Carolyn Clark is the Vice President of Employee Experience Strategy & Transformation of Simpplr, an employee experience platform. A seasoned leader, with deep roots in employee communications and employee experience, Carolyn joined to help Simpplr elevate the employee experience by driving innovation and reimagining how employee communication is delivered in today's world.

Throughout her career, Clark has intentionally diversified her experience to all facets of communication. From producing broadcast news to consumer and product public relations, media relations and corporate communication. Before joining Simpplr, Clark led internal and HR communication at major tech companies including Yahoo, Oath (Verizon Media), Pandora, GoDaddy, and Opendoor. Clark has led countless transitions, navigated more crises than she can count, and shepherded thousands of employees through complex acquisitions and integrations. She has a passion for navigating difficult situations and an ability to drive employee experience strategy through complicated corporate issues.

Clark lives in North Carolina with her husband and energetic 8-year-old daughter.

Rosalie Chan is a senior editor for Insider’s big tech team, which covers the biggest tech companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook, and more. Previously, she covered cloud computing and enterprise tech, where she reported on companies like Google Cloud, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, Intel, Alibaba Cloud, Atlassian, GitHub, VMware, and more. She has written extensively on topics including cloud computing, developer companies, and open source. She received the Excellence in Business / Consumer / Tech Reporting award from the Asian American Journalists Association for her investigation into the coding bootcamp Holberton School.

Rosalie joined Insider after working as a software engineer and freelance journalist. She studied journalism, computer science, and technology and business law at Northwestern University. Her work has previously appeared in TIME, the Huffington Post, VICE, Pacific Standard, Inverse, Chicago magazine, the Chicago Reporter, and more. She's currently based in San Francisco.

David Bator thinks and writes about how work could work. David leads Achievers Workforce Institute, a strategic practice whose focus on Research, Community and Advisory empowers global executives with tactical, practical approaches to changing how the world works.

David is passionate about people, and has spent the last 20 years working closely and consultatively with HR, IT and Communications leaders to build programs that position individuals, teams and companies to grow.

Rob Catalano is WorkTango’s Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer. Rob has spent the last 20 years building HR Technology companies. He was on the founding team at Achievers, where he spent the majority of his 10+ year tenure leading their Marketing function as well as the final few years leading their global expansion out of the UK. Rob’s passion for improving the employee experience led to him co-founding WorkTango in 2015 to help companies collect and act on authentic employee feedback. He has been named as a top 101 Global Employee Engagement Influencer every year since 2017, and has had the privilege of speaking to HR leaders at conferences in over 45 cities. Rob is an avid hockey fan, traveler, once played guitar in a metal band, and is a self-proclaimed ‘pointaholic’ – collecting loyalty points for anything and everything. Get in touch with Rob at rob@worktango.com.

Iyad Uakoub is the Senior Director of Behavioral Science at Sounding Board.

Ayishah Williams is the Director of People & Culture at Sounding Board.

Megan Cassidy is a crime reporter with The Chronicle, also covering cops, criminal justice issues and mayhem. Previously, Cassidy worked for the Arizona Republic covering Phoenix police, Sheriff Joe Arpaio and desert-area crime and mayhem. She is a two-time graduate of the University of Missouri, and has additionally worked at the Casper Star-Tribune, National Geographic and an online publication in Buenos Aires. Cassidy can be reached on twitter at @meganrcassidy, and will talk about true crime as long as you’ll let her.

Swati Sarupria is a Sr. Director of Talent and Organization Effectiveness at Splunk. Her perspectives have been shaped by her broad experience ranging from external human capital consulting to internal HR consulting; from large, stable blue chip to fast-paced high growth companies; from highly regulated financial services sector to relatively lesser regulated technology sector.

She has experience working in India and the US. In her current role, she leads a team focused on designing organizations/teams and integrating talent practices that not only support the business strategy but also help the employee in their growth and development. She recognizes the power of these systems/ processes in driving more equitable outcomes.

