Alton “AJ” Rodino

Manager, Account and Finance

Lake Forest Graduate School of

Management

AJ Rodino is an office utility player

currently serving as a finance

professional at Lake Forest Graduate

School of Management. AJ has worked

across many industries, including

professional sports, municipal

government, commercial banking and

currently higher education in a variety of roles from receptionist to to interim

Director of Financial Aid.

AJ was a three-sport athlete and Economics/Music double major at Lake

Forest College; more recently he earned his MBA in Organizational

Behavior from Lake Forest Graduate School of Management in 2014.

He currently lives in Highwood, IL with his wife, Valentina and enjoys home

improvement projects and cycling. On occasion he moonlights at his

mother-in-law's Italian pasta specialty store, Pastificio.

Anthony Izzi

General Manager

F.H. Paschen

Anthony Izzi is a General Manager at F.H.

Paschen, a General

Contractor/Construction Management

company that has been servicing the

Chicagoland area for over 40 years. He

graduated from Illinois State University in

2002, where he studied Construction

Management and Business. Anthony has

over 17 years of construction industry

experience and started with F.H. Paschen

as an Intern in the Job Order Contracting

Division over 14 years ago. He has since held various roles and

responsibilities before becoming a General Manager over five years ago.

With Paschen, Anthony has worked on hundreds of projects of various size

and scopes. He oversees a staff of over 50 client-focused professionals

working on fast-track and emergency projects within different market

sectors, including educational, transportation, recreation, healthcare, and

industrial. Anthony ensures that he and the rest of the Paschen staff are

dedicated to understanding and exceeding customer expectations and

complete every project efficiently and with the best quality, whether that be

a small renovation or a major infrastructure build-out. Anthony and his wife

Amanda currently live with their two daughters, Annabelle (9) and Abigail

(7), in Park Ridge.

Bob Hill

Senior Project Engineer

The Hill Group

Bob got his start working for the family

business as a teenager, performing

typical summer laborer tasks. In 2002,

Bob enrolled at Purdue University where

he began studying Construction

Management. Throughout his college

career he continued to spend his

summers interning at The Hill Group,

where he strengthened his understanding of the construction industry in

Chicago.

After graduation, Bob started working full time as a project engineer with

the mindset of building relationships and executing work in the most cost-

effective manner. In 2012, he was promoted to senior project engineer and

has been operating a business unit within the company ever since.

Christopher Daugherty

Internal Audit Manager

Kirkland and Ellis

Christopher Daugherty is the Firmwide

Internal Audit Manager for Kirkland &

Ellis LLP, and is based in the Firm's

Chicago office. Christopher is a licensed

CPA and CIA (Certified Internal Auditor),

and is a graduate from Loyola University

Chicago where he studied Accounting.

Prior to joining Kirkland & Ellis LLP in

2011, Christopher worked at Baxter International, Inc., in a variety of

finance and accounting related areas including Internal Audit, Internal

Controls, Financial Planning & Analysis, Supply Chain Finance, and

Transfer Pricing.

Christopher also has a breadth of international work experience, having

previously worked and lived in Asia and Europe.

Jason Lesniewicz

Cultural Tourism Manager

Choose Chicago

Born and raised in the Chicagoland area,

Jason graduated from the University of

Illinois Chicago in 2001. Upon graduation,

he went to work for the Chicago Office of

Tourism from 2001-2012 helping run the

Chicago Neighborhood Tour program.

Working for the Neighborhood Tour

program allowed me to learn the cultural,

culinary, historic and architectural assets of Chicago’s 77 community areas.

In 2012 the Chicago Office of Tourism and the Chicago Convention &

Tourism Bureau was consolidated into Choose Chicago and Jason became

the Cultural Tourism Manager of Neighborhoods. In this role, he helped

create the content for Choose Chicago’s robust neighborhood microsite,

shaped Choose Chicago’s Cultural Tourism Strategy and currently plan

and execute a multi-year Neighborhood Tourism Development Strategy.

Jason continues to promote Chicago’s neighborhoods as the heart and

soul of Chicago to regional, national and international guests as the lead of

the Cultural Tourism department here at Choose Chicago.

Jason Schwartz

Director of Investment Sales &

Acquisitions

Syndicated Equities

Jason Schwartz is the Director of

Acquisitions and Investment Sales for

Syndicated Equities. Jason joined the

firm in 2010 and focuses on sourcing,

underwriting, and due diligence

coordination for the firm’s own

acquisitions and dispositions. Jason

also manages the firm’s growing net lease brokerage division, having

completed over $200MM of transactions over the last 5 years. The net

lease brokerage division advises institutions, 1031 exchange clients,

developers, and private investors in both the sale and purchase of net

lease properties across the country. Jason is a licensed Series 22 and

Series 63 representative through FINRA and is a licensed real estate

broker in the state of Illinois. Jason earned his B.S. from The Ohio State

University with a specialty in Finance and Real Estate. Jason is an active

member of the International Council of Shopping Centers. Jason lives in

Chicago’s West Town neighborhood with his fiancé.

