Our Fellows

Born in Haiti and raised in Brooklyn, Alex earned a BA in biochemistry from Harvard and Master’s degrees in business and law from Stanford. She began her career at Goldman Sachs, later joined the pan-African private equity firm ECP, and then moved to Meta. At Meta, Alex has led major infrastructure investment programs across Africa, Latin America, and the Asia-Pacific region. As Vice President, she oversees a global team that designs, delivers, and deploys subsea and terrestrial fiber networks to connect Meta’s data centers and support more than three billion users. Alex also serves as a Commissioner on the Los Angeles Workforce Development Board.

Sam grew up in Manalapan, New Jersey, graduated from New York University, and worked at skincare startups and Estée Lauder (squeezing in a year at Bridgewater Associates in between) before she co-founded FoodHealth Company to improve the world’s health through food—and help millions of people with food allergies like she has. FoodHealth Company began as a food-as-medicine marketplace for healthcare providers and employers, and then Sam pivoted to build a nutrition technology company. FoodHealth Company provides its trademark FoodHealth Score to manufacturers and retailers so customers can improve and personalize their food purchases.

Growing up Native American and African American in rural Texas, Vanessa saw the digital divide’s impact on certain ethnic groups—and wanted to fix it. She earned degrees in computer science and law from the University of Texas at Austin. Her career took her from clerking at Jones Day to heading patent litigation at Nokia Siemens Networks to leading global IP policy at Intel to heading patent policy at Amazon. She left Amazon in early 2026 and now helps businesses navigate the convergence of intellectual property and AI/data regulation.

Rachel grew up in the D.C. area, earned a BS in chemical engineering from the University of Delaware, and began her career as a developer for Arthur Andersen. After a decade at Ariba and stints at Lithium Technologies and SAP—in Australia, the UK, Switzerland, and Singapore—she joined Cisco in 2020 ultimately serving as SVP Americas. She recently joined UKG, a leading provider of HR, payroll, workforce management, and culture solutions, where she leads all go-to-market (GTM) functions. She serves on the board of CSG International, a publicly held software company, and is a constant advocate for LGBTQ+ rights and increasing digital literacy and access to underserved youth.

AJ grew up in Maryland, graduated from Morgan State University (an HBCU), and started her career at General Motors before moving to banking at Citigroup and then Bank of America. Rising through a dozen jobs over three decades, AJ now leads Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) at BofA, she also serves as President of the Bank of America Foundation and oversees BofA’s partnerships with members of the Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) and Minority Depository Institution (MDI) industry.

Kara grew up in Greensboro, North Carolina, as the eldest of six siblings and graduated from Duke University. She moved to New York City, produced theater on and off Broadway, earned an MBA from Harvard, and went on to senior leadership roles at Lincoln Center and American Ballet Theatre—which she led as Executive Director. Kara oversaw social impact and communications for First Republic before joining General Atlantic to steward the global investment firm’s foundation, which propels social innovation, entrepreneurship, and leadership.

Ivy began her career as a computer programmer with Accenture, designing and developing systems for Fortune 500 companies in telecom, media and entertainment. Since joining Walmart in 2010, she has risen quickly through supply chain and operations to her current role as Head of Store Operations, East. That includes 817 stores in 16 states plus Washington, D.C. As Walmart’s Black ERG chair, Ivy played a key role in shaping the company’s strategy in the wake of George Floyd’s murder.

Melissa grew up in Los Angeles, graduated from Notre Dame, and earned an MBA from The University of Chicago. She started her career in Ecuador at Citi and Grupo Futuro and then spent seven years at Best Buy before joining Sleep Number in 2013. Today, Melissa leads a broad portfolio for the high-tech bedding company, from development through distribution. She also serves on the boards of Pentair and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Minnesota.

Robyn grew up outside Boston, studied civil engineering, and early in her career helped build the world’s largest headquarters solar panel installation at Google. She went on to roles at Vestas Wind Systems and with inventor Dean Kamen before founding Blueprint Power, a company that equipped real estate owners with software to manage and sell excess energy. Robyn sold Blueprint to BP in 2021 and stayed on to lead it inside BP’s Gas and Power Trading division until early 2025.  As an Operating Partner at Sandbrook Capital, she’s focused on building businesses that transform the world’s energy infrastructure.

After earning a degree in chemical engineering and an MBA, Shenna joined Dow, where she rose through leadership in a broad variety of positions including Production Engineer, Six Sigma Black Belt, Productivity Leader, Procurement Director, and Supply Chain Director. Now, as Director of Global Logistics Operations, she’s in charge of delivering Dow products effectively, efficiently, and sustainably to customers around the world.

Jemina’s journey has taken her from the South Bronx to Yale to Columbia Business School, where she earned an MBA. She worked at Deloitte, PwC, and the New York Department of Education before joining Teach for America. Jemina left her SVP role there in 2013 to lead ROADS Charter High Schools and the Student Leadership Network, and returned in 2019. She served as Teach for America’s COO, overseeing a 12,000-strong teacher corps in underserved schools across the U.S., until 2026.

Regina grew up in Switzerland, earned a Master’s in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Fribourg and an MBA from the University of Miami, and went on to build a cross-cultural career. She started in marketing at Hershey and moved quickly to Yum! Brands, where she’s driven Yum’s core brands—KFC, Pizza Hut, and Taco Bell—to give women and minority entrepreneurs access to capital and connections essential to building businesses. In 2025, after serving as General Manager of KFC Latin America & Caribbean, Regina added Canada to her portfolio.

Adrienne grew up in Tampa Bay and attended Florida A&M for her BA and MBA before beginning her career as a sales representative at Eli Lilly. In her two decades with the company, Adrienne has tackled healthcare inequities by bringing to market many innovative treatments for major diseases. She served as Group Vice President of U.S. diabetes, an epidemic affecting nearly 500 million people worldwide, and then oversaw corporate development worldwide before her promotion to President of Lilly Immunology in 2025. Adrienne is also on the board of BioCrossroads.