Dr. Janet Ahn is an expert academic researcher, professor, and consultant. She is MindGym's first Chief Behavioral Science Officer leading product innovation and R&D and serving as primary subject matter expert translating academic models into scalable and actionable insights to solve organizational problems. She is also MindGym's President Americas. She is a trained psychologist from Barnard College, Columbia University (Bachelor degree in Psychology), New York University (Ph.D. in Social Psychology), and Teachers College, Columbia University (postdoctoral fellowship). Prior to joining MindGym, she was a tenure-track professor of Psychology at a large public university in New Jersey, where she created tools and interventions to increase persistence and retention for underrepresented groups (women and persons of color) in STEM (Science, Tech, Engineering, Math) fields. She published in high-impact, peer-reviewed academic journals topics related to motivation, goal pursuit, cognitive biases. She is a sought-after speaker in academic and industry conferences and is also a skilled statistician. Her research has been featured in several media sources - Business Insider, NPR, Times Higher Education, CBS, Women's Health Magazine, etc. She consulted for various Fortune 500 organizations, educational institutions, and non-profit agencies.

Anna is CEO and Founder of Ceresa.  Ceresa’s mission is to build diverse leadership for the future, by democratizing access to truly transformative career and leadership resources. She dedicates her time to shaping the company’s vision and strategy, driving consistent high-quality programming, building a world-class team and culture, and shaping a sustainable social impact business model.

Prior to launching Ceresa, Anna was a Partner at McKinsey & Company, where she served healthcare systems globally, as well as leading leadership development and diversity initiatives. She also served as COO at an early-stage tech company prior to launching Ceresa. She holds an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, MPhil, and BA from the University of Oxford. Anna lives in the Colorado mountains with her two dogs, three kiddos and one husband (who typically manage to get her attention in that order).

Laura Lomeli Russert is the Head of Executive Engagement at BetterUp.

Surbhi Sarna is an entrepreneur, partner at Y Combinator, advocate for innovation in health care, and author of the new book, Without a Doubt: How to Go From Underrated to Unbeatable, to be published in March by Simon & Schuster. Her book is an an inspiring take on how to turn other’s—and your own—doubt into rocket fuel to achieve your dreams.

The very qualities that make you an outlier are, in fact, your strengths–or so Sarna discovered after a teenage cancer scare inspired her to reimagine health care, founding a medical start-up to detect early ovarian cancer. In Without a Doubt, she shares her entrepreneurship story of proving the doubters wrong. As a young, brown woman without a medical degree, Ivy-league contacts, or any Silicon Valley street cred—and who had felt different throughout her life—she was often overlooked and underrated.

Undeterred, Sarna used the naysayers as ammunition to help her surpass the expectations of others—and achieve her dreams. Without a Doubt is her story of becoming a leader without an MBA, networking without a network, and raising funds when she didn't know a single venture capitalist, teaching you how to do the same. Sarna led an all-star team to develop a life-saving medical device, sold her business for $275 million, and became a partner at Y Combinator, one of the most successful venture firms in the world. Using her own experience, she shows you how to face setbacks, not let impossible standards (including your own) get in the way, lead empathetically, empower others to think differently, and how to convince the right people to help you accomplish your goals.

Saran worked as an engineer before becoming CEO and founder of nVision Medical, which developed a catheter-based device for early detection of ovarian cancer. After obtaining FDA clearance, the company was purchased by Boston Scientific. Sarna also sits on both nonprofit and for-profit company boards, has been featured in publications such as Bloomberg, Forbes, Entrepreneur magazine, and Inc. She has received numerous awards, including being named on the Forbes 30 under 30 list and the Inc. Female Founder 100 list. She lives in the San Francisco Bay area with her husband and two children.

Aruna Ravichandran is the Chief Marketing Officer at Webex by Cisco Systems. Arena is a change agent and recognized authority on the future of work, with a track-record of guiding customers, partners, and global teams through workforce and technology transformations. Aruna brings a unique parallel expertise in technology and marketing, where the office of the CMO is a ‘growth partner’, not a marketing cost-center. She marries her computer engineering background, with a maniacal customer focus, and a business-outcome philosophy that is based on equal parts: purposeful storytelling and data science. Bridging the roles of the CMO, CIO, and CXO, Aruna believes in the power of marketing as a revenue creator, a brand value accelerator, and enabler of human connection. She is an outspoken proponent of leading with a people-first approach, to shepherd business leaders towards a more innovative, culture-conscious, and inclusive way of doing business. As an industry expert on SaaS marketing and enterprise technology, Aruna has a track record that spans more than two decades – building SaaS and digital routes-to-market and expanding the service addressable market – for companies including HP, Juniper, CA Technologies, and Cisco. In her current leadership post as the Vice-President and CMO for Cisco Webex, Aruna oversees marketing for the $6 billion organization, as a growth engine for the company. Aruna has authored two pioneering books on DevOps, is a contributor for Forbes.com, and serves on multiple corporate boards. She is a multi-award honoree, including: Top 100 Most Influential Women in Silicon Valley 2016, and the National Diversity Council’s 2016 Most Powerful and Influential Woman. Aruna holds an MBA and MS Computer Engineering from Santa Clara University and a BS Computer Science from Bangalore Institute of Technology (BIT). She was also a graduate of the esteemed CMO Leadership program at Kellogg Business School in 2019.

