade, and although she spoke perfect English, school administrators put her in an ESL class because of her last name.

Vasquez was too young to speak up for herself, until she found herself having to advocate with parents who spoke little English at the time. She has been using her voice to advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) ever since. Today, she’s the vice president of DEI for the Golden State Warriors and Chase Center. For someone growing up playing sports (including basketball) and an avid basketball fan (whose favorite childhood players were Grant Hill and Shaq), the opportunity was a full-circle moment for her.

“Sports presents a tremendous opportunity to bridge communities and bring people together,” Vasquez says. “It gives us a publicfacing platform we can use to make a greater impact globally.”

While NBA teams are fierce competitors on the court, Vasquez is collaborating with her counterparts across the league and in other sports to continue to set DEI as a priority, share best practices, and maintain long-term momentum. Recognizing that leagues and teams are facing similar challenges requires establishing a strong ecosystem for broader based impact.

“I’ve encountered a lot of barriers, obstacles, and setbacks that seemed unrelenting as a Latina,” she says. “Assimilation and codeswitching were against every fiber of my being, I had to learn how to identify accomplices and sponsors that were willing to open opportunities for me to thrive and passed the mic to me, to amplify my voice.”

“Sports presents a tremendous opportunity to bridge communities and bring people together. It gives us a public-facing platform we can use to make a greater impact globally.”

Jennifer Vasquez

Jennifer Vasquez VP of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Golden State Warriors

Creating authentic connections and opportunities for others, especially women and women of color is important in her position, and DEI and social impact have been part of her ikigai —her purpose—that fuels this passion.

Adding to her unique approaches is Vasquez’s global perspective. She has traveled to more than thirty-five countries, worked in global settings, and studied organizational development, business, change management, government, foreign policy, and international affairs while earning several advanced degrees. She’s worked in the public and private sector for fifteen years with an acute awareness and understanding of DEI.

From launching and overseeing business and employee resource groups, driving inclusive strategies, developing public/private partnerships, and implementing a comprehensive and effective diversity program, she has experience in the gamut of organizational transformation spearheaded by DEI.

At the Warriors, Vasquez is responsible for engaging with league-wide projects and developing and measuring the team’s own DEI strategy. The NBA has announced three new efforts—the Future Sales Stars Program, the Executive Highlighting Initiative, and the NBA Mentorship Program—designed to increase diversity.

Support from vocal players helps push these social and racial issues to the forefront. “The players desire to see change and lend their influence; it is nothing short of amazing to see and be a part of,” Vasquez says.

The Warrior’s own Stephen Curry is a threetime champion, two-time MVP, and eight-time All-Star. He’s also the father of two girls and an advocate for women in sports. In February 2022, he added another title to his long résumé—Academy Award winner. Curry won an Oscar for executive producing The Queen of Basketball, a short documentary film about female basketball pioneer Lusia Harris.

The film is one of many tools Vasquez and others are using in the quest to change and challenge the stigma of women in sports. There has been progress, more so in recent years. For example, the NBA and NFL now have female referees. In April 2022, Alyssa Nakken became the first woman to coach in an MLB game when she filled in for a male colleague who was ejected. It happened in the Warrior’s

hometown of San Francisco. The NBA also saw its first Latina referee, Blanca Burns.

While Vasquez is excited and encouraged by the developments, she wants to elevate this work. “Inclusion and equity are evolutionary, and we’re constantly up against the social stigma of women working in sports,” she says. “We are working to shift that narrative and remove any isolation that we see impact women far more than men.”

As researchers at Ohio University demonstrate, diversity makes good business sense in sports. According to their reports, 40 percent of all sports participants are women, but women’s sports receive just 4 percent of media coverage. On college campuses, softball attendance often out draws baseball. Forty-five percent of NFL fans are women, and one-third ($3 billion) of Under Armor’s annual sales comes from women. Half of all customers on the NBA’s online store are women.

Vasquez, of course, is well-aware of the stats. That’s why she’s working to welcome female fans and employees alike. “We need to do everything we can to build a pipeline for women to come into the NBA,” she says.

Golden State’s workforce has doubled in the last two years, and its people operations teams are using data to enhance recruiting and make sure diverse employees within the organization have appropriate development and advancement opportunities.

Outside of the office, Vasquez is known as a sought-after speaker, content creator, devoted mentor and sponsor, and nonprofit board

leader. She is a founding member of Hacking HR, a professional community of leaders, DEI practitioners, and consultants who come together for mutual learning and encouragement.

Golden State’s logo carries special significance for this kind of work. It’s a circle in royal blue with the Golden Gate depicted in yellow. In all she does, Vasquez is looking to build bridges internally and externally.

“We have to continue to encourage work between leagues and teams and between individuals and groups and having the NBA DEI Council is a prime example of this cross pollination,” she says. “Bringing the different perspectives in the room and this collaboration is critical to achieving equality and equity across the league.”

“Bringing the different perspectives in the room and this collaboration is critical to achieving equality and equity across the league.”

Jennifer Vasquez

Annette Shaff (Trophy)/, R-studio (Paper texture) /Shutterstock.com

Rip City Reboot

By Zach Baliva

Photos by Sheila Barabad

For the NBA’s Trail Blazers, the main product might be on the hardwood. But when it comes to team success, Michelle Soares and a talented IT crew get the assist.

Sarmiento

Good coaches unite others around a singular goal. They strategize, coach, mentor, motivate, and lead. They impart wisdom, correct mistakes, hold others accountable, and make tough decisions. They develop strategies and train new leaders. And they study the skills of each individual player in a never-ending quest to improve overall performance. What Head Coach Chauncey Billups does for the Portland Trail Blazers on the court, Michelle Soares replicates in the IT department.

Like Billups, Soares has a game plan—one that features 1s and 0s instead of Xs and O s. The New Jersey transplant amassed a quartercentury of tech experience and developed a reputation for delivering complex mission critical projects. But she admits she hadn’t watched a lot of basketball or spent much time in the city of Portland before joining the Pacific Northwest’s beloved NBA franchise in 2020.

Soares may not have built her career in sports tech, but she did fill her playbook with something critical to success: the fundamentals of the game.

So what convinced a seasoned veteran to leave her known world behind and travel all the way across the country for something entirely unknown? “Adventure,” Soares explains. “I love to learn new things and I love challenges.”

After twenty years of parenting, Soares and her husband became empty nesters, and as technical consultants, they had a built-in opportunity to relocate. Oregon’s Guardian Peaks and oceanic climate beckoned and eventually became home.

At first, Soares didn’t know exactly what to expect. But Portland’s tech community was inviting, and when she updated her LinkedIn profile, a recruiter made contact. She walked into a blind interview with the Trail Blazer’s CFO, unaware that she was up for one of the most coveted jobs in sports. The discovery didn’t faze Soares, who thinks of the franchise as just another of the countless consulting clients she steered through product upgrades, systems rollouts, and other successful projects.

As the team entered its 2020-2021 regular season, the Blazers were led by Damian Lillard, who had cemented his place among franchise greats and set fans’ expectations at all-time highs. While the team was performing well on

the court, things were somewhat different in the IT department. The group was talented but tactical and “heads down.” Team members spent their days supporting events and closing out help desk tickets without much opportunity to drive strategy.

They were playing defense; Soares wanted her team to play offense. “IT can partner with the business to really transform operations and add value, but only if there’s clear vision and a strong plan,” she explains. A series of new plays would help Soares meet that goal.

PLAY #1: A FOCUS ON DOCUMENTS AND SYSTEMS

IT installs and maintains the technical networks and systems, telecom and audio-video that support office employees, business operations, game functions, live events, and all other activities related to the Portland Trail Blazers, the Moda Center arena, the Veterans Memorial Coliseum, and the nearby practice facility. While many elements ran smoothly, a small group of legacy employees were keeping the lights on in a quiet, reliable manner, but went unrecognized.

Soares formalized policies, implemented procedures, deployed a new help desk, IT asset management, and contract management system to centralize IT requests and organize equipment, maintenance schedules, vendor information, and corporate and sponsorship contracts. She then performed an audit to identify gaps and uncover needs before embarking on an IT cost optimization project to reduce IT asset redundancy and risk of security breaches with antiquated equipment/ software and repurpose IT funds toward more progressive initiatives.