The daughter of Korean immigrants, Carrol began her career working with North Korean refugees in China—where she was jailed for assisting them and then deported by the Chinese government. In 2008, Carrol joined the Obama campaign and later served in the Department of Homeland Security. After three years at McKinsey and seven at Uber, Carrol is now CEO of Andela, where she leads efforts to enhance opportunities for workers globally.

The daughter of Bangladeshi immigrants, Ayesha grew up in New York City and studied international relations and quantitative economics at Tufts, later earning an MBA from Columbia. She spent a decade structuring commodities at Deutsche Bank before shifting to the biofuels sector at Freeport Commodities and then Morgan Stanley. In 2022, Ayesha joined Infinium, a climate tech startup, where she’s helping to build a breakthrough platform to decarbonize transportation.

Born in South Africa and raised in Alaska, Muriel navigated to the intersection of AI and the global workforce. Earning a doctorate in industrial and organizational psychology from the University of Georgia along the way, she is on a mission to enable the underserved. Muriel co-founded Anthill to connect the deskless workforce—frontline workers who often lack access to smartphones and computers—with employee resources on any kind of device and in over 100 languages. In 2026, Muriel sold Anthill to Humanly, an AI recruiting company.

Eradicating workplace inequities fuels Maria’s leadership. A first-generation college graduate, she raised $17.1 million in Series B funding for Syndio while she was eight months pregnant. Syndio is a SaaS company that empowers companies to optimize pay equity. Before joining Syndio as CEO in 2018, Maria spent four years at Starbucks and co-founded Smartsheet, a NYSE-listed company that was acquired by Blackstone and Vista Equity Partners for $8.4 billion in 2025.

Julia grew up in the San Francisco Bay area, went to Harvard and then Stanford for her MBA, and spent her early career rising through the New York City restaurant scene. In 2015, she co-founded Zume Pizza, a tech company that cooked pizza en route to delivery. Four years later, Julia founded Planet FWD to tackle the climate crisis. Planet FWD builds software that reduces the cost and complexity of bringing to market sustainable and carbon-neutral products—such as Julia’s climate-friendly snack brand, Moonshot.

Melissa grew up in Minnesota, became the first in her family to earn a college degree (University of Minnesota), and co-founded Josh’s Place, a home- and community-based Medicaid provider supporting adults with disabilities. She named Josh’s Place in honor of her late brother, who had developmental disabilities and epilepsy. After selling Josh’s Place in 2019, Melissa co-founded Joshin to transform workplace support for people with disabilities. Following the 2025 sale of Joshin to RethinkFirst, Melissa is leading strategy at the large behavioral healthtech company and scaling her work and mission.

Madeline was born in Seattle, grew up as one of 13 children in a blended multicultural family, and studied psychology at the University of Sydney and University of Texas at Austin before getting a Harvard MBA. She began her career in store operations at Disney, was a senior consultant at Oliver Wyman, and in 2018 gravitated to venture at Victress Capital and then CircleUp. In 2022, Madeline launched Kaya Ventures to back founders redefining health. In 2025, she joined IBank to drive access to venture capital across California.

Born in Ethiopia, Lule spent her early years as an immigrant in Greece, the UK, and Kenya before coming to the U.S. and working in a series of increasingly senior roles at J.P. Morgan, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, TD Ameritrade, and Ally. A risk taker with guardrails, as she calls herself, Lule led U.S. Operations of the social investing platform eToro USA with a perspective informed by her intersectional identities and experience.

Lauren grew up in the East Bay and went to college at Stanford, where she earned a BA in Human Biology, an MBA, and a Fulbright scholarship to research supply chain systems in India. Working at Revolution Foods and living in Kenya opened her eyes to the opportunity to help factories operate more sustainably. In 2018, Lauren founded Guidewheel, which works with 250+ manufacturers across five continents to optimize their assets and reduce their carbon footprint. She also serves on the Executive Committee of the U.S. Center for Advanced Manufacturing.

Sassie grew up in Plano, Texas, studied biomedical engineering at Texas A&M, and earned her MBA from Virginia Tech. She began her career at National Instruments, honed her skills at fiber optic, biotech, and cargo transport startups, and worked at Virgin Orbit before co-founding Venus Aerospace in 2020. One of the few women CEOs in aerospace, Sassie is leading the charge to build the world’s first high-speed plane powered by a next-generation rocket engine—one that could enable two-hour global travel.

Lisa earned a BA from Brandeis, a Masters in physics from the University of London, and a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 2008, she founded Kiverdi (originally called Sequesco) to harness space age science to create planet-friendly commercial solutions and new products through carbon transformation. While she remains Chair of Kiverdi, Lisa now leads her other startup, Air Protein, which uses half-century-old NASA technology to create protein-rich food from elements of the air.

Jarah grew up in Fresno, earning a Bachelor’s in business from NYU and a Wharton MBA, and then worked in analytics at BCG and Yahoo. There she saw how technology can create smarter, more equitable systems for the types of hourly workers she grew up with back in California’s Central Valley. In 2019, Jarah founded WorkWhile to connect hourly workers with companies providing flexible work with benefits. With nearly 60 million Americans working independently, WorkWhile is helping thousands of people build sustainable careers—while enabling businesses to stay nimble.

