Thomas Seitz is a Senior Partner of McKinsey & Company in Houston. During his 25 years with McKinsey, he was the Southern Region Managing Partner, the Chair of McKinsey’s Global Partner Election Committee, the Managing Partner of the Houston location, the leader of the Global Energy Practice, the founder and leader McKinsey’s Renewable Energy and Capital Productivity service lines. He as been elected for two terms to McKinsey’s Shareholder Council, McKinsey’s Board of Directors, is member of the Firms Global Risk Committee, and the Chair of McKinsey’s Board of Trustees. He is the chair of Generation USA, a non profit education and placement entity that won many awards, served on the NACD Tri-Cities Chapter as chair of the strategy committee, and served on MD Anderson’s board of Visitors. Thomas Seitz is a frequent speaker on Energy Trends, and Transition as well as Technology topics including at the World Economic Forum and the Oxford Energy Forum. He is serving Industry Leaders in Energy, Chemicals, Technology, Automotive and Consumer Industries. He studied Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Aachen, Germany and Cornell University and holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Economics from RWTH Aachen. Thomas Seitz co-led the leading Energy Research Institute in Aachen, while building a technical consulting firm serving clients in Europe and Asia before joining McKinsey. He has been married for more than 30 years and has six children.

Emily is a workforce executive with the personal mission of creating lasting economic mobility in underrepresented communities. She has spent 15 years building best-in-class programming and employer partnerships at companies defining our world. Emily is coming to Generation USA from Year Up, where she built the Bay Area market to be the largest and highest-performing market in the United States through organizational leadership, strategic planning, college and employer partnerships, and 6- and 7-figure fundraising stewardship. Emily has presented to the Congressional Black Caucus as part of their Tech2020 tour, served as Year Up’s executive sponsor for the $100m Google Career Certificates Fund, and is a founding member of LinkedIn’s Network Gap Coalition.

Martha’s work focuses on economic development and opportunity creation, with an emphasis on labor markets, post-secondary education, workforce development, and talent and human capital. She serves philanthropic foundations and higher education institutions on topics including strategy, operations and organization. Martha’s recent work includes identifying operational best practices to improve graduation rates and cost efficiency in higher education institutions, serving higher education institutions in transformation programs to improve student outcomes, and developing the strategy for a start-up business school. Martha is an active writer and speaker on education, labor markets and workforce development. She has led several knowledge efforts on these topics including the 2010 McKinsey report, “Winning by degrees: The strategies of highly productive higher education institutions.” Her research on the economic and social implications of skills gaps the US labor market was published in the 2009 report “Changing the Fortunes of America’s Workforce: A human capital challenge.” Martha serves on the Board of Rubicon Programs. Before joining McKinsey & Company in 2001, Martha received a doctorate in biochemistry and pursued an academic career.

Mr. Kenneth M. Smith serves as President and CEO of Jobs for America’s Graduates, Inc. (JAG), the nation’s largest, most consistently applied model of dropout prevention and employment for at-risk and disadvantaged young people. In 1979, Mr. Smith worked with Governor Pete du Pont of Delaware on the design of the first statewide test of the JAG Model and has served as President and CEO since the inception of Jobs for America’s Graduates. JAG currently serves 72,000 at-risk young people annually, in over 1,300 high schools in 35 states. JAG has served 1,200,000 young people since its inception, achieving 90%+ graduation rates and more than doubling the employment rate for the youth it serves. Mr. Smith is also Chairman and Chief Executive of Strategic Partnerships LLC. Strategic Partnerships is a leading domestic and international solutions practice that helps companies and organizations grow by building new partnerships and new positions with government and private sector organizations. Prior to founding JAG, Mr. Smith served as staff aide to President Nixon (1969-70); as Director of Special Projects for the Distributive Education Clubs of America; and founder and President of 70,0001 Ltd., a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping high school dropouts obtain employment. Thereafter, he served in a new post as Senior Advisor to the Governor of Delaware on all activities related to education at the secondary and postsecondary levels. During this period, he chaired the Commission of the Future of Education in Delaware and was nominated to serve as the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of Delaware Technical and Community Colleges. Mr. Smith serves as a Trustee of the America is Promise Alliance, founded in 1997 with General Colin Powell as Chairman and chaired today by Alma Powell. The Alliance is a cross-sector partnership of more than 300 corporations, nonprofits, faith-based organizations, and advocacy groups that are passionate about improving lives and changing outcomes for children. Mr. Smith holds a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations from the School of International Service at American University. He resides with his wife in Sarasota, Florida.