Soares plans to put telephony in the cloud for the Trail Blazers’ contact-center with a contactcenter-as-a-service and omnichannel initiative. The move will reduce call times to improve the customer experience and push data to contact center agents that they can use to upsell or cross-sell and increase revenue streams.

PLAY # 2: IMPROVING THE FAN EXPERIENCE

In today’s hypercompetitive world of sports and entertainment, the fan experience is the number one most important factor executives consider, and Soares does all she can to

improve how Moda Center guests experience game day action.

Her team is responsible for supporting courtside technology and sending live stats to the League, while also supporting all network connectivity, security (cyber and campus), audio-video, and telecom needs in both venues, whether at the concession point of sale, ingress and egress, or the concourses.

“The way fans want to interact with live events is changing, and we’re keeping pace by testing what’s out there and being smart about what we choose to implement,” Soares says, adding that tech is powering contactless check-in, cashless payments, mobile ordering, vaccine verification, and other important features that mitigate COVID-19.

PLAY # 3: SECURITY

Like her counterparts on the court, Soares is battling a rival—the modern hacker. The threat of cyberattacks is very real in the NBA as seen in past reported attacks. Soares is in frequent contact with IT leads at various professional sports leagues to discuss best practices.

“We’re competitive on the court, but collaborative off the court,” she says. “We talk about the challenges we face, and we’re all invested in keeping our data safe and secure.”

After networking with other leaders and researching league guidelines, Soares led a team that created a cybersecurity road map, institutionalized a passphrase policy, and deployed a threat detection, removal and

“The way fans want to interact with live events is changing, and we’re keeping pace by testing what’s out there and being smart about what we choose to implement.”

Michelle Soares

Michelle Soares VP of Technology

Portland Trail Blazers

prevention software, and business continuity/ disaster recovery to harden its security posture. Other new measures include multifactor authentication, cybersecurity training, passphrase policies, upgraded network switches, company-wide security training, and a new threat intelligence platform.

PLAY # 4: IMPROVE THE DRAFT

Why are hackers targeting sports teams? Some experts believe they’re trying to uncover and publicize information that they can use to place bets as online and legalized gambling become increasingly popular. Teams are storing and using more data than ever before, and in addition to protecting that data, Soares wants to unleash its power to improve the on-court product by bringing the very best athletic talent to Portland.

“Advanced algorithms and predictive analytics can tell us what kind of athlete to target and which eligible player would be the best fit in any round and at any point in the draft,” Soares explains. She envisions a future where complex programs replace excel spreadsheets and dry erase and magnetic boards as GMs

and CEOs crunch stats, measurements, and salaries. The system she’s proposing will even consider GPA and scrub social media histories to determine culture fit.

Game days are electric in the City of Roses. Soares’s IT team is skilled and experienced and arrives four hours prior to tip-off to support the three Cs—courtside, concourse, and connectivity. Courtside technicians make sure scoreboards, shot clocks, and referee headsets are functional. Concourse technicians solve problems related to monitors, ATMs, and point of sale systems and all things audio-video. Those assigned to connectivity make sure all Wi-Fi signals are strong. One key partner, Comcast, provides reliable internet service in all Trail Blazer facilities.

“The Portland Trail Blazers are a premier client for Comcast Business: they’ve seamlessly integrated our technology solutions to best meet their back-office business needs while creating the ultimate fan experience,” says Alan Goldsmith, regional vice president of Comcast Business in Oregon and southwest Washington.

“Our business relationship with the Trail Blazers

BLAZERMANIA: FACTS & FIGURES

Founded: 1970

NBA Championships: 1 (1977)

Nickname: Rip City

Head Coach: Chauncey Billups

Leading Scorer: Clyde Drexler (18,040 points)

Arena: Moda Center

20,000+ spectators

70 concession areas

650 TV monitors

4 15’ x 22 ½’ Mitsubishi HD scoreboard screens

EARLY ADOPTERS

Can the Trail Blazers strike lightning by bringing the first cryptocurrency jersey sponsorship to the NBA? The forecast looks promising after the team announced a deal with StormX in summer 2021. The crypto company logo now adorns game and practice jerseys, reminding the Rip City faithful that they can earn crypto cashback on purchases inside the team’s arena and elsewhere.

Blazers fan Calvin Hsieh created the minority-owned company in nearby Seattle and has grown StormX into a network with 2 million users and nearly 800 partners in 173 countries worldwide.

The team celebrated the deal by announcing a non-fungible token (NFT) release, a series of digital game day posters created in collaboration with seven area artists.

goes way beyond robust technology. We are proud to partner with the team to support our local community, through organizations like the Portland Boys and Girls Club.”

Soares has empowered her team to function well without her, and while her presence isn’t required at home games, she often finds herself heading toward the Moda Center to support her colleagues and catch part of the action.

In addition to her leadership at the Trail Blazers, Soares serves on the board of the Technology Association of Oregon and the University of Portland Executive Advisory Board for Operations and Technology Management.

“These organizations afford me the platform to advocate, mentor, and promote women in technology whether they are in the workforce, looking for a career change, or about to enter the workforce,” she explains. “I love that it connects me to other people and leaders locally, since I recently relocated. I’ve also been able to mentor young people and people looking to change careers, which has been so rewarding.”

With bringing on Chauncey Billups as its new coach, the Trail Blazers aspire to win the Western Conference and go all the way to the Finals. To get there, they’ll have to overcome a slow start, a slew of injuries, and defensive miscues.

Soares knows they can do it, and her IT team will keep working behind the scenes to power the pride of Portland.

“Advanced algorithms and predictive analytics can tell us what kind of athlete to target and which eligible player would be the best fit in any round and at any point in the draft.”

Michelle Soares

He’s Got SPIRIT

Josh Lipscomb embodies the mission of Varsity Brands by leading HR initiatives that elevate the experience of both customers and employees

By Natalie Kochanov

Josh Lipscomb learned his first leadership lessons from his parents.

“My parents owned a business, and they taught me that you should never ask your employees to do something you’re not willing to do yourself,” Lipscomb explains. “They would come home covered in sweat and dirt every day, just like their employees. And the people they employed respected them for it.”

Lipscomb took his parents’ teachings to heart. Today, as senior vice president of total rewards at Varsity Brands, Lipscomb practices a nonhierarchical form of leadership, empowering his team by listening and connecting with them personally, and also connecting the dots between individual contributions and the mission of the overall organization.

“Our mission is to elevate the student experience through sport, spirit, and achievement. We’ve taken that outward mission and turned it back on ourselves.”

Josh Lipscomb

Beyond that, he works to achieve cohesion across the diverse divisions that make up Varsity Brands without ever losing sight of the equally diverse needs of the company’s employees.

Varsity Brands has existed in its current form since 2013, when a private equity firm acquisition brought together three businesses

centered around the high school student experience, from academics to athletics. This synergy was enhanced when Bain Capital bought Varsity Brands in 2018. Over the past few years, and with the support of Bain Capital, Lipscomb has focused on aligning those businesses on compensation, benefits, HR systems,

and HR operations—an undertaking that has presented its fair share of challenges.

“We put everyone on the same 401(k) and the same medical plans, but we still have two different payroll systems, three different recruiting platforms, and three different benefit administration systems,” Lipscomb says. “Our next step is to bring those systems into line.”

To that end, Varsity Brands is in the process of implementing Workday, a cloud-based enterprise management system. “The introduction of Workday will be transformative for us because our employees and managers will have direct access to our systems. Additionally, HR will be able to work within one system across the enterprise instead of managing multiple systems at once,” Lipscomb elaborates. “We’re hopeful that it’s going to create synergy and free up time for everyone and enable us to focus on more value-additive activities.”

For instance, the consolidation will simplify the transfer of employees from one division to another, opening new doors for career growth within the company. Lipscomb likens such upsides to those of the services Varsity Brands provides to its customers.

“When we create tools and systems that allow our coaches, sponsors, or school leaders to do their jobs better and more easily, they can focus on the students,” he says. “Our managers are like coaches. If we give them the right tools, they can spend less time dealing with administrative matters and more time developing their employees.”