Karen grew up in China and graduated from the University of Tokyo before beginning her career at Merrill Lynch Japan. She moved to London for Deutsche Bank and then to New York for Goldman Sachs before joining Bank of America Merrill Lynch in 2010. She rose quickly to Global Head of Infrastructure & Sustainable Finance, added the role of Co-Head of Global Capital Solutions in 2025, and is a member of the bank’s Management Committee. Karen leads BofA’s efforts to deliver innovative capital solutions for clients across public and private markets in sectors such as energy, power, and digital infrastructure, including data centers and AI ecosystems. She is also responsible for the firm’s strategy to deliver $1.5 trillion in sustainable finance capital over 10 years by 2030. She has been recognized on Fortune’s “40 Under 40,” as a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, and in the “TIME100 Climate” list of the world’s most influential climate leaders.

From UC Berkeley to Stanford to the U.S. House of Representatives and John McCain’s presidential campaign, Heather navigated business and politics early on. She was an Associate at Morgan Stanley for two years before joining Trulia as employee No. 12 in 2006. She rose to SVP & GM and left to co-found Solv Health in 2016. Heather now leads the largest national healthcare booking network, connecting millions of consumers with same-day providers offering services at significantly lower costs than ER treatment. Heather is also on the board of Atlassian.

Growing up on Long Island with a father who was a volunteer EMT, Shanel learned early on about the challenges faced by first responders. After graduating from Cornell, she worked at AT&T and Athenahealth, managing enterprise healthcare IT sales teams, before starting MD Ally to fix a critical and under-resourced piece of America’s healthcare infrastructure: 911. MD Ally connects non-emergency 911 callers to in-network virtual care, mental health, substance abuse, and other community resources.

Rebecca grew up in rural New York State, served in the Peace Corps in Russia, and has built her career on a mission to tackle one of the world’s toughest challenges: advancing clean energy. She spent seven years at the Consortium for Energy Efficiency, a partnership of utilities and advocacy groups, before going to the Vermont Energy Investment Corporation (VEIC) as a consultant in 2011. Now she’s at the helm of the nonprofit, working with utilities, manufacturers, and distributors to design renewable energy programs for towns and cities—particularly underserved and vulnerable communities—across the U.S.

Ana grew up in Kerman, California, a low income agricultural town, as the only daughter of a Mexican immigrant. First in her family to graduate from college, she earned a BA at San Diego State and then worked briefly as an analyst at Kleinfelder, an engineering and construction management firm. Ana joined Booz Allen Hamilton as a junior analyst in 2000 and rose to senior roles in the company’s Global Defense Sector. Joining Accenture in 2024, she now manages complex projects for the Department of Defense, including work with the U.S. Navy to deliver capabilities in cyber, engineering, decision analytics, and AI. Ana also chairs Pathways to Citizenship, a nonprofit dedicated to helping qualified immigrants become U.S. citizens.

The daughter of Jamaican immigrants, Camille earned a BS from Miami University (Ohio) and a JD from American University. After advising the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and then Deloitte on cyber risk, she joined Google, where she rose to Global Head of Product Security Strategy. Camille later served in the Biden White House as the first Deputy National Cyber Director for Technology and Ecosystem Security. After leaving government, Camille launched CAS Strategies, a strategic advisory firm that helps companies, governments, and nonprofits navigate secure AI, systemic resilience, and the converging risks that define the next era of national and global security.

Emma is a co-founder of Fractal Ag, where she leads impact underwriting and data science to accelerate farmland investment in regenerative agriculture. With a career at the intersection of environmental science and innovation, Emma designs scalable, data-driven solutions that drive measurable ecological and financial outcomes. Previously, Emma developed a groundbreaking carbon program at Corteva Agriscience, empowering farmers to reduce emissions and unlock new revenue opportunities. She holds a BA in Biology and Environmental Studies from the University of Chicago and a PhD in Ecology from Princeton University. Emma’s work reflects her dedication to leveraging private-sector tools to address some of agriculture’s biggest challenges.

Harini grew up in India and came to the U.S. to get her Masters in marketing at Vanderbilt. Over two decades, she worked at IBM, then Microsoft in western Europe, and then Amazon Web Services (AWS). Harini recently joined Entrust, a leader in securing identities and payments and digital infrastructure, as Chief Customer Officer. She is an active startup advisor and also on the city council in her hometown of Medina, Washington.

Born on a Navajo reservation in New Mexico, Talia was raised by doctor parents who started a hospital there. She grew up in Portland, Oregon, went to Wharton, and worked at startups before joining Bessemer Venture Partners in 2013. The youngest elected Partner in Bessemer’s history and the only female GP, Talia invests in startups that leverage AI to create new categories and improve the way we live and work. She is on the boards of Rupa Health, Supermaven, and Syndio, which are in the Bessemer portfolio.

Born in Singapore and raised to be a global citizen (she has lived on four continents), Paula earned her BA from UC Berkeley and then a Masters in Public Affairs from Princeton and a Harvard PhD. During eight years at the Omidyar Network, she did pioneering work in impact investing, and then in 2019, she joined Salesforce as Chief Ethical and Humane Use Officer. Paula helps guide the company’s AI innovation with a focus on inclusion and trust. She is on the board of climate tech startup Capture6.

Shayna grew up in Chicago, went to college at Boston University, and earned her MBA from MIT. A Fulbright Scholar who pioneered new approaches to supply chain management at consumer giant Mars and at venture-backed startups, Shayna co-founded Supply Change Capital in 2020. The venture capital firm invests in early-stage technology to transform the food system. Shayna is also a contributing writer for Forbes.

The daughter of entrepreneurs, Davida grew up in San Diego, earned a Bachelor’s at UC San Diego and a law degree from University of San Diego. She came up with the idea for her startup, Aclima, while in law school. Aclima is an environmental intelligence company that measures pollution at the street level and translates the data into insights for governments, businesses and communities. In 2024, the State of California tapped Davida to lead statewide air monitoring efforts—a calling that put her and her company at the center of recovery efforts after the Los Angeles fires.

