Marc Baranski
Mr. Baranski is a managing director at Semler Brossy, a leading independent executive compensation consulting firm. Prior to joining the firm, Mr. Baranski was a principal at Mercer and the investment management segment leader for their human capital business. He previously was at Sibson where he was the leader of the financial services industry practice and managed their London and Princeton offices.
Sandra Beach Lin
Ms. Lin served as chief executive officer of Calisolar, Inc., a solar silicon company, until her retirement in 2011. Previously, she held senior leadership roles at Celanese Corporation, Avery Dennison and Alcoa. Ms. Lin currently serves on the boards of American Electric Power (AEP), Interface Biologics, PolyOne Corporation, Trinseo, and WESCO, is the co-chair of Paradigm for Parity and a member of the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD) Nominating and Governance Committee Chair Advisory Council.
Ryan Cotton
Mr. Cotton joined Bain Capital Private Equity in 2003 and is currently managing director and global head of the consumer/retail vertical. Previously, he served as a consultant at Bain & Company and worked in baseball operations at the Boston Red Sox.
Patricia Diaz Dennis
Ms. Diaz Dennis joined SBC Communications in 1995 as a Senior Vice President and Assistant General Counsel and she served in a variety of positions for the company, which later became AT&T. Prior to SBC/AT&T, Ms. Diaz Dennis served as Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs in 1992-1993. She was also appointed to the National Labor Relations Board in 1983, and as a commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission three years later. Ms. Diaz Dennis is currently a director of Amalgamated Bank, Entravision Communications and U.S. Steel.
Christine Heckart
Ms. Heckart is the CEO of Scalyr, a leading log management and observability platform. Previously, she was senior vice president and marketing leader at Cisco and chief marketing officer of Brocade. Prior to joining Brocade, Ms. Heckart served as executive vice president of strategy, marketing, people, and IT at ServiceSource. She was also chief marketing officer at NetApp and Juniper Networks. Ms. Heckart was general manager of Microsoft’s TV, video, and music business and president of TeleChoice. She is currently a member of board of directors of 6sense and previously Lam Research.
Wayne Hewett
Mr. Hewett is chairman of DiversiTech Corporation and Cambrex Corporation, and the former chief executive officer of Klockner Pentaplast Group. He previously was chief executive officer of Arysta LifeScience Corporation prior to the sale of the company to Platform Specialty Products Corporation. Mr. Hewett’s early career included over 20 years with General Electric where he was chief executive officer of GE Advance Materials; president of GE Plastics Pacific and Vice President, Supply Chain and Operations and a member of the company’s Corporate Executive Council. In addition to Cambrex and DiversiTech, Mr. Hewett currently serves on the boards of Home Depot, UPS and Wells Fargo.
Mark Mandel
Mr. Mandel is a partner in the Corporate & Securities Practice of Baker McKenzie’s New York office. Mr. Mandel advises public and private companies with investments, mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, unsolicited and friendly tender offers, joint ventures, public offerings and private placements, and restructurings. He also advises boards of directors on corporate governance and fiduciary duties.
Bob Maricich
Mr. Maricich joined World Market Center in 2008 and continues to serve as chairman and chief executive officer. In 2001, he was instrumental in envisioning and developing the strategy for the creation of International Market Centers, founding the company with sponsors Bain Capital and Oaktree Capital Management. Mr. Maricich successfully raised over $1 billion to purchase the International Home Furnishings Center, ShowPlace properties, and Market Square properties, merging them with World Market Center Last Vegas to form the world’s largest operator of premier showroom space for the furnishing, home décor, and gift industries. Prior to WMC, Mr. Maricich served as CEO of Century Furniture Industries, and president and CEO of American Drew Furniture and American of Martinsville, at the time the largest manufacturer of furniture for the hospitality industry.
Keith Meyer
Mr. Meyer is the co-founder and president of the Directors Academy, and the global head of the CEO & Board Practice and co-leader of the Leadership Practice at Allegis Partners. Mr. Meyer was founder and managing partner of Park Avenue Advisors and previously was vice chairman and managing partner of the Global Board Consulting Practice and co-leader of the North America CEO & Board Practice at Heidrick & Struggles. Mr. Meyer held a variety of corporate leadership roles with Exxon and PepsiCo. He was also a member of McKinsey’s global Energy Practice. He has previously been named to the D100 list of the most influential people in corporate governance. Mr. Meyer is a Directors Academy board member.
Mike Millegan
Mr. Millegan served as president of Verizon Global Wholesale group, a business unit of Verizon Communications, where he focused on global carrier, wireless and cable company network requirements from 2007 until his retirement in 2013. Prior to that, Mr. Millegan was senior vice president/market president for Verizon’s Midwest Operations and senior vice president Enterprise/Wholesale business unit. Mr. Millegan also led the Logistics/Supply Chain business unit as the senior vice president from 2000 to 2004. Mr. Millegan is a member of the Axis Capital Holdings Ltd., CoreSite Realty, Portland General Electric and Wireless Telecom board of directors, and is a NextGen Directors program alum.
Heather Redman
Ms. Redman is the co-founder and managing partner of Flying Fish Partners, a venture capital firm investing in early stage software and mixed hardware and software companies, concentrated in artificial intelligence. She is also a member of the boards of Coldstream Holdings, Yesler, Beneficial State Bank and Washington State University. She was most recently vice president, operations at Indix and previously served as a senior executive at Summit Power, co-COO at Atom Entertainment, and general counsel at Getty Images and Photodisc.