In both cases, the outcome speaks to what Varsity Brands is as a company. “Our mission is to elevate the student experience through sport, spirit, and achievement. We’ve taken that outward mission and turned it back on ourselves,” Lipscomb says. “Our internal mission is to elevate the employee experience.”

During his time at Varsity Brands, Lipscomb has fully embraced this mission as well as the six values that sustain it: service, passion, integrity, respect, innovation, and transparency (abbreviated as SPIRIT). He strives to help each of his team members understand the impact of their individual role on the mission’s success and motivate them to put their best foot forward inside and outside the office.

Lipscomb applies a similar philosophy to his benefits responsibilities. “Historically, people have equated well-being with physical

Care. Fully.

SPORTS

Holmes Murphy is proud to partner with Varsity Brands to elevate their employee experience. Varsity Brands employees & their families receive:

• Access to affordable, high quality healthcare.

• Benefit coverage when they need it the most.

• Focus on whole person wellbeing.

• Clinical intervention to improve health outcomes.

To learn more, contact Jim Holder, Holmes Murphy Vice President at jholder@holmesmurphy.com 303-883-5707 | holmesmurphy.com

wellness. I’m really passionate about the idea of whole-person, or holistic, well-being,” he explains. “You have to create programs and tools that support all aspects of well-being, whether physical, mental, financial, emotional, or social.”

Through a partnership with insurance consulting firm Holmes Murphy, Varsity Brands has made significant strides in that direction. Holmes Murphy facilitated an analysis of anonymized employee health data that Lipscomb has since used to rethink employee benefits.

“We saw that a lot of our costs were related to preventable illnesses,” he says. “So we’ve implemented programs to help our employees focus on those areas.”

Specifically, Lipscomb has increased offerings pertaining to musculoskeletal issues, age- and sex-based cancers, and mental health support. In the long run, these offerings should not only keep employees happier and healthier but also save them and the company money.

“We are thrilled to work with Josh and his team to help manage costs and improve the health and well-being of their employees,” says Jim Holder, vice president of Holmes Murphy.

Still, Lipscomb knows that the organization’s journey toward holistic well-being must be an

ongoing effort. “You can have the best programs in the world, but if employees don’t use them, it doesn’t matter,” he emphasizes. “We have to continue to communicate and let our employees know about all of the different benefits available to them.”

As with all his work at Varsity Brands, Lipscomb believes that enhancing benefit options will start a chain reaction that ultimately serves the company’s employees and customers alike. He envisions a version of the organization that mirrors its customer base, and he plans to keep striving to transform that dream into reality.

“We offer a 360-degree support model to our customers; the schools and students we serve. If we want to support them well, we have to understand what they need and who they are, and we can’t do that if we don’t listen, and also have a similar diversity of perspective internally,” Lipscomb says. “Just like our customers, our employees have different needs as well and our aspiration is to create inclusive experiences for our employees via benefits and career opportunities that will allow us to ultimately deliver better offerings to our customers in the future.”

As they like to say at Varsity Brands, that’s a “win-win.”

“Our managers are like coaches. If we give them the right tools, they can spend less time dealing with administrative matters and more time developing their employees.”

Josh Lipscomb

Build It and They Will Come

As Oak View Group establishes its place in sports and entertainment, Ann Jackson creates the right HR structures and strategies to attract the best talent

By Zach Baliva

Veteran human resources professional Ann Jackson has been in the industry long enough to recognize a rare opportunity when she sees one, and she immediately saw something special at the Oak View Group. In 2021, the sports and entertainment venue company was in growth mode, and its leadership team courted Jackson to drive an important people strategy. They didn’t want her to simply enhance or improve an existing HR function—they wanted her to build it from the ground up.

For Jackson, it was a dream come true. “HR leaders often come in to apply their expertise to a well-defined program, but most of us never get the chance to truly make our mark on an

organization from the very beginning,” she explains. “This was a great opportunity for me to apply everything I’ve been able to learn and accomplish in my long career.”

That career started at NBC, where Jackson managed daily operations for its renowned Page Program that puts entry-level candidates through a rotation on high-level media assignments. Participants work on shows like Saturday Night Live and the Tonight Show, where they get immersive exposure on marketing, business development, production, and public relations teams.

Jackson built relationships with numerous colleges and universities to diversify the program as well as handled employee relations matters for its sixty-five employees, which helped her grow as a professional. “The NBC

Chief People & Culture Officer Oak View Group

Page Program taught me to really understand people’s individual goals and then put them on the right path.” she explains. Jackson later launched special seminars, summits, and career development programs to provide additional opportunities.

After six years at NBC, Jackson had found a niche in entertainment, but left the organization to join the Madison Square Garden Company (MSG) to lead HR for the Rockettes. She stayed with MSG for more than sixteen years, ultimately serving as vice president of human resources. In that role, she partnered with business leaders to drive strategy for nine thousand employees at venues including MSG Arena, Radio City Music Hall, the Beacon Theatre, the Chicago Theatre, and the Forum.

In 2021, after stints with Charter Communications, Jackson came to Oak View Group to

Ann Jackson

Joe Scarnici (Jackson), cloki (Paper clip)/, R-studio (Paper texture) /Shutterstock.com, Kiwihug/ Unsplash.com (Paper texture)

“HR leaders often come in to apply their expertise to a welldefined program, but most of us never get the chance to truly make our mark on an organization from the very beginning.”

Ann Jackson

build the right teams to facilitate an aggressive growth plan. CEO Tim Leiweke and his partners started the organization in 2015 to disrupt the venue management and operation space. Since then, they’ve expanded through acquisition and organic growth to become the world’s largest sports and entertainment venue developer.

When Jackson arrived as chief people and culture officer, the company was emerging from its start-up phase. Members of its small core team were accustomed to filling many roles and pitching in where needed to help launch the organization. Jackson wanted to maintain a fun and entrepreneurial culture while building more formality to the HR function which was then managed by legal.

“At some point in the life of every business, leaders have to transition from exciting start-up to mature disruptor, and we were at that inflection point,” Jackson recalls. “As an HR leader, I wanted to formalize the function and create an experience for employees so Oak View Group would be a place where they want to stay and grow and thrive.”

And that’s just what she’s done. After building a strategy, Jackson got to work. She hired systems, compliance, and talent management leaders; introduced employee resource groups; got new policies and procedures in place; and conducted an employee survey.

As this was taking place, Oak View Group was acquiring companies, growing its employee base, and working with municipalities to build and renovate arenas. When Jackson started, Oak View Group had just a few hundred employees on its team. Today, the company has more than two hundred

venues—including five owned and operated— with more than three thousand full-time and twenty thousand part-time employees.

As she moves the function forward, Jackson is drawing from the lessons she learned at NBC and MSG and still strives to match employees with the opportunities they most desire. “I’m always asking questions of people who start here because helping people reach their dreams is good for the people and the organization as a whole as you create culture,” she says.

Now that Oak View Group’s HR foundation is in place, Jackson will focus on strengthening what she’s built so far. She’s implementing new technologies to drive efficiencies, rebranding culture to “One OVG,” unifying all facilities to one centralized system, improving development programs, and taking more steps to emphasize diversity, equity, and inclusion.

In recent years, Oak View Group has finished key projects in major cities like New York and Seattle. In March 2022, it announced plans to build a $3 billion hotel and casino complex near the Las Vegas Strip. The Sin City deal is the biggest gamble in Oak View Group’s history, and Jackson has the right people in place to help them hit the jackpot.

Paylocity provides award-winning, easy-to-use HR and payroll solutions that help businesses automate HR processes, attract and retain talent, and build culture and connection with employees. Consistently recognized as a top place to work, Paylocity accompanies clients on the journey to create great workplaces and unlock the potential of every employee.