Jomayra grew up in Orlando and was the first person in her high school to go to Stanford. (Her younger sister was the second.) She majored in education, learned venture investing at Emerson Collective and Cowboy Ventures, and joined Reach Capital in 2021 to back startups that are innovating to improve education and the future of work. She is also President of SomosVC, which works to increase the number of Latinos in venture. Jomayra serveson the boards of Reach portfolio companies WorkWhile and KaiPod, as well as The FoodHealth Company (led by JOURNEY Member Sam Citro Alexander).

Toni grew up in Colorado, earned her BS from UC Boulder, and her law degree from SMU—beating the odds since fewer than 2% of IP lawyers in the U.S. are African American. As Deputy Chief of Staff at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, she helped launch the Patents for Humanity initiative to spur innovation that tackles global humanitarian challenges. After nine years at Cummins, where she served as Deputy General Counsel and Chief IP Counsel, Toni played a key role in the spinoff of Atmus Filtration Technologies, later becoming its Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary. Now, as Technology General Counsel in Residence at Mayer Brown, she’s continuing to build her career at the intersection of technology and law.

Rashida grew up in St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands, earning a BS and Master’s in Industrial Engineering from North Carolina State. She spent two decades at IBM, rising through 12 roles to a Global VP position. Today, Rashida leads AI Customer Success at Microsoft and serves on the boards of Regal Rexnord and Sonatype. She recently established a $1 million endowment for Virgin Islands students to attend NC State, her alma mater, for free.

Carole grew up in South Korea and earned a BA in International Affairs from the University of Georgia. She served in the U.S. Army as Assistant Chief of Operations in Kandahar, Afghanistan, and later as an Intelligence Operations Officer for the Pacific Command. Carole earned a Master’s in Security Studies from Georgetown University, served as Senior Cyber and Emerging Tech Policy Officer in the Treasury Department, and then was Director of Cybersecurity and Secure Digital Innovation at the National Security Council. Now at the Atlantic Council GeoEconomics Center, Carole focuses on geopolitical, economic, and national security implications of evolving financial markets, emerging technologies, and cybercrime. She is also a Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists.

Alyssa grew up in the Chicago suburbs as one of five children, graduated from the University of Wisconsin–Madison, and earned her MBA from the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business. She began her career in health tech and went on to co-found TransparentCareer, a crowdsourced career platform. Alyssa moved into venture capital at the Pritzker Group before joining 7wire Ventures in 2019. She now invests in early-stage digital health companies. She serves on the boards of NOCD, Summer Health, Zerigo Health, Jasper Health, MedArrive, and Brightline.

Cherée graduated from Florida A&M University and began her career as a chemical engineer at 3M before pivoting to law at the University of Minnesota. She built her career as an IP lawyer, rising through leadership roles at Cargill, Kraft Heinz, McCormick, W.R. Grace, and Dentsply Sirona, and in 2024 became Chief Legal Officer at SPX Technologies. She created Haswell & Co. in 2025, an AI governance and executive advisory firm that helps leaders navigate complexity by bringing structure and clarity to AI use. Cherée is on the board of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Lindsay spent 28 years as the primary caregiver for her mother, who suffered from multiple sclerosis. That experience—the trials of attending to her mom while attending Columbia undergrad and Harvard Business School—led Lindsay to create a company to help people navigate the confusing caretaking landscape. Before starting Wellthy in 2014, Lindsay worked in advertising, technology, and media, including three years at Microsoft.

A doctor’s daughter who grew up on Native American reservations in Washington and Oklahoma, Elli studied political science at Mount Holyoke and earned an MBA from Harvard before starting her career in Washington. She worked at the White House, the State and Treasury Departments, the United Nations, and in private equity before starting Neurotrack to change the way Alzheimer’s is diagnosed and treated. After losing two grandparents to the disease, Elli built a company that develops digital tools to detect cognitive impairment early and improve care. She is a member of Harvard Business School’s Healthcare Advisory Board.

Lenore’s passion for national security and economic mobility fuels her leadership. After graduating from the Naval Academy and serving as an officer in the Marine Corps for seven years, she worked at Bank of America, SoFi, McChrystal Group, and Citadel, and in early-stage venture supporting veteran entrepreneurs at First In and Context Ventures. Today at UA1, Lenore deploys her Wharton MBA and deep market experience to invest in early-stage startups with a focus on defense tech, cybersecurity, and dual-use technologies.

Cindy grew up in Nashville, studied industrial engineering at Northwestern, and got her MBA from Vanderbilt before starting  her career at Eli Lilly. After 15 years there, she spent six years at Medtronic and then five years at 3M. Cindy joined startup Everly Health as COO in 2021 and left in 2023. She is on the boards of Accolade and Vanderbilt University.

Dana was raised in a Korean immigrant household by a pediatrician-turned-entrepreneur mother and a stay-at-home father. She studied Economics and Psychology at Barnard College and earned her MBA from Wharton. Dana worked in consumer research and strategy consulting before founding Highlight in 2020. Highlight’s product testing platform helps global brands like Nestlé and Estée Lauder gather product performance data and insights. Her mission: to shift consumer goods toward lower-emission, more sustainable production.

April was born in Korea, grew up in New Jersey, and founded Spring Health at Yale after health struggles close to home—her own and those of friends—convinced her that the system was broken. At a time when 1 in 4 adults lives with a diagnosable mental illness, April is leading an AI-driven healthcare company that serves Fortune 500 companies, including Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Pfizer, and Target. The youngest woman to build a unicorn, she has been recognized on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list, as one of Goldman Sachs’ 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs, and as a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer. She is also a Fellow at the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute.