Jeffrey Plecha

Project Manager

Johnson Design Group

In his 11+ years at JDG, Jeff has

consistently used his Architectural and

project management skills to assist in

every facet of the retail design business.

Jeff is in constant contact with

consultants, contractors, and clients to

ensure all projects run smoothly from

beginning to end. He takes pride in his

knowledge and experience of both refined design and technical proficiency

which are helpful throughout all phases of design and construction.

After graduating in 2001 from Lawrence Technological University with a

Bachelor of Science in Architecture, Jeff worked for several architectural

and construction firms in metro Detroit before transplanting himself to the

Chicagoland area. He met his wife in Chicago and married in 2011. Last

year they welcomed their first child and are looking forward to watching

Collette grow.

Jeremy Rice

Senior Manager

Mazars USA, LLP

Jeremy is a CPA with over 11 years of

experience providing audit and advisory

services. He has provided services across

a wide variety of local, national, and

international organizations, including a

number of U.S. subsidiaries of foreign

companies. He has significant experience

working with companies in the

manufacturing, insurance, financial

services, higher education, and health care.

His primary focus over the last 5 years has

been serving international manufacturers

across a variety of subsectors including food & beverage, industrial products, and

consumer products.

Jeremy has also written a series of articles on the manufacturing skills gap for

the WeiserMazars M&D Watch Newsletter which have been quoted in business

journals, and is scheduled to be published in the January/February 2017 edition

of Manufacturing Today. Jeremy holds Bachelor of Science and Master of

Accounting Science Degrees from the University of Illinois at Urbana-

Champaign. He is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public

Accountants, Institute of Internal Auditors and the Illinois CPA Society.

He has been married to a wonderful wife for 9 years, and has a 6 year old

daughter and a 1 year old son. Outside of work and family, Jeremy is an avid

sports fan and tries to keep up as best he can amidst a busy lifestyle.

John Martin

Senior Director

PureCircle Ltd

John Martin is the Senior Director,

Global Technical Development and

Innovation at PureCircle Ltd, specializing

in product research and development,

and leading application teams globally.

Prior to joining PureCircle, Martin held

technical leadership positions at Ferrara

Candy Company, The Coca-Cola Company, Brown-Forman Corporation,

and Beneo. Martin holds advanced degrees from Cornell University in

Food Science with a minor in International Marketing.

John Wicklein

Director - Information Management

GoGo

John is the Director of Information

Management at Gogo. He leads an

organization of ~25 resources across

three locations. His team develops and

supports the enterprise's data

warehouse and unstructured data cluster

- which is in the process of being

migrated to a newly architected hybrid

data warehouse in AWS. The focus on

everything data related to data: Ingestion, integration, quality, governance,

profiling, modeling, and visualization.

John has been with GoGo since 2013. Prior to that he spent 10 years at

US Cellular managing a Data Warehouse/Business Intelligence group and

as a BI Developer. He got his start with Verizon Wireless working on

cellular billing system conversions in 2001.

John and his charming wife have two boys, 5 and 1 and live in Elmhurst,

Illinois.

Katie Yarber

Senior Manager, Events and Operations

Chicago Sports Commission/Choose

Chicago

Katie Yarber is the Senior Manager, Events and

Operations for the Chicago Sports Commission

(CSC), a part of Choose Chicago, the official

destination marketing organization for the city of

Chicago. Yarber joined CSC in June 2012, and is a

key member of the team that has won the rights to

host high-profile national and international events,

such as: 2015 ITU World Triathlon Grand Final,

multiple Big Ten Men’s Basketball Tournaments,

the 2017 NCAA Men’s Ice Hockey Championship,

2016 Louis Vuitton America’s Cup World Series, the 2015 & 2016 NFL Draft, and many others.

Yarber leads management of these client relationships, providing various services to ensure

event success, including, facilitation of regular communications and meetings, management of

large-scale volunteer programs, hotel contract negotiations, coordination of vendors and

partners, and much more. She also produces a quarterly “CSC Business of Sport Speaker

Series”; and is responsible for the financial management of CSC's Corporate Partner Program,

currently in its forth year and bringing in approx. $500k annually. Prior to joining CSC, Yarber

worked for USA Baseball as the Director of Travel Services. There, she created the department

responsible for managing domestic and international travel for the national teams, and for

providing travel support to over 6,000 athletes annually. Yarber holds a B.A. from The University

of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She and her husband, Matt, reside in Chicago.