Tech MVP

As the Las Vegas Raiders focus on winning a championship, Matthew Pasco builds his own team to bring a best-in-class game day experience to the new Allegiant Stadium

By Zach Baliva

Matthew Pasco VP of IT Las Vegas Raiders

Michael Clemens/Las Vegas Raiders, 80’s Child (Football)/, cloki (Paperclip)/, R-studio (Paper texture) /Shutterstock.com

In 2014, the then Oakland Raiders were heading to Seattle to take on the Seahawks. The team plane carried big names like quarterback Derek Carr and star running backs Maurice Jones-Drew and Latavius Murray. One lesser-known non-position player was also making the trip: Vice President of Information Technology Matthew Pasco.

Pasco was traveling with the team on a reconnaissance mission ahead of a new stadium project. Then, the team was a cotenant at the Oakland Coliseum with MLB’s Athletics, which had eighty-two regular season home games compared to the Raiders’ eight. The NFL franchise was exploring how it could find a new home to give fans a better experience, and Pasco wanted to make sure that new home had the right technology infrastructure.

“The fan experience is huge in today’s world of sports and live events, and we knew we had the chance to do something special if we started early to bring in the right systems and features,” Pasco says.

As the Raiders players warmed up before the game, Pasco walked their rivals’ stadiums and interviewed his counterparts. While teams are fierce competitors on the field, personnel are cordial and collaborative. “We’re all trying to accomplish the same thing and are willing to share strategies and best practices,” he explains. Watching fan behavior after kickoff gave him important insight regarding mobile ordering, in-seat delivery, grab-and-go purchasing, and other innovations.

When the Raiders filed the necessary documents to relocate to Las Vegas in January 2017, Pasco was ready with a robust tech strategy. While the plan has many complex components, the philosophy behind it remains simple.

“We want to make sure what we’re doing with technology meets and exceeds our fans’ expectations and gives them a way to interact with the game as they come to our stadium,” Pasco says.

It’s the same approach he’s taken since day one. Pasco, a Northern California native, grew up playing with gadgets and devices his father brought home from employers like Xerox, Atari, and IBM. He served in the Marines where he worked in aviation electronics, got into information technology consulting as a civilian, and then joined the Raiders in 2002 to design and

run the team’s website network and e-commerce platform. He took over as head of the IT department in 2007.

Ten years later, when the Las Vegas Raiders started building Allegiant Stadium, Pasco’s team put his plan into action. Their first priority was “lightning-fast internet connectivity everywhere” to enable mobile ticketing, social media engagement, food orders, and the allimportant fantasy football app management.

Pasco uncovered one major pain point when he visited other stadiums. Some other teams used one network for security cameras, another for point-of-sale systems, and another for Wi-Fi. That set-up requires many devices and expensive maintenance and prevents vendors from working together. At Allegiant, he partnered with Cisco, AmpThink, and Cox to build one converged, redundant network that runs IPTV, VoIP phones, security cameras, point-ofsale, Wi-Fi, and all other tech components.

“Cox is deeply invested in connecting Las Vegas and exceptionally proud to work alongside Matthew and his team to power Allegiant Stadium and ensure best-in-class connectivity,” says Steve Westerman, vice president at Cox Business Las Vegas.

While stadium design and implementation teams include several thousands of people, Pasco made sure his group was leading import ant parts of the decision-making process and involved in all major design discussions.

“Pro sports and construction have both been around for a very long time, and tech nology hasn’t,” he says. “But since tech is now a core piece of those worlds, we have to have a seat at the table.”

Instead of letting vendors impose their will, Pasco set requirements for participating in Allegiant’s singular network, and the move helped his cybersecurity managers keep everything safe and secure.

The Raiders’ tech group implemented a similar plan at the nearby Intermountain Healthcare Performance Center and Raiders Headquarters, a 135,000-square-foot office area and 150,000-square-foot field house located 10 miles south of the Allegiant Stadium. Private point-to-point fiber connections between all buildings let coaches and staff share documents and other files securely.

Coaches and players also share game and practice footage, and a secure file

“We want to make sure what we’re doing with technology meets and exceeds our fans’ expectations and gives them a way to interact with the game as they come to our stadium.”

Matthew Pasco

transfer system makes this process more efficient. Instead of gathering in one place to watch DVDs, it all happens on-demand through smart tablets and other handheld devices. Those using the modern system can scrub through games and watch replays from various angles and speeds to better analyze the game.

Unfortunately, after all this hard work, the COVID-19 pandemic forced the Raiders to open its new stadium without fans in attendance. Still, Pasco asked his IT professionals to act as if Allegiant Stadium were full and take the opportunity to practice operating all systems to uncover and fix any bugs or problems.

Finally, on September 13, 2021, the Raiders hosted fans for their first regular season game, a Monday Night Football matchup with the Baltimore Ravens. Quarterback Derek Carr passed for 435 yards and 2 touchdowns to lead Las Vegas to an overtime victory.

The night was also a “W” for the IT team. Pasco’s tech plan worked without incident and the sixty-some thousand fans at Allegiant enjoyed a seamless experience while immersed in the on-field action.

Now, Pasco is refining what he’s built with his team, investigating new technologies, and doing all he can to support the Raiders as it looks to build upon a playoff appearance in its pursuit of a championship.

As the pioneer for Lens Antennas, MatSing has transformed the mobile connected experience in stadiums and venues globally. Our patented multibeam lens antennas deliver unmatched network capacity and the most reliable connectivity in the industry. We are committed to delivering a future-proof, high-performance network with the lowest cost of ownership.

Michael Clemens/Las Vegas Raiders, cloki (Paper clip) /, R-studio (Paper texture)/ Shutterstock.com, Kiwihug/Unsplash.com (Paper texture)

“Pro sports and construction have both been around for a long time, and technology hasn’t. But since tech is now a core piece of those worlds, we have to have a seat at the table.”

Matthew Pasco

For the Love of the Game

Longtime Boston Red Sox fan Jon Hay shares how he leveraged his analytics and data

and organization he loves

By Zach Baliva

For many families in America, a love for baseball is a tradition. Parents share their passion for the game with their kids by watching games on TV together, teaching the rules of the game, and talking about their favorite players. Then comes that special day of visiting the ballpark to watch their favorite team play.

That wasn’t the case for Jon Hay, who attended his first Red Sox game when he was eight years old, after he, his sister, and his parents moved from Sydney, Australia, to Boston.

“I went to my first baseball game and did not know what was going on,” Hay remembers. “It was very different than cricket, which was what I knew. Baseball is fast-paced compared to cricket, which is one of the few sports that takes longer to play than baseball.”

In his new city of Boston, Hay went to many games and developed a passion for America’s favorite pastime. He studied the player statistics

expertise to build a career supporting the sport

Jon Hay VP of Data, Intelligence & Analytics Boston Red Sox

on baseball cards, and read Michael Lewis’ Moneyball, which focuses on Oakland A’s General Manager Billy Beane and his analytical, evidenced-based approach.

While Hay isn’t stepping up to the plate or staring down hitters from the pitcher’s mound, his career in analytics led him to become vice president of data, intelligence, and analytics for his beloved Red Sox.

“The eight-year-old me would lose his mind if I told him that thirty years later, he would get to go to Fenway Park for his job every day,” Hay says.

After graduating from Harvard with an economics degree, Hay followed the

traditional path of working on Wall Street, starting his career with Morgan Stanley and trading fixed-income derivatives.

“The story I always tell is about having one of those quiet moments on the trading floor and everyone is looking at stock charts while I’m reading some esoteric baseball analytics article on FanGraphs,” he explains. “That motivated me to consider that maybe I could take what I do building comprehensive analytical models and apply them to baseball.”

He returned to school at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business with a goal of finding a career within sports. A key factor was networking, which led him to meeting Vince

“The eight-year-old me would lose his mind if I told him that thirty years later, he would get to go to Fenway Park for his job every day.”

Jon Hay

Gennaro, the former president of the Society of American Baseball Research.

Gennaro later talked with Bill James, the legendary baseball statistician and writer. James shared that team owner John Henry instructed him to hire an intern, but he wasn’t sure how to go about finding someone. Gennaro suggested that he interview Hay.

“I flew to Boston, I met Bill, and we talked baseball for about six hours,” he recalls. “Which you can imagine that as someone who grew up reading his books, it was probably one of the coolest experiences of my life—sitting and talking baseball with him the entire day.”