Elena started her career as an IT specialist at the World Bank, built innovative cybersecurity partnerships at the World Economic Forum, and went on to fight cybercrime and fraud at Barclays, Bank of America, and SAP. Elena holds more than 30 patents for inventions related to cybersecurity. She is an adjunct professor at Cornell’s Johnson Graduate School of Management, serves on the board of Refugees International, and is currently building Trustguard AI.

Growing up in New Jersey with a single mom, her grandmother, and two older sisters, Leslie was inspired by her grandmother’s stories of working in a light bulb factory. Drawn to building things, she studied civil and mechanical engineering at Vanderbilt and then earned a Master’s in mechanical engineering from Imperial College London. Leslie went on to lead clean-energy work globally at the Clinton Foundation and Acumen. Today, at the Environmental Defense Fund, she shapes how markets finance energy transition around the world.

Kate grew up in Ohio and Japan, went to Washington University in St. Louis, and began her career in healthcare at Baxter International. She moved on to Takeda, PwC, Deloitte, AbbVie, Organon, and Genentech-Roche before joining the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy in 2025. Kate helps guide the Institute’s strategy, operations, and governance to accelerate cancer research and life-saving therapies.

Wendy-Kay was born in Kingston, Jamaica, immigrated to Texas when she was in grade school, and earned a BA in computer science at Rice and an MBA and Masters in computer science at MIT. Starting as a software engineer at Motorola, she moved on to National Instruments, Raytheon, McKinsey, and Google in 2016. During the global pandemic, Wendy-Kay played a key role in building contact tracing technology across Apple and Google/Android phones—saving many lives.

Vanessa immigrated to the U.S. from Lima, Peru, at age 10 and grew up undocumented in New York. The first in her family to graduate from college, she has dedicated her career to advancing equity in education. After teaching in Los Angeles and New York City via Teach for America, Vanessa started ImmSchools to provide undocumented students and their families access to safe and welcoming learning environments.

Terah grew up in Colorado, graduated from Harvard, and worked in the Obama White House, leading AI and emerging technology policy. She spent four years as the founding Executive Director of the Partnership on AI, the first multi-stakeholder nonprofit focused on AI governance, before moving into the private sector to focus on these issues. Terah joined JPMorgan Chase in 2024 to be at the global forefront of shaping applied AI and responsible AI governance.

The first African-American woman to earn a doctorate in electrical engineering from NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering, Ruthie is among the world’s top Black female patent holders with more than 200 issued patents and pending applications. She honed her skills in hardware and software design and IP/technical project management at IBM and then served as Strategic Innovation Director at USAA before moving to Nvidia in 2020.

Lori grew up in San Jose and (along with her sister) was first in her family to earn a college degree. With a BA and a Master’s from the University of San Francisco, she began her career at Intel—on the tech giant’s first ethics and compliance team—and moved to Verisign, VMware, and McKesson before joining Salesforce in 2018. Over seven years, Lori rose from VP to EVP of Performance and Workforce Innovation. In 2026, she moved back to McKesson, North America’s largest pharmaceutical distributor, to lead workforce innovation. 

Growing up across geographies—London, New England, the West Coast—Jenny went on to earn Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in earth systems at Stanford, and later an MBA from Yale. She spent over a decade at McDonald’s, where she rose to global Chief Sustainability and Social Impact Officer. In 2024, she joined CVS Health as VP of Sustainability and Community Impact, with a mission to bring a systems-change mindset to consumer healthcare. In 2025, she moved up to Chief Sustainability Officer.

Growing up in Jamaica, Sheryl knew the power of Western Union to change lives: Thanks to Western Union, her family received much-needed remittances from her grandmother in the United States. Sheryl spent 15 years at American Express and worked at Mastercard and Bread Financial before moving to Western Union in 2022, where she built and launched products that were accessible to people everywhere.

Melissa grew up near Toronto, graduated from Western University in Ontario, and spent 24 years at PepsiCo, rising from financial analyst to SVP of Finance for North American Beverages. In 2021, she joined General Motors as CFO of the EV, Digital, and Innovation businesses, then led global finance strategy and financial planning & analysis, and rose quickly to Deputy CFO of GM, overseeing the CFOs of North America, International, and China. In early 2025, Melissa moved to global pharma giant Novartis to be CFO of its U.S. unit.

A Rhodes and Truman Scholar who started her career in the U.S. Army, Liz completed two year-long tours in Iraq, where she served on the senior staff of General David Petraeus, and served as a Military Police Commander. At McKinsey for a decade, she rose to Partner and Global Leader at McKinsey Academy, and then at Schmidt Futures, she oversaw a portfolio of programs addressing hard to solve problems in science, technology, and society. At the DOD until late 2025, Liz oversaw collaboration with the investment community and commercial technology sector.

Raised with three sisters by Chaldean parents in Farmington, Michigan, Jaclyn earned degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Michigan before joining General Motors in 1999. Over the next two decades, she shaped GM’s truck portfolio as Executive Chief Engineer of Full-Size Trucks. In 2022, Jaclyn was promoted to President and Managing Director of GM Europe, where she led operations from Zurich. She returned to Detroit to lead Buick and GMC. Now, as Global VP back in the product area, Jaclyn oversees the execution, management, and development of GM’s vehicle programs worldwide.

Born in Accra, Ghana, Mia came to the U.S. at age eight with her parents, two sisters, and nothing more than their suitcases. She went on to Wellesley and Harvard (MBA), and then Citigroup, United Airlines, and PreCash, a fintech startup, before landing at Sodexo in 2012. In a decade, Mia ascended through eight jobs, including leading SodexoMagic, a joint venture between the food service and facilities management giant and Magic Johnson Enterprises. Now at C&W Services, she oversees 13,000 people—85% of them frontline workers—and is focused on scaling their economic opportunities. Mia is on the board of H&R Block.