Jonathan Carmel is currently serving as Executive-in-Residence at Collective[i], which uses artificial intelligence and a network model to provide the most powerful revenue optimization system with clients around the world including a majority of the Fortune 2000. Jonathan fills a variety of roles including sales, strategy, and marketing. Prior to joining Collective[i], Jonathan held a number of senior positions in finance. After starting his career with JPMorgan as a fixed income derivative marketer and trader, Jonathan became an investor at a variety of hedge funds starting with AngeloGordon. From there he built his own firm, Carmel Asset Management, before combining that firm with Arbiter Partners. He has been interviewed in a variety of notable publications including the Wall Street Journal, Grant’s Interest Rate Observer and Bloomberg. Jonathan is a father to two daughters; lives in NYC with his wife, Ashley Stone, and is a graduate of Brown University in Political Science.

Van Richardson serves as CIO of iManage, the company dedicated to Making Knowledge Work™ through its intelligent, cloud-enabled, secure knowledge work platform.  In his role at iManage, Van is responsible for delivering strategic IT initiatives and solutions that enable the business to scale and meet the changing demands of its customers. As part of this mandate, Van oversees multiple areas, including Infrastructure, Global Service Delivery, Corporate IT Security, Collaboration, Business Applications, Data, and Business Intelligence. With over two decades of experience, Van has held IT leadership roles at organizations as varied as Grubhub, Fujitsu, and ITT. He is passionate about his ability to serve as a trusted advisor focused on strategically enabling organizations to achieve their goals.  An outspoken proponent of diversity and inclusion among senior corporate leadership as well as a results-driven, business- and customer-focused global IT executive leader, Van has been featured in various industry and business publications and outlets. They include CIO Magazine,  Fox 32 Chicago, and Forbes Technology Council.  He is a member of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc. Van received his Bachelor of Science with a specialization in Business, as well as an MBA with a specialization in Information Technology, from Capella University. A passionate lifelong learner, he is currently pursuing a Doctor of Business Administration with a specialization in Information Technology from University of Phoenix.

Claudia Jaramillo serves as Executive Vice President Strategy & Corporate Development at Jacobs. During her more than 20 years in the industry, she has held a variety of leadership and senior finance positions in the Americas, Europe, and Asia. Before Jacobs, Claudia worked at Schlumberger, an S&P500 company with operations in over 100 countries, most recently as Corporate Officer and Vice President Group Treasurer. Prior to that, she was the North America Controller and Global Controller of two product lines headquartered in Houston as well as the Northern Asia Controller in Beijing, where she led the finance organizations of all product lines operating in China and Japan. Claudia serves on the board of Generation USA and on the board of the Wharton Club of Houston. Previously, she served on the board of Arabian Drilling ADC and was a member of the UN Global Compact CFO Taskforce, whose goal is to reshape the future of corporate finance and investment as a catalyst for growth, value creation, and social impact. Claudia is a frequent speaker on treasury, sustainability, governance, and diversity matters. She has been a panelist at the global Women Economic Forum, EuroFinance and the Board Governance Dialogue conference for Fortune 500 board members. Her focus on development of diverse talent led to the launching of a global program where Claudia sponsors mentoring for women from over 60 countries. Before working in the finance industry, Claudia held various technical and commercial positions, managing telecom and smart-card projects in different markets. She is passionate about understanding technology and how to leverage it in businesses and the world at large. Claudia holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from Pontificia Universidad Javeriana and an MBA from The Wharton School. She is fluent in English, Spanish, French, and Italian.

Jesse is a Global External Relations Manager for McKinsey and Company, based in the Washington D.C. office. There, he’s responsible for the firm’s Mid Atlantic region’s strategic reputation building program, with a particular emphasis on building the firm’s relationships and content leadership. His areas of expertise include communications strategy, public engagement, writing, and thought leadership. Mr. Salazar has been a member of this Board of Directors since its founding on December 5, 2018. Prior to joining McKinsey and Company, he worked as a senior leader at the Council on Foundations and the U.S Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Before those roles, he served in government in the Office of the Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack, in the Office of U.S. Senator Robert P. Casey Jr., on the Obama Biden Presidential Transition, and on former PA Governor Ed Rendell’s Advisory Commission on Latino Affairs. He lives in Baltimore with his partner, Tom, a senior official at the U.S. Department of Defense. In their spare time, they run a small inn.