He took the $8-an-hour-internship and worked on player predictive models and contract analysis. The Red Sox didn’t have a business analytics team or a customer data warehouse at the time. Customer segmentation wasn’t really in place either, which led to Hay getting pulled into work on such projects given his finance and MBA background.

A few years into his tenure, the Red Sox officially hired Hay for a hybrid role where he took over ticketing analytics, and that led to his current role of overseeing all business analytics, data, intelligence, and reporting efforts for the organization.

Since then, Hay has worked on big developments for the Red Sox and its ownership group,

Fenway Sports Group, including its acquisition of the National Hockey League’s Pittsburgh Penguins in 2021. He’s also heavily involved in the recent migration to Google Cloud Platform, following Major League Baseball’s deal with Google.

“We have all of our customer data sorted in one space, and we can access it whenever we need to,” he explains. “We can actually answer questions around how many fans do we have, how many people spend more than $1,000 at Fenway Park, and how many people come to Fenway with children. It’s been a huge boon for us.”

Hay and his team are at work on improving the fan experience by making Fenway Park cashless and introducing food and drink ordering through an app, thus cutting down on wait times so fans don’t miss any action.

Another key revenue-driving project is dynamic ticket pricing. Prior to COVID-19, while the Red Sox charged different ticket prices for different seats and different games, these prices were static over time. Starting in 2021, in partnership with Demand Analytics, the Red Sox made the move to dynamic pricing, meaning that prices throughout the park fluctuate over time based on various factors such as weather, team performance, and pitching matchups.

“If there’s a David Ortiz Hall of Fame night, I want to make sure that we are charging the right amount of money for that and not leaving money on the table for brokers to come in and buy tickets and resell them,” Hay shares. “We also want to make things affordable for the right games and make sure we have the ability to price down and make the game more accessible for families.”

That kind of thinking not only adds to the Red Sox’s success, but also keeps fans engaged in the game they love.

“Jon Hay and his team at the Red Sox have been excellent partners with Demand Analytics. Jon is extremely collaborative and insightful whether discussing consumer demand models, operational integrations, or organizational decision-making. These strengths helped the Red Sox make and implement successful demand-based decisions during the 2021 MLB season using the Demand Analytics software platform. These strengths are also an asset in ensuring our product and partnership remains industry leading.”

–Gabe Gershenfeld, Cofounder & President, Demand Analytics

“We also want to make things affordable for the right games and make sure we have the ability to price down and make the game more accessible for families.”

Jon Hay

CULTURE

How leaders cultivate inclusive environments that allow both employees and companies to thrive

How to Attract Top Talent

Berdon CHRO Karen Bennett shares her insight on the current landscape and what employment professionals can do to capture new opportunities

By ZACH BALIVA

Karen Bennett knows that in today’s competitive talent market, the right people strategy is a key differentiator. She’s taking all she’s learned in a twentyyear human resources career and using it to lead important projects and initiatives at Berdon.

“As an HR professional, there are many ways you can have a positive impact on others,” Bennett says. “I started working at a very young age and never stopped. I knew early on that I wanted a satisfying and rewarding career, and one of the reasons I went into HR was to help others along the same path.”

In her seventeen years at Berdon, Bennett has introduced numerous programs and initiatives and witnessed their positive impact on countless careers.

“Karen is one of those great HR professionals who understands how to balance

the needs and interests of Berdon and its employees,” says Tarter Krinsky & Drogin’s Laurent Drogin. “A smart listener and leader, Karen proactively handles matters so they don’t become problems, furthering Berdon’s positive culture.”

She spoke with Profile about how employee expectations are changing, what it means for recruiting talent, and what other HR leaders can learn from her approach.

As teams, workplaces, cultures, and the world continue to change, what new challenges are emerging in HR, and what opportunities are you seeing as a result? One of the major challenges in HR today is recruiting and retention. It’s a tight labor market, where your organization’s culture will make the difference in attracting talent. The pandemic has made a lot of people reevaluate the type of work they do, who they work for, the hours they work, and where they want to work.

Karen Bennett CHRO Berdon LLP

Courtesy of Karen Bennett

Today, there are many factors that influence a candidate’s career choice. For many years, compensation and benefits were the primary concerns for most people. More recently, this has shifted to include a focus on firm culture and values, work hours and location, and work/life balance. It requires a lot more effort to find qualified talent, so firms need to be proactive in their hiring practices.

It sounds like a big, yet important, pivot. How can you accomplish this?

We realized we were doing a lot of great things for our employees but not really showcasing them sufficiently to future candidates. Before a candidate applies to a position, they are researching your firm, looking at what perks and benefits are available, and seeing what others are saying about your firm and its culture. We put more effort into our social media campaigns to better highlight all our firm initiatives.

What does it take to keep employees engaged in this new hybrid environment?

Keeping teams engaged in a remote environment takes more thoughtful structured efforts to share information with each other. Managers need to ensure they are communicating with their in-person teams, as well as the team members that are remote. Regular firm town halls are an excellent way to ensure all your employees are kept up to speed on what’s going on in the organization.

The focus needs to be less on where our employees are located physically and more on how we set them up for success. It’s also

crucial for employees to feel a true sense of belonging and a sense of purpose, and that they share the same values and culture of the firm.

Are there other programs or activities you’ve put into place since the pandemic started to help with connectivity and collaboration?

We created a program called BerdonHub, which is our answer to a virtual office. The program focuses on communication and connectedness. We keep connected with our new hires, and especially our remote staff, through regular communications and meetings, virtual lunches, team building activities, and breakfasts with our leadership.

We’ve hired over 150 people since COVID-19 began, and we wanted to make sure they feel part of the firm and understand our culture. In addition to the day-to-day work, we want our new hires and remote staff to feel connected to others in the firm and also participate in firm events and activities.

Business development, recruiting, BerdonCares events, and education and learning seminars will continue to be largely virtual in our firm. BerdonHub highlights how they can get involved in these initiatives to add value to the firm [and also enables us] to help them grow professionally in their careers.

What is BerdonCares?

Berdon has always been a firm that has given back to the community and that is actively involved in philanthropic activities. I created our BerdonCares program several years ago with the intention of expanding

on what the firm was already doing by allowing our employees to play a bigger role in getting involved and giving back through donations and volunteering. Our employees love to volunteer and participate in these initiatives.

We encourage all employees to volunteer a minimum of one day a year during work hours. I think of it as a do-good mandate. We have partnered with the Red Cross, the Wounded Warrior Project, the VA Hospital, and the Children’s Aid Society. More recently, we worked with Learn Fresh and the NY Mets to provide a fun and educational experience for students in our local community. The event encouraged learning and growing through STEM-based activities and enhanced their social emotional learning.

It’s been a challenging period for HR leaders. What advice do you have for your counterparts in other companies?

We need to shift from the perspective of “I will treat people as I want to be treated” to “I will treat people as they need to be treated.” We have to manage, grow, and lead our teams by understanding first what motivates them. It’s important to ask questions and truly listen so you are able to understand their perspectives and what drives each person.

We should know where they want to be in five years, and how we can help guide them toward reaching those goals. Helping people flourish in their lives and careers is one of my primary goals as an HR professional. I’m thankful to those throughout my career who helped me learn and grow professionally.

“We have to manage, grow, and lead our teams by understanding first what motivates them.”

KAREN BENNETT

“Live the Culture”

Joe Terry leads an internal work culture transformation at Culture Partners

By BILLY YOST

Admittedly, Joe Terry is a “super-intense guy.” Whatever he does, he goes all in with passion and tenacity. Prior to joining Culture Partners as CEO, Terry thought the role actually drove the culture. Over the course of twenty years, though, he has adjusted that mindset and now leverages his energy to empower and inspire, as well as to lead by example to energize those around him.

“When I first got here, I just thought, ‘You knucklehead,’” Terry says, laughing. “There’s a process and methodology for creating culture and alignment throughout a whole organization in a way that everyone can own and feel connected to. It opened my eyes to see that this process is something we can teach our clients. Culture Partners is a place that could truly make a difference in the world.”

Founded in 1989 as Partners In Leadership, the firm now known as Culture Partners has spent over thirty years helping companies and organizations meet their full potential by harnessing the power of their culture. This approach is not about the bottom line. It’s about creating work environments that support both the individual’s and organization’s purpose and meaning, ensuring that they are tangible and inspirational no matter the job position.