Nina grew up in New Jersey, went to college at Dartmouth, and earned a Master’s in Classical Art and a PhD in Religion and Business from the University of Oxford. She began her career at global design firm IDEO, developing systemic solutions for healthcare and climate. In 2024, after helping to build Doveras Fertility, Nina joined Ayble Health, a venture-backed virtual GI care platform. In addition to serving as Ayble’s Chief Product Officer, she is a faculty lecturer at Dartmouth, focused on how to design for human flourishing in the age of AI.

Born in South Korea and raised in Seoul and the U.S., Christine began her career in finance before moving to Silicon Valley in 2004. She spent nearly a decade at Google, where she played a key role in launching Android globally, and then led international partnerships at Dropbox. Christine worked at health tech and autonomous vehicle startups, including Drive.ai, until 2019 when she co-founded BlueSpace.ai to bring autonomous navigation to improve safety in high-risk industries like defense and mining.

Christine grew up in Bradenton, Florida, earned a BA at UNC and MBA at Wharton, and worked for international trade conglomerate A.P. Moller-Maersk Group before moving into startups. She headed business development for juice bar chain Organic Avenue, then rerouted to San Francisco to pursue her entrepreneurial dream. In 2016, Christine launched Full Harvest, a B2B marketplace with a mission to eliminate on-farm food loss (a major contributor to climate change) by digitizing the produce supply chain.

Ritu grew up in India, the first woman in her extended family to become an engineer. She earned a Bachelor’s degree from the Delhi Institute of Technology and a Masters in Management from Stanford Graduate School of Business, and then held product roles at Oracle, Yahoo, and eBay. It was during her study at Stanford that she developed the idea for Zūm: a modern student transportation platform serving 4,000 schools with safe, reliable, sustainable rides using electric buses that can double as energy storage units to return power back to the grid.

The daughter of Indian immigrants, Monisha grew up in Staten Island and attended Wesleyan University. She joined Citigroup straight out of school and spent more than 20 years rising through 10 roles, ultimately becoming Chief Operating Officer, overseeing consumer banking and wealth management. Recruited to U.S. Bank in 2023, she led a transformation for a $10B unit serving 12 million consumers and businesses across 2,200 branches. Joining IBM as Sales Transformation Head in 2025, Monisha leads large-scale modernization initiatives that strengthen performance and drive growth across global sales teams.

From KPMG tax accountant to senior counsel at Amgen to Executive Director of the Debbie Allen Dance Academy, Shannon eventually landed at Wing, Alphabet’s drone delivery unit, as CFO. A lawyer and a CPA, she left Wing in 2024 and recently joined Alpha, which advises companies and boards on AI governance. Shannon is on the boards of NetScout Systems, Lazy Dog Restaurants, and Sofi Bank (a Sofi subsidiary). She is a producer of OnBoard, a film about board diversity, and host of the podcast No Boxes Just Verses.

Jennifer grew up outside Boston, inspired by her Cuban immigrant mother. With a BA from Harvard and a Stanford MBA, she spent the first part of her career in tech development and operations at YouTube and 21st Century Fox. Switching to investing, Jennifer cofounded Flashstarts, a startup accelerator focused on software startups outside Silicon Valley and was a partner there for five years. In 2018, she launched January Ventures to invest in underrepresented founders building game-changing software startups.

Shally began her career in IT as a developer at Amerigroup. She rose to lead technology strategy and innovation there before moving to Anthem, WellStar Health System, Humana (where she was the first woman SVP & CIO), and Liberty Mutual. She joined Zelis, a healthcare fintech company, as CTO in 2023. Shally is also co-founder and Chairwoman of the Freedom Council, a coalition of businesses combating human trafficking. In 2024, Shally joined the boards of DIRTT Environmental Solutions, a publicly traded industrialized construction company, and Sentara, a healthcare delivery system.

After growing up in India and immigrating to the U.S. as a teenager, Amisha earned a BS in Computer Science from Binghamton University and an MS in Environmental Policy and an MBA from the University of Michigan. A year-long internship at Walmart, working on sustainability strategy, led to major roles at Deloitte and Bloomberg LP before she joined Blackstone in 2021. As Global Head of Sustainability for Private Equity, Amisha works to embed sustainability into business strategies across Blackstone’s portfolio companies.

Born in Jamaica and raised on Long Island, N.Y., Onay Payne earned a Bachelor’s in history and literature and then an MBA at Harvard. She spent two decades at real estate investment giant Clarion Partners, rising to Managing Partner, and headed real estate at Lafayette Square, a middle market private credit platform, before joining Manulife Investment Management in 2023. As Senior Managing Director, Onay works with Manulife’s portfolio companies to build strategies around climate resilience and housing equity.

A first-generation college grad with an electrical engineering degree from Northwestern, Leslie joined IBM as an intern and rose to global sales VP. She moved on to Comcast and First Data. Following Fiserv’s 2019 acquisition of First Data, Leslie co-heads operations for the combined companies Global Business Solutions Division. As executive sponsor of the company’s Black Leadership Council, she changed the name of the organization to SOAR.

Michelle grew up outside Wilmington, North Carolina, and earned her BA from King University—the first in her family to attend a four-year college. She began her career as a personal assistant, only to find that as the wife of a Marine, she faced frequent rejection—due to the stereotype that military spouses move frequently and are unreliable. In 2017, Michelle founded Squared Away, a platform that matches companies with military spouses looking for work as virtual executive assistants.

Corbin grew up in Ohio, earned a BA from Yale and an MBA from Wharton, and began her career in healthcare tech. After stints at Deloitte, Goldman Sachs, and Bain, she served as COO of Massachusetts Medicaid, led a statewide health plan, and founded and led Eleanor Health, which has transformed how addiction and mental health treatment is funded and delivered. She joined Carelon Behavioral Health, a division of Elevance Health that supports more than 60 million people across the U.S., as President in 2024. A minority owner of the Utah Royals Women’s Professional Soccer team, Corbin supports equity for women and the LGBTQ+ community as a corporate advisor and investor.

