Angela Sowell is the Director of Benefits and Wellness at Safran Companies.

Arturo Arteaga is the Senior Director, Total Rewards at VCA.

Eve Rodsky is a New York Times best-selling author of Fair Play and National Bestseller, Find Your Unicorn Space

Candace Damon is the Vice President of Field Total Rewards at Northwestern Mutual.

Jeanne Walsh is responsible for overall strategic leadership in the design, development and success of BSC’s competitive and innovative North America Benefits and Global Mobility programs. She partners closely with Senior Business Leaders and HR Business Partners to translate business strategy into meaningful programs that meet the organization's needs and investment in its talent. She is Chair of the BSC Employee Benefits Committee and participates in multiple Employee Resource Groups.

Samantha Purciello is a Sales Strategy Manager at Carrot Fertility, the leading global fertility care platform for women, plus people of every age, race, income, sex, sexual orientation, gender, marital status, and geography. In her role, Samantha partners with teams across Carrot to identify opportunities to further enhance products and services while driving employer sales.

Prior to joining Carrot, Samantha started her career in Mercer’s Total Health Management practice, helping employers strategize and implement population health strategies for their workforces. Over her more than seven years at Mercer, Samantha specialized in inclusive family planning, where she was responsible for educating employers on trends in the marketplace and helping strategize how to enhance family planning benefits. Samantha was also tapped as a fertility healthcare and family-forming benefits expert, with her insights included in Bloomberg, CNBC, and Quartz stories.

Samantha earned her bachelor’s degree in healthcare management from the University of Connecticut, and now lives in Stratford, CT.

Lila Seidman is a reporter for the Los Angeles Times’ yearlong initiative exploring various facets of mental health. The project will marry her graduate work in clinical psychology and more than 10 years of journalism experience. Since joining The Times in 2020, Seidman has served on the breaking news and utility desks, where’s she written about Indigenous communities, wildfires threatening giant trees and fishing the L.A. River. Previously, she covered City Hall for Glendale News-Press, then part of Times Community News.

A native Angeleno, Seidman cut her teeth as a freelancer at L.A. Weekly, Patch and other local outlets. She’s reported for a variety of publications, including the Daily Journal, a statewide legal publication, and the UB Post, an English-language newspaper in Mongolia, and her work has appeared in Gawker and Vice. She briefly deflected from the sun and smog of L.A. to attend Reed College in Portland, Ore., where she earned a degree in Russian and psychology. She’s working toward a master’s degree in clinical psychology at Pepperdine University, with plans to become a licensed marriage and family therapist.

Lydia Dishman is Fast Company’s senior editor for growth and engagement. She has also written for CBS Moneywatch, Fortune, The Guardian, Popular Science, and the New York Times, among others.

Gloria has more than 25 years of experience in human resources in mostly technology companies.  Responsibilities include providing leadership in all areas of Total Rewards, working closely with Compensation and Human Capital Committees of Boards, leading M&A HR teams, HR services and Global Payroll teams, additionally working closely with the business as an HR Business Partner.  Various levels of these responsibilities have been carried out at Keysight Technologies currently, Agilent Technologies, Hewlett Packard, Applied Materials and Telemundo.

Gloria has also lead teams and provide the vision to help the HR function tie to the company's business focus, culture, success, and affordability.

Gloria holds a BS in Economics and a BS of Language Studies.

Christopher Smith is the Senior Director, Benefits at Universal Music Group.

Dana Kirwin joined Medela in 2019 and leads the strategy and solutions for Employer and Government Relations, with the goal of expanding how Medela’s deep insight and expertise around the breastfeeding journey contributes to improving the experience for breastfeeding parents. Prior to Medela, Dana worked at both Optum and Medtronic and brings more than 16 years of experience in the employer benefits and population health space.

As a working mom herself, Dana understands the challenges faced by both employers and new parents during the return-to-work transition. She is passionate about driving policy changes that provide more support and protections for growing families, and helping employers better understand how they can attract, retain, and engage the valuable segment of working moms and parents in their employee population. 

Dana graduated from the Carlson School of Management at the University of Minnesota, and currently lives in Minneapolis with her husband and two children.