WSJ Middle Market

J.W. (Bill) Marriott, Jr. is executive chairman and chairman of the board of Marriott International, Inc., the largest lodging company in the world. Mr. Marriott’s leadership spans more than 60 years, as he guided what was once a family-run root beer stand and restaurant to a global hospitality company. Mr. Marriott served 40 years as Marriott’s CEO before stepping down in 2012. Mr. Marriott is a trustee of The J. Willard & Alice S. Marriott Foundation. He has served on the board of trustees of the National Geographic Society and as a director of the U.S. Naval Academy Foundation. He also chaired the President’s Export Council and served on the boards of General Motors and Mayo Clinic. Mr. Marriott earned a bachelor’s degree in banking and finance from the University of Utah, and served as an officer in the United States Navy. Mr. Marriott blogs at Marriott on the Move.

Mike Foley is CEO for Zurich North America, chairman of Zurich Holding Company of America, Inc. and a member of the Zurich executive committee. He joined Zurich in 2006 as COO for the North America commercial business and also served as the regional chairman of the Americas and North America. Mr. Foley began his professional career in 1984 with Armtek Corporation. He worked for the Deerpath Group before joining Electrocal, Inc. as president in 1993. In 1996, he joined McKinsey & Company, where he became a principal and led the firm’s North American property/casualty insurance practice. Mr. Foley is a member of the board of the American Insurance Association and Lyric Opera of Chicago.  He holds a bachelor’s degree from Fairfield University and an M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Susan Schwab served as U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) from 2006 to 2009, and as deputy USTR from 2005 to 2006. As USTR, she concluded free trade agreements with numerous countries, launched the initial Trans Pacific Partnership negotiations and pursued the WTO Doha negotiations. She initiated and settled trade disputes with Canada, China and others. Previously in government, she served as assistant secretary of commerce and director-general of the U.S. and Foreign Commercial Service. She also was director of corporate business development, working mainly in Asia, for Motorola, Inc., and served as vice chancellor and president of the University System of Maryland Foundation and as dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy. She currently serves on the boards of Caterpillar, FedEx, Boeing and Marriott, and is an adviser to Mayer Brown, LLP. Ambassador Schwab holds a B.A. from Williams College, a master’s degree from Stanford University and a Ph.D. from The George Washington University.

Marco Annunziata is responsible for global economic, financial and market analysis to support GE’s business strategy. He also leads strategy for GE’s business innovation unit. Author of The Economics of the Financial Crisis: Lessons and New Threats, published in 2011, he twice won the Rybczynski Prize for best paper in business economics, awarded by the Society of Business Economists in London. Recent papers focus on the latest technological innovations in industry and their economic impact. Mr. Annunziata joined GE in 2011 after years in the financial sector, where he was chief economist at Unicredit and chief economist for the Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa region at Deutsche Bank in London. Earlier, he spent six years at the International Monetary Fund in Washington. Mr. Annunziata holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University. Mr. Annunziata blogs at medium.com/@marcoannunziata and  @marcoannunziata.

Dr. Drew Altman is a leading expert on national health policy. He founded the current-day Kaiser Family Foundation in the early 1990’s. A leader in health policy, communication and journalism, the foundation is based in Menlo Park, California, with offices in Washington, D.C. Dr. Altman served on the governing council of the Institute of Medicine from 2007 to 2012. Prior to joining the Kaiser Family Foundation, he was commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Human Services, director of health and human services at the Pew Charitable Trusts and vice president of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. He also served in the Health Care Financing Administration in the Carter administration. Dr. Altman earned his Ph.D. in political science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and completed post-doctoral work at Harvard University. He holds an honorary doctorate from the Morehouse School of Medicine.

An authority on intellectual capital and knowledge management, Thomas Stewart is the executive director of the National Center for the Middle Market, based at The Ohio State University Fisher College of Business. He previously served as chief marketing and knowledge officer for Booz & Company (now Strategy&). Prior to that, he was for six years the editor and managing director of Harvard Business Review. Earlier, he was the editorial director of Business 2.0 magazine and a member of Fortune’s board of editors. He is the author of two books: Intellectual Capital: The New Wealth of Organizations, published in 1998, and The Wealth of Knowledge: Intellectual Capital and the Twenty-first Century Organization, published in 2003. Mr. Stewart is a graduate of Harvard College. He holds an honorary doctorate from Cass Business School, City University London.

Richard Edelman has extensive experience in marketing and reputation management, having led assignments with major corporations, NGOs and family businesses in over 25 industries around the world. He has also counseled countries in every region of the world on economic development programs. As the creator of the annual Edelman Trust Barometer, he has become one of the foremost authorities on trust in business, government, media and NGOs. Mr. Edelman serves on the boards of the Ad Council, the Atlantic Council, the Children’s Aid Society, the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, the University of Chicago Medical Center and the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. He is a member of the World Economic Forum and PR Seminar. Mr. Edelman holds an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and a B.A. from Harvard College.

Dr. Peter Cappelli’s recent research examines changes in employment relations in the U.S. and their implications. His numerous books include Why Good People Can’t Get Jobs: The Skill Gap and What Companies Can Do About It. Published in 2012, the book identifies shortfalls with current hiring and training practices. Talent on Demand: Managing Talent in an Age of Uncertainty was published in 2008. Dr. Cappelli served on the Global Agenda Council on Employment for the World Economic Forum, and he has been a guest scholar at the Brookings Institution, a fellow with the German Marshall Fund and a faculty member at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Illinois and the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Cappelli holds degrees in industrial relations from Cornell University and in labor economics from Oxford University, where he was a Fulbright Scholar.

Richard Bejtlich is chief security strategist at FireEye, and was Mandiant’s chief security officer when FireEye acquired Mandiant in 2013. He is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and an adviser to security startups. He was previously director of incident response for General Electric, where he built and led the 40-member GE computer incident response team (GE-CIRT). Mr. Bejtlich began his digital security career as a military intelligence officer in 1997 at the Air Force Computer Emergency Response Team (AFCERT), Air Force Information Warfare Center (AFIWC) and Air Intelligence Agency (AIA). Mr. Bejtlich is a graduate of Harvard University and the United States Air Force Academy. His fourth book is The Practice of Network Security Monitoring. He also writes for his blog at taosecurity.blogspot.com and on Twitter at @taosecurity.

Andrew Keyt is an internationally known business strategist and succession planning expert for family-owned businesses. His 2015 book, Myths and Mortals: Family Business Leadership and Succession Planning, is based on years of research and interviews with next generation leaders. After serving as the executive director of the Loyola University Chicago Family Business Center for 18 years, Mr. Keyt is currently a clinical professor at the university’s Quinlan School of Business. He is also the founder of Keyt Consulting, a private firm that assists family enterprises with succession and strategic planning. In addition, he is the president of Family Business Network North America, which serves over 6,000 members in more than 40 countries. Mr. Keyt holds a master’s degree in family systems theory from Northwestern University and an M.B.A. from Kennesaw State University. He is a graduate of Kenyon College.