Laura grew up in New York City, went to Harvard undergrad and Stanford for her JD and MBA, and started her career in the non-profit sector. She co-founded Code 2040, a nonprofit focused on dismantling structural barriers to diverse and inclusive leadership in tech, and then worked on access to capital and DEI as a senior policy adviser in the Obama White House. She was head of impact at social innovation fund Echoing Green before joining Base10, the first black-led VC firm to cross $1 billion in assets under management, in 2021. Laura has taught social innovation at Stanford and at the American University of Rome.

Growing up with a single mom who was a schoolteacher and two sisters in Miami, Chevon developed an early passion for education and an interest in medicine. She graduated from Duke, went on to Harvard Medical School, and became a physician, board certified in both internal medicine and endocrinology. With a mission to improve patient outcomes and fix healthcare inequities, Chevon worked across business (from digital health startups to Amazon to Takeda Digital Ventures), government, and academia. Now at Oncology Care Partners, she leads the company’s digital strategy and oversees its oncology delivery systems.

Michelle arrived in the U.S. from Ecuador at age seven, grew up in Miami, and studied chemical engineering at Carnegie Mellon. She spent the first part of her career as an engineer at ExxonMobil. In 2021, Michelle co-founded Hyfé to use waste to enable biotechnology and break our dependence on carbon-intensive industries. Hyfé uses nutrients washed away in food manufacturing wastewater to power the creation of low-cost chemicals, materials, fuels, and foods that are better for the planet.

As a teenager growing up outside New York City, Kristina founded Project Heal—now the largest grassroots eating disorder nonprofit in the U.S. She earned a psychology degree from Harvard and then, after overcoming her own health challenges, founded Equip to improve care for people with eating disorders. Equip has grown to be America’s largest provider of virtual, evidence-based eating disorder treatments. The company connects patients and their families with therapists, dietitians, and physicians—providers trained to treat not only all eating disorder diagnoses, but also co-occurring conditions like anxiety, depression, and OCD—and offers a wide range of support groups.

Maria was born in Bogotá, Colombia, and grew up in Orlando. She earned her BA from UC Berkeley and then worked in various education ventures before landing at Unshackled Ventures, a VC firm that funds immigrant entrepreneurs. In 2022, Maria joined Ulu Ventures, a Latina-led fund that invests in companies with diverse teams and founders. She serves on the board of Leadsales, a Mexico-based software company, and AI-powered beauty startup Parfait.

Yolanda grew up in Altadena, California, earned an BA from Berkeley and a JD from UC Law San Francisco. Starting her career at law firm Morrison & Foerster, Yolanda joined Gap in 2003 as a contract attorney. She rose through the ranks to General Counsel of Gap’s Athleta unit and Deputy General Counsel of Gap Inc., and then SVP and General Counsel. On a mission to make paths smoother for those behind her, she developed initiatives to provide jobs for attorneys who tend to be overlooked in traditional recruiting.

A mother of four autistic sons, Ling founded SpectrumAi to improve healthcare for families like hers. A graduate of MIT and Harvard, she began her career as a nurse in the U.S. Army, where she led a battalion aid station in an active combat zone—an excellent training ground for her audacious goals. Through SpectrumAi, Ling created predictive analytics and real-time decision‑support tools to help clinicians optimize care quality and advance neurodiversity outcomes. In 2025, Ling sold SpectrumAi to CentralReach, the leading software company focused on helping adults and children with autism and intellectual/developmental disabilities. She integrated her SpectrumAI team into CentralReach, and now, as the company’s SVP of Outcomes‑Based Care, Ling is achieving her mission on a larger platform.

After starting her career in education, Elise worked at IBM Watson and then in venture philanthropy. While pursuing her MBA/MA in Education at Stanford, she co-founded Praxis Labs to create immersive VR-enabled learning platforms to train employees to be empathetic and inclusive—and drive inclusion across the workplace. Among the companies using Praxis Lab today: Amazon, Google, Merck, and Uber.

A computer scientist by training, Nancy has spent her career building and scaling AI products across multiple industries. She held leadership roles at Meta and Microsoft, where she led the AI assistant platform for Meta’s Ray- Ban smart glasses and drove adoption of chatbot AI. As EVP of Growth and Strategy at BrightAI, she focused on modernizing critical infrastructure—and helped scale the startup to more than $100 million in revenue. In 2025, Nancy founded Boop AI to reshape the $355 billion market for travel commissions. Nancy has pledged 1% of Boop AI equity to JourneyToLead. org—yet another way of empowering women leaders. 

Born in Ecuador, Saskia came to the U.S. at age 17 and worked multiple jobs to graduate college in three years. She started in PR and headed the Medellin, Colombia, office of Burson-Marsteller before going to the NBA, where she rose to VP of Marketing. Saskia launched Fresh Bellies in 2016 with a mission to combat childhood obesity. Her vegan snacks are now in 4,500 stores including Target, Walmart, and Whole Foods.

Raised in Mukilteo, Washington by Chinese immigrant parents who prioritized education, Jenny earned a BA from Harvard and then an MBA from Stanford. She interned at BlackRock and Deutsche Bank before working as a business analyst at McKinsey and a private equity associate at Bain Capital. In 2017, Jenny created FreeWill, which provides free estate planning tools to make it easy for people to give their money to charity. Her goal is to move $1 trillion into non-profits.