Kristin Major is Executive Vice President, Chief Human Resources Officer at Hewlett Packard Enterprise Company. Kristin and her team serve as the HR Business Partners for these businesses and work to enhance the employee experience of thousands of team members around the world.

Before joining Hewlett-Packard Company, Kristin was a labor and employment counsel at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom in Palo Alto, California.

Kristin is focused on community service and currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology and is the Executive Sponsor of the HPE Women’s Global Network.

Kristin holds a law degree from Georgetown University, was a visiting third-year law student at Stanford University and received her undergraduate degree from the University of Arizona.

Leslie Lai is the Head of Social Impact at Roku.

David Thigpen, academic coordinator of the undergraduate journalism program at the University of California, Berkeley, is a former Time magazine reporter who covered Wall Street, popular music, and Chicago politics. His work has also been published in Rolling Stone and the New York Times. At  Berkeley, David designed and directed the new undergraduate journalism curriculum. He has also done public-policy research as a fellow at Institute for the Future in Palo Alto.

Rekha Gurnani Chowdhury is the senior director of global compensation and people analytics at Box, the cloud-based, content-management company. Previously, she held leadership roles in HR and financial analysis at Symantec, Aon, Safeway, HSBC, and Liberty Mutual Insurance. She earned a bachelor’s degreee in business at Babson College, a master’s in industrial-organizational psychology at San Francisco State University, and has studied at the Wharton School and Harvard.

Christa St. Cyr is the Senior Vice President, Director of Workforce Experience at Citizens Financial Group.

Pamela Rodas is the Senior Director - Global Talent Acquisition at TELUS International.

Abhishek is the Talent lead for Engineering at Groq - the leading AI inference provider of the world. Being at the intersection of AI and Human resources is a privilege which he doesn't take lightly - always trying to learn and contribute back to the community. Prior to Groq, Abhishek worked at Uber, Samsara (IOT), Snapdeal (e-com startup) and P&G (CPG). An engineer turned HR professional - he has experience across almost all disciplines of HR and has worked extensively across geos. 

Dionne Adams is the Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging at Pacific Gas & Electric Co., headquartered in Oakland, CA. She has been with PG&E for over 20 years and served in roles of increasing responsibilities within human resources, supply chain responsibility, regulatory affairs, and customer care line of business functions.

In her current role, Dionne provides strategic oversight of the company’s DEIB strategy focused on creating and sustaining a work environment where every member of their 25,000 person workforce feels known, loved and proud to work with and for PG&E.

n the community, she serves as an elected City Councilmember for her hometown of Pittsburg and as an Advisory Board Member of Tri-Delta Transit. In these roles Dionne works to drive equity and inclusion for members of the community in the areas of job creation, housing, public safety and accessibility.

Dionne is a California native and holds a Master of Public Administration from Golden Gate University and a Bachelor of Science of Business with an emphasis in Marketing from San Francisco State University.

Leah Pimentel is a Director of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Culture for the University of California, San Francisco's Department of Anesthesia and Perioperative Care.

Leah received her Master of Business Administration (MBA) from Dominican University of California and Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from California State University, Sonoma. She has over 15 years of experience in leading culture and operational change, and is also well-versed in representing diverse backgrounds and integration programs, events, resources, and values into core people and business processes.

One of her major accomplishments as a DEI expert is overseeing diversity outreach for the UCSF Real Estate’s Supply Chain Vendor Diversity event with 260 Black and Latinx owned businesses to inform and connect them to UCSF’s procurement and contracting opportunities with capital projects.

Albrey Brown currently serves as VP of Strategy at Joonko. Prior to this role, he founded and sold a company focused on teaching people how to code and spent 8 years leading Diversity and Inclusion at 3 major tech companies. Albrey prides himself on being a data driven people leader. Helping underrepresented people find fulfilling jobs is his passion and he's grateful to be in a position to solve this problem at scale. His work has been highlighted in FastCompany, Protocol, and TechCrunch.