“I arrived in the summer of 2020,” Terry remembers. “The company was going through a major disruption, both with the COVID-19 pandemic and internally. That disruption unearthed this underlying foundation that was in need of repair. It was just being covered up by the company’s top-end success.”

The firm had a culture problem. The disruption offered Culture Partners an opportunity to bridge that gap. “That’s what made me so excited about the role,” Terry explains. “The company never could have consumed the amount of change we’ve placed on it in the last eighteen months if not for that disruption.

“It was a chance to start bringing pieces— new and different—together, and at an accelerated rate,” the CEO continues. “While a difficult time for the employees, it was actually a better time for growth and to really put our own culture methodology—what’s made this company so successful—into practice. It was a chance to reset and set culture alignment using our own methodology.”

The upside was that the company had all the in-house people, intellectual property, processes, and tools needed to fix its own culture. Thus, the mantra “Live the Culture” was born. The company put metrics in place to monitor and ensure alignment with its purpose, mission, and culture to measure employees’ experiences of the transition.

Joe Terry CEO Culture Partners

Nina Pomeroy

The results have thus far been very positive. “Once we started working toward living the culture, we realized that some hard decisions had to be made.”

Unfortunately, the deviation from Culture Partners’ core concepts had also created a rift between the message the company sent to its clients and the actual ongoings within its walls.

Terry says it is imperative to admit that things were not OK in order to fix the faults. Now, the company works to rebuild trust along the journey in a way that helps everyone feel invested. This trust and transparency makes communication more valuable.

“The biggest shift we’re making comes down to looking out for your team first, then your clients. In that order,” Terry says. “That’s living the culture. If you’re making decisions with them in mind, it’s never a losing proposition.”

Terry says his ideal culture is one where 80 percent of his team wakes up energized about their job and work. That remaining 20 percent? “There are days when you can’t give your all, but knowing your teammates are energized will inspire you to give what you can,” Terry explains. “If all you have is 50 percent, then be the best 50 percent you can be. You want to give a good, solid performance, day in and day out.

“That’s living the culture,” he continues. “If they see their peers giving their all, they’re going to bring their best that day too. That inspiration, that’s living the culture.”

“The biggest shift we’re making comes down to looking out for your team first, then your clients. . . . If you’re making decisions with them in mind, it’s never a losing proposition.”

JOE TERRY

Courtesy of Joe Terry

An HR Leader for Every Battle

from inside the company. He’s found a way to improve people’s lives inside his company and for his customers.

ADVOCACY IN ACTION

One of the primary motivating factors for Riley in coming to Oportun was the company’s commitment to making the organization one that is welcoming to all.

“Part of the reason that I came to Oportun is that I knew DEI is not an uphill battle here,” the VP explains. “From our board to our CEO to our executive committee and leadership team, Oportun truly understands what we’re trying to accomplish. I have the chance to continue to advocate for people and make meaningful differences for each and every person here.”

The company had an already established framework and commitment to continue to build out its DEI capabilities when Riley joined in 2021. With that framework in place, he has helped move the organization forward, including signing on to the CEO Action for Diversity & Inclusion pledge.

By BILLY YOST

Growing up, Lionel Riley couldn’t wait to take on his dream job: building refrigerators at the same Whirlpool factory where his father spent thirty-two years of his career. It may sound odd, but Riley says working at the factory was seen as a bestcase scenario for many in his hometown: a good job with good pay and the knowledge that you were creating something that made people’s lives better.

It wasn’t the path he would ultimately take. After a stint in the Army Guard, Riley went on to further his military career in the Air Guard. He then built out best-inclass human resources expertise on behalf of Walmart and its 2.3 million associates. In coming to Oportun as vice president of people and culture, however, Riley has managed to thread the needle of his early goals and his more mature ambition.

Riley is aiding an organization that helps build credit for underserved communities by growing diversity and inclusion efforts

Along with more than two thousand other CEOs, Oportun CEO Raul Vazquez is part of a broad consortium of leaders working to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in the workplace. The pledge is more than a call to action; it includes specific actions that signatories are taking to make that goal a reality.

Additionally, Riley just recently helped Oportun lead its first annual employee resource group (ERG) summit, an opportunity for ERG leaders to come together to talk about leadership, establish common goals, evaluate metrics, and open up true collaboration amongst the ERG leadership team. There are currently eight ERG groups at Oportun for members and allies alike.

Riley says that while it was a place for like-minded individuals to come together and share their experiences, there was also a broader expectation of the groups that contain so much talent.

“It’s important to connect ERGs back to the business and make sure they are a place for development,” the VP explains. “We have metrics and budgets in place to make sure that these groups are more than a place to air grievances. They’re a place for employees to

Lionel Riley moves Oportun’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion forward with the heart of a soldier

learn, grow, and feel connected to each other while continuing to build buy-in and allyship.”

AT EVERY FRONT

It’s a significant goal that Riley is working toward, but his résumé shows him to be a high performer who has consistently demonstrated the ability to exceed the mark.

Riley built his HR chops in the whirlwind environment of one of the world’s largest retailers: Walmart. Over seventeen years, Riley earned several promotions and developed a skill set at a pace that he says was truly unrivaled in the retail space.

“You’re talking about the global Fortune One company. The minimum was that you were always working one or two levels above your role. It was incredible for development, but I think the speed and rapidity of pace brainwashed me for the rest of my life,” he says with a laugh.

Yet it wasn’t the first experience where Riley was encouraged to bite off more than he could chew. Lt. Col. Riley currently serves as an intelligence squadron commander for the 288th Operations Support Squadron in the Arkansas Air National Guard. “We are the best Guard unit in the United States. I put that challenge out to every other Air Guard unit out there,” he says. He recalls the challenges of spending his early career in the Army Guard.

“I remember being eighteen years old at the wheel of a $1.1 million Bradley Fighting Vehicle and thinking, ‘Man, I’ve only had my driver’s license for two years,’” Riley says. “The military wasn’t afraid to train you to do a job and expect you to perform.”

He now acts as a mentor for those pursuing their own military careers, regardless of where they are in their own journeys. In fact, Riley was heading off for weekend drill duty a day after speaking with Profile

“The military has been part of me since I was eighteen, and now I just want to help others navigate their own challenges and offer access to all and share all the benefits the military has to offer,” he says.

That’s really where Riley excels now. Whether it’s on the clock or on duty, the VP is helping remove obstacles for those working to make their own opportunities. And he’s with them every step of the way.

Lionel Riley VP of People & Culture Oportun

“Part of the reason I came to Oportun is that I knew DEI is not an uphill battle here.”

LIONEL RILEY

Double Down on Culture

Susan N. Eckert and her HR team work behind the scenes to keep Parx Casino the number one in gaming facility the region

By ZACH BALIVA

It was an interview like no other. In 2006, the parking lot at the Bucks County Visitors Center looked like something from a reality TV show. Hundreds of applicants waited in a long line that wrapped around the corner of the building.

Inside, workers put them into groups of six and escorted them into the auditorium, where they performed songs by Bon Jovi and the Village People. Those who had fun performed somewhat well, and those who embraced the unconventional process walked away with job offers.

They were not auditioning for a spot on American Idol . They were trying out for one of the eight hundred jobs at Parx Casino. And instead of Simon Cowell, they met Susan N. Eckert, the organization’s head

of human resources. Eckert, whose father worked in a gaming-related field, came to Parx after the company won approval from the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board to transform what was once a thoroughbred horse racing venue and bring 3,200 slot machines to its 430-acre site.

With new legislation passed, legalized gambling in high demand, and other jobs scarce, Eckert and her boss, Vice President of HR Andy Green, knew they would get more than enough applicants for the positions they needed to fill. But soon, they were overwhelmed by unending phone calls, inquiries, and walk-ins from prospective employees.

“We had to get people in the door quickly, and there was no time to do a traditional interview with each and every person,” Eckert says. “We decided to get creative and have fun, and that ended up setting the tone and contributing to the culture we still have today.”