Arna’s parents escaped Romania for Israel when her mother was six months pregnant—and then, amidst a terrorist attack, she arrived at the hospital via military tank to deliver baby Arna. On to Greece and then the U.S. when Arna was three years old, she grew up in the San Francisco Bay area, studied computer science at Princeton, and then earned a Masters at Stanford. Applying design thinking to healthcare, Arna worked for IDEO and Proteus Digital Health before founding Triody, a healthcare startup consultancy, in 2014 and then joining Wavely Diagnostics in 2020. Wavely develops smartphone-based medical diagnostics for pediatric care.

A Vassar grad with two Master’s degrees—one in National Security from the U.S. Naval War College and another in International Relations from the University of Oklahoma’s program in Germany—Shelly spent 15 years working in national security in the U.S. Senate, House of Representatives, White House, and Pentagon. She served as SVP of Government Relations at BAE Systems and, later, at Lockheed Martin, until 2024. Shelly now advises defense and tech startups on navigating government contracting at StonePoint Solutions, where she serves as Founder and CEO.

Joanna grew up in Palo Alto, studied political science at the University of Pennsylvania, and earned a law degree at UCLA. She started her career at Bessemer Venture Partners, investing in consumer Internet and software startups, including Blue Nile and BabyCenter. Seven years heading venture capital and private equity at Silicon Valley investment firm Sterling Stamos led Joanna to become an entrepreneur. In 2014, she founded Kurbo Health (a digital platform for childhood obesity), served as CEO for four years, sold it to Weight Watchers, and, in 2021, founded Midi Health to support women in perimenopause and menopause. Midi has quickly grown into the leading U.S.-based virtual care clinic for women in midlife.

A Texas Tech grad with an MBA from MIT’s Sloan School, Laurel has lived through the problem she’s working to solve: out of control student debt. After conquering her own financial stress and spending a decade in tech sales—including at Google where she catered to large customers—she started Candidly to guide individuals and families through every step of the planning, borrowing, and repayment experience. Candidly is now the leading student debt and savings optimization platform.

The daughter of Filipino immigrants, Amber graduated from Johns Hopkins and Northwestern’s Feinberg School of Medicine and began her career as a cancer researcher and genetic counselor. Over 13 years at InformedDNA, which launched the first telegenetic counseling services, she rose to Chief Operations Officer and then served as COO of Blue Note Therapeutics. Now at 3viedi Insights, Amber advises digital health and AI-enabled startups on how to scale.

Born and raised in Ukraine, Anastasia moved to Australia, where she earned a PhD in aerospace, aeronautical and astronautical engineering at the University of Sydney. As founder and CEO of Flurostat, she helped farmers improve their crops via data analytics. Now at Regrow Ag, she combines satellite imagery with soil samples to help food companies measure the carbon impact of supplier farms and incentivize growers to implement climate-­positive practices.

After moving to the U.S. from China at five years old, Sherry grew up in Stony Brook, New York, and Isla Vista, California. She earned a BA in mathematics and economics at Yale, then joined Goldman Sachs as an analyst, and rose to Managing Director. In 2021, Sherry was tapped to co-head the firm’s Urban Investment Group, investing in public-private real estate projects and socially motivated companies that support underserved communities across the U.S. Now a Partner at The Vistria Group, she is focusing on impact-driven investing at scale.

Born in Paris and raised in New York City, Zoe went on to Harvard, Yale (law degree), and Stanford (MBA). She worked for the International Finance Corporation (the private sector arm of the World Bank) in Africa, as an aid worker in Iraq, and in research and machine intelligence at Google before starting ex/ante in 2022. Ex/ante is a venture fund that backs pre-seed & seed stage companies in “agentic tech.” Zoe invests in startups tackling challenges around privacy, data ownership, security, identity, and information integrity.

Martina, a Bowdoin grad, founded two tech startups in mobile gaming and virtual reality before moving into venture capital. Her first fund, WXR Fund, invested in 11 early-stage women-led spatial computing (AR/VR/AI) companies. Goldenrod Ventures, her second fund, invests in women-led companies building solutions for climate, health, media, and community. Martina aims to build a venture ecosystem that enables women-founded companies to access resources and build community. She serves on the boards of several startups and nonprofit advisory groups.

Allison grew up in Boulder, Colorado, and earned a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Southern California. She spent two decades in Silicon Valley working at eBay, Google, and Meta on corporate and product strategy, customer experience design, and marketing focused on sustainability and social impact. Today, Allison is CEO of an AI-driven software startup that works with fire districts, counties, state and federal agencies, tribes, and utilities to pinpoint where wildfire and climate risk mitigation will produce the highest impact and ROI—to monitor and mitigate risk.

Denise grew up in North Carolina and earned a BA from UNC-Chapel Hill and an MBA from Arizona State. She spent her career in consumer packaged goods, including seven years with Coca-Cola, before her daughter’s struggles with food allergies prompted her leap to start Partake Foods in 2017. She poured her personal savings into her business, raised $25 million, and built an allergy-friendly cookie company that now counts Target, Walmart, and Whole Foods as customers. Denise’s mission is to fight food insecurity and open doors for HBCU students to pursue careers in the food and beverage industries.

Mahshid grew up in Iran, earned a BS from Sharif University of Technology, then moved to Canada to pursue a Master’s in computer science at McGill University. In 2015, Mahshid co-founded healthcare software company Evenset. In 2020, she launched Tali AI, a voice-enabled virtual assistant to support providers at the point of care. Mahshid’s mission is to make Tali an essential tool for reducing physician burnout and improving patient outcomes.

By age six, Alexis had already moved from China to Wales to the U.S. After graduating from MIT, she began her career at UBS Investment Bank, followed by private equity firm Summit Partners. Alexis has since built a career in fintech, including leading the sales team at Affirm and Scratch before joining Stripe in 2021. At Stripe, she is passionate about increasing access to payment methods around the globe and building a world-class team. She serves on the Board of Directors at the MIT Federal Credit Union, is an advisor to multiple startups, and remains an avid traveler.