Kenneth Kuhrt

Senior Vice President, Portfolio Manager

Ariel Investments

Ken serves as co-portfolio manager of

our small cap value strategy.

Additionally, he serves as portfolio

manager for Ariel Fund, as well as our

micro-cap value and small cap deep

value products. As a research analyst,

Ken covers consumer services and

industrials. Prior to joining Ariel as a

research analyst in 2004, he spent more than two years with William Blair &

Company, LLC, most recently as a senior investment banking analyst. Ken

also worked as a senior auditor at KPMG, LLP. He earned a BS in

accounting from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and an

MBA from the University of Chicago, and he is also a Certified Public

Accountant.

Konrad Mikolajczyk

Manager Network and Telco

Edward Elmhurst Health

Information Technology professional

with extensive engineering experience

and leadership skills with a proven track

record leading IT organizations to meet

business goals and objectives. Results

and goal oriented individual who takes

full ownership in his responsibilities of

the organizations operational and strategic information technology

functions. Perceptive management style reinforced by well-rounded skills,

capable of leading, mentoring, and motivating individuals while forming a

cohesive team environment.

Family orientated individual that enjoys outdoor activities and adventures.

Always looking for new challenges and thrills to enjoy with family and

friends. I love to stay busy with kids sports, house projects, and hobbies.

Enjoy watching sports such as basketball and football when time allows.

Laura Wooster

Senior Vice President, Public Policy

American Osteopathic Association

In Laura’s current role she oversees all public policy/government relations for the AOA on behalf of the 130,000 osteopathic physicians and medical students we represent. As well as being a part of the Senior Leadership Team of the AOA, in her current role she oversees all public policy/government relations for the AOA on behalf of the 130,000 osteopathic physicians and medical students we represent. In this senior role she is helping to lead the association's business functions. While she started her career in public health, in 2008 she changed careers to government relations after being exposed to it due to her work in health IT. She’s since grown her responsibilities through her work first for Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (5 years), and now 4 years at the AOA. Her future career aspirations are to have more of a leadership role for a large organization that has a strong base in advocacy and public policy. Therefore, play a significant role in helping to lead the association's business functions.

Leslie Corbett

Executive Director

IL Equal Justice Foundation

Leslie currently serves as the Executive

Director of the IL Equal Justice

Foundation, a nonprofit organization that

administers and advocates for the state

appropriation for civil legal aid. This role

requires her to work regularly with the

Attorney General and the legislature to

secure funding as well as with the legal

aid community to grant the funds. Her past work includes serving as the

Associate Director of the Chicago Bar Foundation, the Executive Director of

Coordinated Advice & Referral Program for Legal Services (CARPLS) and

program staff at Chicago Legal Aid to Incarcerated Mothers (CLAIM). She

has been in legal aid her entire career even though she is not a lawyer.

Leslie currently resides in Beverly with her husband Aaron Chenoweth and

daughter, Nora.

Matt O’Kane

Chief Development Officer

Group Fox Management

Matt is the Chief Development Officer for Group

Fox Management, a family owned and operated

management company with over 4,000 units in

the Chicago area. Matt has overseen the

acquisition of approximately 1,400 Units, and

the construction of 280, which represents over

$500MM of asset value. H has also overseen

the leasing of about 100,000 sqft of commercial

space and 40,000 sqft of office space. Matt

started in the business in my early teens turning

apartments. Painting and cleaning. He then moved on to the accounting and financing

side in his later teens and as a young adult. He attended a handful of different

colleges/universities. Most notably Purdue University. He spent 8 months as a farmhand

at a self-sufficient farm/orchard and 5 years in the US Navy as a FMF Hospital

Corpsman.

Matt is fortunate to traveled much of the world with his family and the military.

He enjoys SCUBA diving, outdoor activities

I intend to get my motorcycle license this year, and would like to get a pilot’s license.

Someday, he would like to visit space!

Michael Schnepf

Director of Network and Systems

Engineering

Gogo

Mike is the Director of Network and Systems

Engineering for Gogo, the leading provider of

inflight entertainment services. Mike has worked

with Gogo for 10 years, the last 7 of which have

been in management.

When he’s not working, or studying he enjoys

watching sports and playing golf. He is looking

forward to what he can learn from this training

course. Mike and his wife live in Naperville with their

3 dogs.

Paul Marron

Account Executive

SAP

Paul is a Chicago native who grew up in

Hinsdale and has lived in the city since 1993.

He has two fantastic kids who are 7 and 17;

and is a huge sports fan and sports enthusiast.

In his professional life he’s a seasoned and

successful account executive who has spent

20+ years selling for outstanding companies.

He’s an Account Executive for SAP America

and works with several key Installed Base

customers in the CPG, Wholesale Distribution

and Life Sciences industries. His focus is on helping his customers deliver innovation

and best-in-class business results across all of their lines of business.