Parx announced something similar to an open casting call and invited people to schedule a group audition. Candidates came from Las Vegas and other major cities. After putting in twelve-hour days, six days a week for several weeks, the Parx management team processed fifteen thousand applicants to form a core team that launched what has become the most successful casino on the East Coast.

Susan N. Eckert

Head of HR

Parx Casino

“We grew around a very special core team, and there was a bond and an energy that became infectious that made us who we are today.”

SUSAN N. ECKERT

Kane Pugh, since its inception, has devoted its entire practice to the defense of insurers, self-insured entities, and businesses throughout Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Our attorneys have tried hundreds of cases to verdict in State and Federal Courts. We have also argued before the Appellate Courts throughout the region.

AREAS OF PRACTICE/SERVICES:

General Casualty

Medical Malpractice

Legal Malpractice

Municipal Liability

Civil Rights

Employment Discrimination

Pharmaceutical Liability

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Commercial Transportation

Directors & O cers

Liability Coverage

Errors & Omissions Liability

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Architect & Engineers

Construction Litigation

Workers’ Compensation

Professional Liability

More than fifteen years later, Parx Casino is known as one of the best gaming and entertainment facilities in the region and is expanding to bring other sportsbooks and mini casinos to nearby areas. “Our opening day was like nothing you could imagine, and our momentum just has not slowed down,” Eckert says.

Parx soon outpaced all Atlantic City casinos, and Eckert put all the right policies and procedures in place to support the operation as it added more restaurants and a gift shop. Parx owners did not stop there and continued to develop the business by adding table games and poker, as well as a purposebuilt 1,500-seat entertainment venue.

These developments doubled Parx’s workforce. Parx is now Pennsylvania’s highest-grossing gaming facility with preCOVID revenue topping $460 million per year.

It has been a nonstop whirlwind for Eckert and her team, with Parx’s remote locations, iGaming and sportsbook operations, and racing business. Parx now employs about 2,200 full-time workers who earn a competitive salary with benefits. Compensation starts at $18 per hour for nontipped hourly gaming positions.

Eckert fondly remembers the early years when everyone had to pitch in to make big events happen with limited resources, and she has aimed to keep that same spirit and culture alive. “We grew around a very special core team, and there was a bond and an energy that became infectious that made us who we are today,” she says.

Parx’s leaders embody the values they want their employees to live by. The casino is responsible for about 75 percent of all charitable donations from casinos in the state and has given nearly $40 million in the past six years, much of it to organizations in the Delaware Valley.

Like all businesses linked to tourism, hospitality, and entertainment, Parx was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. While the casino endured multiple shutdowns, team members maintained their pay and benefits for extended periods of time during related furloughs. As variants come and go and mask mandates change, Eckert says her team is doing all it can to make sure all team members feel safe and secure.

In recent months, they’ve provided additional training on new procedures and made themselves available to answer questions and address concerns. Parx suspended indoor smoking during the pandemic, and a positive reaction from team members will likely make permanent what was intended as a temporary measure.

As the gaming industry moves forward in uncertain times, Eckert is focusing on projects and initiatives designed to attract new team members and support current staff. Parx is launching more robust employee resource groups as HR strengthens its diversity, equity, and inclusion programs.

Before earning her MA in organizational psychology with a focus on HR, Eckert studied school counseling and worked in the human services field with students with disabilities. She hopes to expand recruitment efforts and create more opportunities for veterans and people with disabilities as well as underrepresented groups.

Building a strong and inclusive talent pipeline is critical because Parx isn’t done yet. The casino still has plenty of space to grow on its existing property, and leaders are in ongoing talks regarding other plans across Bucks and neighboring counties.

As those plans unfold, Eckert and her team will continue to onboard great team members and protect the special culture they’ve built together at Parx Casino—you can bet on it.

“Our opening day was like nothing you could imagine, and our momentum just has not slowed down.”

SUSAN N. ECKERT

IMPACT

Leaders highlight successful outcomes of initiatives, whether within their companies or the communities they serve

Chris Peake, Smartsheet P110

Ivoree Reinaldo, Newfront

Caring for the Customer

By ZACH BALIVA

Today, Chris Peake is the vice president of information security and chief information security officer (CISO) at Smartsheet. Ninety percent of Fortune 100 companies use the enterprise platform to automate processes and drive innovation. As Peake works with top clients, he reminds them of one thing he’s learned over the last twenty years: the best security programs are anchored in trust and transparency.

Peake encourages others to focus on creating an excellent customer experience. It’s a lesson he learned in an unlikely place. The veteran security professional didn’t originally study computer science, cybersecurity, programming, or business. Instead, he completed an undergraduate degree in sociology and anthropology at Oregon’s Linfield University.

Smartsheet’s Chris Peake knows cloud service providers need to protect data and earn trust to attract clients. That’s why he’s committed to building the best user experience in the industry.

Working with computers was more of a hobby. In his spare time, Peake tinkered with Apple IIe computers and other pieces of emerging technology. But he took his first job managing medical missions for Operation Smile, a nonprofit group whose volunteers perform cleft lip and cleft palate surgeries around the world.

Like most nonprofits, Operation Smile needed to maximize every dollar and worked without a robust IT team. Peake volunteered to use his knack for computers and technology to gather information, build databases, create networks, and even connect doctors to patients for remote consultations.

The experience opened Peake’s eyes to the power of technology and the need for refined security measures around the user or customer experience. “I saw the impact of what happens when talented people come together and bring digital solutions that add real value to peoples’ lives,” he says. “But we also have to protect personal data and stay committed to an excellent customer experience, so people will use the solutions we build for them.”

The fulfilling work set Peake on a new path, and he started reading computer networking books, taking introductory courses, and collecting IT certifications. Those activities led to work with a government contractor, where he managed networks, completed a Windows 2000 migration, and moved more fully into security engineering and architecture.

After progressing into leadership roles at various companies and completing masters and doctorate programs in information security, Peake joined Smartsheet in 2020. As the company’s first formal CISO, he’s on board to build and mature an overall

Chris Peake

VP of Information Security and CISO Smartsheet

“Our customers work with data. They can trust that their information is private and secure, and we are always improving our own internal security controls.”

security program that will protect Smartsheet and its users alike.

“Our customers work with data. They can trust that their information is private and secure, and we are always improving our own internal security controls,” Peake says.

Under his leadership, the IT and security teams built and launched the Smartsheet Trust Center, an online portal where users can access information related to security measures, privacy practices, data governance, and compliance protocols, while checking service availability.

“Chris Peake is leveraging his experience in hyper-growth organizations to help Smartsheet build a robust and comprehensive security program,” says Chris Cottler, regional director at Zscaler Inc. “Zscaler is proud to be a critical pillar of that program, ensuring that they meet the demands of their employees and clients, while ensuring Smartsheet’s security posture is never compromised.”

Peake views Smartsheet’s relationship with its customers as collaborative. Customers are storing sensitive data within the company’s SaaS platform, and the security team has the responsibility to manage and protect that data. Smartsheet earns

customer trust by talking about its road map, discussing any challenges the customer is facing, and being vocal about the capabilities leaders are building to address issues and concerns that arise.

“Security is a journey, and you never cross the finish line,” Peake says. “We’re always striving to be better and deliver more to our customers.”

With this trust and transparency in place, large corporations, small businesses, and individuals can leverage Smartsheet to do their work more efficiently and manage data with very little outside support. The applications are nearly endless.

One customer, a project manager, recently built an app within Smartsheet to help a large retailer manage inventory workflow across ten thousand stores. Another customer, Pip Hare Ocean Racing, helped British sailor Pip Hare track schedules, timing, weather, and routes, as she sailed around the world in the Vendée Globe. Hare became just the eighth woman to complete the 24,365-mile, 95-day journey.

Peake started with a four-year road map in 2020 and is still executing on his original plan, while helping support the transition to remote and hybrid working

environments. “We have to evolve and provide the right security controls with more people working from home, and that means improving endpoint security and network protection capabilities,” he says. Peake adds that Smartsheet has sourced new products and developed new capabilities to protect off-site employees from outside threats.

