Best Practices for Operationalizing & Quantifying Your Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Initiatives

Catherine Clancy Mandell is General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer of Argand. Previously, Catherine was Counsel for American Express, where she advised the company’s Global Commercial Services business and earned the American Express and Harvard Certificate in Leadership Excellence.

Before joining American Express, Catherine worked as a corporate attorney at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP and Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson LLP. She focused her practice on the structuring, offering and ongoing management of private equity and hedge funds, as well as M&A, securities and regulatory compliance. Catherine has also worked as in-house counsel on secondment at HPS Investment Partners (formerly known as Highbridge Principal Strategies), advising the firm’s private credit platform.

Catherine earned her LL.M. in Taxation, with Distinction, and her J.D. from Georgetown Law, where she was a Global Law Scholar and received The Tax Lawyer Michael Mulroney Award for Outstanding Service. Catherine earned her B.S. in Business Administration, summa cum laude, from Georgetown University, where she received the United States Trust Company Award in Finance for Scholarship and Service and was inducted into Beta Gamma Sigma.

Adiah Ferron Reid is Senior Counsel at AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, in Wilmington DE, where she counsels on legal issues related to contracts and business transactions. She also provided legal support for the company’s prescription brand sales and marketing teams, regarding labeling and promotional matters and laws impacting the commercialization of pharmaceutical products. In addition to legal matters, Mrs. Reid is a leader of the Company’s Business Resource Groups, as well as community service activities and diversity initiatives for the Legal function.

Mrs. Reid is involved in legal organizations, local community non-profits and national community service organizations, where she has been in leadership roles, provided pro bono legal services and served as a board member or mentor.

Mrs. Reid served as law clerk to the late Honorable Clifford Scott Green of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. She is a graduate of Howard University (2000 summa cum laude) and Harvard Law School (2003).

La Fleur Browne is an Associate General Counsel and Assistant Corporate Secretary at Church & Dwight Co., Inc.

Ms. Browne is a dynamic and diverse attorney, speaker, and presenter with thorough knowledge of securities laws, corporate governance, underwritten public offerings (debt and equity), mergers and acquisitions, financings, executive compensation and general corporate transactions, and is relied upon as a trusted advisor to the board of directors, CEO and other members of senior management.

Ms. Browne is a graduate of Howard University School of Law and has a Diversity & Inclusion Certificate from Cornell University. Ms. Browne is a member of the Executive Leadership Counsel and the Association of Corporate Counsel.

Ms. Jones is a lawyer by training and a diversity consultant who specializes in providing diversity/inclusion consulting and training to individuals, law firms, corporations, not-for-profits, educational institutions, and other types of organizations. She is the founder and CEO of Jones Diversity. Her firm’s broad range of services enhance an organization’s competitive edge by enabling the organization to fully utilize, retain, and promote diverse individuals into leadership roles and create an inclusive organizational culture.

Ms. Jones has practiced law and been a community leader over a 25-year career, including positions as a federal prosecutor, with major law firms, and with Fortune 500 Corporations. She has been highly successful as a litigator, a counselor, an educator, and a problem-solver with regard to extremely complex and sensitive matters.

Ms. Jones is a graduate of Harvard Law School and Harvard College.