Merline Saintil
Ms. Saintil is the former chief operating officer at Change Healthcare. She was previously the head of operations for product and technology at Intuit, and managed global teams in a variety of positions at Yahoo, Sun Microsystems, Adobe, PayPal, and Joyent. She currently serves on the board of Aequi Acquisition Group, Alkami Technology, Banner Corporation, Evolv Technology, Gitlab, Lightspeed HQ and Shotspotter. Ms. Saintil is a NextGen Directors program alum.
Lynn Tetrault
Ms. Tetrault is Lead Independent Director of NeoGenomics Clinical Laboratories and Non-Executive Director of Rhythm Pharmaceuticals. Ms. Tetrault served as executive vice president of Human Resources and Corporate Affairs at AstraZeneca PLC from 2007-2014 and held a variety of other executive roles during her 22-year tenure with the company. She began her career in private law practice in Boston. Ms. Tetrault is a Fellow and Advisory Board Member of the Simmons University Institute for Inclusive Leadership. She also serves on the Board of Directors of Paradigm for Parity, a non-profit organization focused on closing the gender parity gap in corporate leadership. Ms. Tetrault is also the founder of Anahata Leadership, a firm focused on supporting the empowerment and development of women leaders.
James D. White
Mr. White is the former chairman, chief executive officer and president of Jamba Inc. and previously held senior executive roles at Safeway, Gillette and Ralston Purina. He is an experienced board chair with 20 years of boardroom experience having served on over 16 public, pre-IPO, private and startup boards. He currently serves on several public company boards, including Adtalem Global Education, Affirm, Honest Company – where he is the board chair, Medallia and Simply Good Foods. Mr. White is also Executive Chairman of Air Protein, a startup that makes protein-enriched food from carbon dioxide. Mr. White is a co-founder and board chair of the Directors Academy.
Paul Williams
Mr. Williams currently serves on the boards of Air Transport Services Group, Compass Minerals, Public Storage, Romeo Power and a group of American Funds boards (part of Capital Group). He is also the president of the Chicago Chapter of the National Association of Corporate Directors (NACD). Previously, Mr. Williams was the Nominating and Governance Committee chairman for Essendant. He has served as the lead independent director of State Auto Financial Corporation, as well as the Compensation Committee chairman and CEO Search Committee chairman for Bob Evans Restaurants. Previously Mr. Williams served as executive vice president, chief legal officer and secretary of Cardinal Health, a Fortune 20 company, and co-leader of the North America Board Practice of Allegis Partners. His career began as a corporate and securities associate with the law firms of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher and Vorys, Sater, Seymour & Pease. Mr. Williams is a Directors Academy board member.
Billie Williamson
Ms. Williamson has over three decades of experience auditing public companies as a partner of EY. In addition, she served as senior vice president, finance and corporate controller of Marriott International and chief financial officer of AMX Corporation. While at EY, Ms. Williamson served as the Americas Inclusiveness Officer, a member of its Americas Executive Board and head of the Center for Strategic Transactions in the southwest region. Ms. Williamson has served on numerous public and private company boards, including Annie's, Beneficient Company Group LP, CSRA, Cushman & Wakefield, Energy Future Holdings, ITT Exelis, Janus Capital Group, Kraton, Pentair plc, Pharos Capital BDC and XL Group Ltd. Ms. Williamson is a Directors Academy board member.
Roxanne Decyk
Ms. Decyk previously served as executive vice president, global government relations of Royal Dutch Shell and held other senior-level positions with Amoco Oil Corporation and Navistar. She currently serves on the boards of Digital Globe, Ensco, and Orbital ATK. Ms. Decyk is the chair of the compensation committee at Orbital ATK and chair of the risk committee at Digital Globe. She previously chaired the remuneration, governance, nominating and audit committees on a number of European boards. Ms. Decyk also served on the Defense Business Board, a civilian advisory board to the Department of Defense, and has served on the Subcommittee for Capacity Building and Skills Training of the International Council on Women’s Business Leadership for the U.S. State Department.
Susan Levine
Ms. Levine is a managing director and member of the North American Private Equity team at Bain Capital Private Equity. As head of talent, Ms. Levine leads the human capital agenda across Bain’s North America portfolio which includes ensuring its companies have strong boards and senior leadership teams aligned with each organization’s strategic objectives. Prior to joining Bain Capital, Ms. Levine served as Bain & Company’s director of North America marketing and client development and previously worked at Barents Group, advising clients M&A activities across emerging markets.
Kim McCaslin
Ms. McCaslin is a managing director and co-head of the North America Private Equity Portfolio Group at Bain Capital Private Equity and has served on a number of portfolio company boards. Prior to joining Bain Capital, she served as vice president, M&A and corporate development at Capital One Financial. Ms. McCaslin was also a principal at Mercer Management Consulting, where she advised companies across a variety of industries. She began her career at Accenture, focusing on business process redesign and financial systems development projects.
Felicia WIlliams
Ms. Williams is the Macy’s Fellow for the CEO Action for Racial Equity, the largest CEO-driven business commitment to advancing diversity and inclusion in the workplace. Previously, she held financial leadership roles at Macy’s including interim chief financial officer; executive vice president, controller and enterprise risk officer; and senior vice president, treasury and risk management. Ms. Williams currently serves on the boards of Realogy Holdings and Meridian Bioscience where she chairs the audit committee. Prior to joining Macy’s, Ms. Williams served as group controller at Coca-Cola Company and vice president, internal audit at Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company in Greece.
Chris Wightman
Mr. Wightman is a partner at PJT Camberview, joining PJT Partners in 2018 through the acquisition of Camberview Partners, of which he was a founder. He advises clients on all aspects of corporate governance and shareholder engagement with a focus on shareholder activism, complex proxy voting, and executive compensation matters. Before joining Camberview, Mr. Wightman led the global corporate governance and portfolio compliance oversight programs for Vanguard.