In today’s globalized and connected world, those threats are increasing. Peake relies on a dedicated, focused, and collaborative team to help him make the right moves to respond to the evolving threat landscape in a proactive way. “We have a team of people willing to try new things and pursue constant innovation,” Peake says.

Together, that team is helping Smartsheet earn trust and drive new outcomes for its customers.

Zscaler is honored to partner with Smartsheet to secure its cloud transformation journey. Using a zero trust architecture, Zscaler enables Smartsheet to move away from outdated network infrastructure to support a modern workforce and achieve infrastructure modernization, and security transformation. With the largest security cloud on the planet, Zscaler makes doing business and navigating change a simpler, faster, and more productive experience.

“We have to evolve and provide the right security controls with more people working from home, and that means improving endpoint security and network protection capabilities.”

CHRIS PEAKE

Insurance’s Secret Weapon

By BILLY YOST

Ivoree Reinaldo knew from a young age she wanted to make a difference in the world. And at just seventeen, she found where she could leave a mark: the insurance industry.

“Insurance has impact on things people will never see,” says Reinaldo, senior vice president of Property & Casualty (P&C) at Newfront. She points to the 1921 massacre that happened to the Greenwood District in Tulsa, Oklahoma. “Black communities couldn’t get insurance. Imagine if insurance allowed them to rebuild an entire community and pass on generations of wealth. Everyone in this country should be able to get insurance.”

Reinaldo has made a name for herself in the age-old industry. At Newfront, she became the first Black female insurance executive to be a principal and owner on the P&C insurance team, a lead broker on publicly traded organizations, and promoted to senior vice president in P&C—all in 2021. She’s also Newfront’s first Black female executive to sell more than a million dollars in net revenue in a calendar year and cross a million dollars in total booked revenue.

In 2021, Insurance Journal named Reinaldo one of the Top 25 Agents of 2021—one of three women and the only Black professional on the list.

At the center of it all is her commitment to support organizations and nonprofits desperately needing corporate insurance to impact their communities positively. Her mission aligns with Newfront, a techdriven insurance company transforming the delivery of risk management, employee experience, insurance, and retirement solutions by building the modern insurance platform.

The importance of corporate insurance doesn’t get enough credit, Reinaldo explains. The list of things you can’t do without that insurance is exhaustive: rent office space, hire employees, take a company public on the stock market, or rent a car for business. Then there are the broader implications. People are less likely to serve on a board of an organization unless they are protected by insurance. Businesses are less likely to engage in transactions with organizations not adequately protected.

One of the more prominent benefactors of Reinaldo’s efforts is Black Lives Matter. The organization approached Reinaldo far before it was a household name, and its mission of racial equality and making the world safer for those with dark skin immediately affected the executive.

Reinaldo approached over one hundred different insurance companies seeking business coverage for the organization. She was told no over a hundred times.

“I think people might be surprised that over one hundred insurance companies even

“I want to go to sleep at night knowing that I didn’t just make my day about me.”

IVOREE REINALDO

Ivoree Reinaldo SVP of Property & Casualty Newfront

exist,” Reinaldo says. “I can’t tell you how many people slammed the door in my face after five minutes.”

Not having insurance puts an organization one accident or incident away from not existing, but BLM couldn’t even get a quote. Had it not been for Reinaldo’s tireless efforts, BLM wouldn’t have found coverage.

“Ultimately, we found a nonprofit organization who understood and valued what the organization was trying to do,” the SVP says. “They didn’t rush to judgment or just read those sensationalist headlines.”

It’s not the only organization that Reinaldo has helped strengthen. She cofounded the BLACKfront Employee Resource Group at Newfront and sits on the company’s Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Council. She also serves as a board cochair for the Youth Leadership Institute, which aids underprivileged, at-risk, and diverse youth change discriminatory legal policy, as well as working with several other prominent private and publicly traded organizations. Reinaldo also took her mission to those who make the laws. In 2020, Reinaldo spoke before members of the US House Financial Services Committee to encourage their support of the Nonprofit Property Protection Act. The legislation would allow insurance companies to offer coverage commercial carriers do not.

The legislation was never voted on, but Reinaldo has faced challenges before. And she won’t stop. “I spoke to a gap these people

didn’t even know existed,” Reinaldo says. “I’m confident that we will be able to get this to a vote at some point, and I’m proud to have spoken the truth about a change we need in the insurance industry.”

Reinaldo says the work she has done for various organizations has exposed a gap, one that leads to groups being systematically prevented from operating: organizations focused on racial equity, women’s rights, and civil rights.

The executive draws a stark comparison to the perpetrators whose actions launched the #MeToo movement and the organizations she works to empower. The former were able to get insurance for decades, so why can’t nonprofits whose only goal is to make the world a better place?

For Reinaldo, the work has only begun. Newfront is launching a women-owned and minority-owned or -operated insurance practice reflective of a modern society—an effort driven by Reinaldo.

“I want to go to sleep at night knowing that I didn’t just make my day about me,” she says. “I want to make enough change in the world, where these aren’t issues we have to discuss in the future. Imagine a world where this doesn’t have to be at the top of mind. But we’re not there yet.

“Regardless of where you or your clients may land on the political spectrum,” she continues, “it is important to be of service to others and find purpose in what you do. That is what being a true professional is all about.”

“Regardless of where you or your clients fall on the political spectrum, it is important to be of service to others and find purpose in what you do.”

IVOREE REINALDO

American Express P13

BDP International P45

Bennett, Karen P96

Berdon LLP P96

Boston Red Sox P92

Burke, Lilian P45

Ciccarello, Joe P28

Coaction P10

Culture Partners P100

Dabberdt, Lee P24

Deflecto Corporation P35

Downs, Brian P59

Dril-Quip P18

Eckert, Susan N. P106

EverCommerce P24

Ferrero USA P56

Foursquare P42

G

Gallo, Alan P13 Gardner, Barry P62

Gimbel, Jordan P16 Golden State Warriors P72

H Hay, Jon P92 Hein, Elizabeth P42

J

Jackson, Ann P83 Julien, Khara P22

K KIND P67

KPMG P48

Las Vegas Raiders P86 Lin, Linda P10 Lipscomb, Josh P80

Matei, Marie-Jeanne P56 McKibben, Jeff P32

MSD Wayne Township P62 Moore, Jamie P38

Newfront P113

Oak View Group P83 Oportun P104

Parx Casino P106

Pasco, Matthew P86

Peake, Chris P110

Pela, Ozie P67

Portland Trail Blazers P75

Rankin, Scott P48

Reinaldo, Ivoree P113

Riley, Lionel P104

Sarsfield, Derek P35

Shift4 P59

Singh, Harveer P52

Smartsheet P110

Soares, Michelle P75

SolarWinds P28

Terry, Joe P100

Transportation Insight P22 Twitch P16

U Ultra Clean Technology P32 Upstart P38

Valle, Elm P18

Varsity Brands P80

Vasquez, Jennifer P72

Western Union P52

Matthew Pasco, VP of IT, Las Vegas Raiders 86

Ivoree Reinaldo, SVP of Property & Casualty, Newfront

The MVPs in SPORTS History

A timeline of key moments both on and off the field

1947

1956

1962

1997

2018

Olympic swimmer Simone Manuel put an inclusion rider—believed to be the first rider of its kind—in her contract with TYR Sport to ensure the company extends opportunities to traditionally underrepresented groups

Magic Johnson was the first Black owner in MLB history when he and Guggenheim Baseball Management purchased the Los Angeles Dodgers for $2 billion

Kim Ng becomes the first person of East Asian descent to serve as a general manager of an MLB team, the Miami Marlins

The Boston Red Sox hire Bianca Smith as a Minor League coach, making her the first Black woman to serve as a coach in professional baseball

Jackie Robinson breaks the baseball color line when he starts at first base for the Brooklyn Dodgers

Althea Gibson becomes the first African American to win a Grand Slam

Buck O’Neil becomes the first African American coach in the MLB when he joins the Chicago Cubs

Amy Trask becomes thenOakland Raiders’ CEO and the first woman of that rank in the NFL

Venus Williams becomes the first African American woman to win Wimbledon

Serena Williams becomes

Becky Hammon becomes the first full-time female assistant coach in the NBA

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