Consistently Paul has met and exceeded quota targets and been in a leadership role on

his teams. His positions have always been focused on competitive, new account

acquisition at the companies he has worked for. Being customer-focused, working with

great people and working well in a team environment have been the keys to his

success.

Rachel Traurig

Market Development & Cultural

Strategist

DIRTT Environmental Solutions

Rachel is the leader of Market Development in

Illinois, for premanufactured interior

construction. DIRTT is a disrupter in interior

construction, they use video gaming technology

to build spaces more efficiently and creates

future flexibility. Rachel’s main responsibility is

to educate clients on building their interior

spaces with a new methodology of

construction. Clients include healthcare, education, corporate commercial, residential,

and government vertical markets. Her role of market development encompasses sales,

design, project management, and managing client budgets. Rachel has been in her

current role and in the construction industry for 17 months. In that short amount of time

she has been able to create her own network of architect & designers, general

contracts, and brokers. Aspirations for the next three years to is be a leader in 21st

century construction. In the next ten years, Rachel is looking forward to being the head

of cultural strategy for DIRTT, assisting companies in building innovative and

technologically advanced spaces for their specific company culture.

Ryan Ferrell

Director, Scientific Communications

HDMZ

Ryan leads a department of two full-time and

several contract technical and creative writers

focused on scientific content generation and

public relations at HDMZ, a full-service

branding and integrated marketing

communications agency that works with leading

healthcare and science brands. His

responsibilities include: providing strategic

direction to clients and staff; elevating the

overall agency's industry and scientific

expertise; advising and consulting with clients and staff on clients' business and the

agency's ongoing client relationships; leading, mentoring and advising writers;

participating in new business development at the firm; managing projects throughout

their lifecycle; and personally taking on selective writing and PR assignments.

Ryan joined HDMZ in 2011 after working for a competitor for a year and half. In 2013,

he founded the Scientific Communications practice and began hiring team members.

In the next few years, his goals include: to grow the team with more senior talent to win

larger and more challenging clients.

Sarah Beeskow Blay

Director of Client Services

Shareasale

Sarah currently is the Director of Client

Services for the performance marketing

network, ShareASale.com. She joined

ShareASale in 2005 and is currently

responsible for the Client Services Department.

The Client Services team provides strategic,

educational, and technical guidance to help our

clients grow. Prior to joining ShareASale, Sarah

was at the Michigan Association of

Broadcasters as Director of Member Services and Broadcast Coordinator for the

implementation of Michigan’s Amber Alert program.

Sarah Frick

SVP External Affairs and Strategy

Chicago Commons

Currently, Sarah is the SVP of External Affairs and

Strategy. She oversees all fundraising, data,

advocacy, communications/events, and strategic

planning for Chicago Commons. Sarah has been

promoted twice in the last 4.5 years and now serves

as the right hand to our CEO. She has gotten

comfortable in her role as the 'number 2' and only

recently have begun to think about a higher

leadership role like a CEO or Executive Director of

an organization.

Tom Klehr

Senior Vice President – Relationship

Manager

Bank of America Merrill Lynch

Tom Klehr is a Senior Relationship Manager on

the Illinois Middle Market Commercial Banking

Team at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

He leads a team of dedicated solution experts

that assist middle market clients in achieving

their overall strategic objectives by advising

them on financing strategies, treasury

management solutions, international banking,

FX and interest rate risk management, and

investment banking strategies. Tom seeks to develop and grow banking relationships

with middle market companies across Illinois.

Tom joined Bank of America Merrill Lynch’s predecessor LaSalle Bank in 1998 as an

analyst in its credit training program. He graduated from the University of Illinois

Urbana-Champaign where he earned both a B.S. in Business Administration and a

M.B.A. He holds the Series 7 and Series 63 general securities licenses administered by

FINRA (Financial Industry Regulation Authority) and is a Registered Representative of

Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc.

Zach Wilson

Principal

Gulo Solutions

Zach co-founded Gulo in 2003. Gulo was

created to build beautiful, impactful and easy to

use websites and digital experiences.

Prior to founding Gulo, Zach worked for the

University of Michigan building web software.

Following those years, he consulted

organizations as a software developer. In the

15 years at Gulo, he has grown his professional

career and personally. Zach is also credited

building several successful web applications.

In his spare time, Zach is very passionate about his family and triathlons. He has

completed 6 full IRONMANs, 30 half IRONMANs and competed the half-IRONMAN

World Championship on Mont-Tremblant. He continues to actively swim, bike and run.

He also enjoys playing Tennis, Squash and occasionally Golf.

Lastly, his involvement in the community is very important. Zach volunteers for Chicago

Cares and is active with the Chicago Chamber of Commerce. This year, with his family

Zach would like to volunteer more and show his daughter what community participation

involves.