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| Hilarie Bass Co-President Greenberg Traurig LLP Hilarie Bass, who was recently appointed as a Co-President, previously completed an eight-year term as the national chair of the 600-member litigation department, and serves on the firm’s Executive Committee. During her more than 30-year career, she has successfully represented clients in commercial cases in jury and non-jury trials involving hundreds of millions of dollars in controversy. She is currently Lead Counsel for the Homebuilder Group in the Chinese Drywall MDL, having served as Lead Liaison counsel in prior MDL’s. She is currently an unopposed candidate for President-Elect of the ABA. In 2011, she completed her term as Chair of the ABA Litigation Section. Hilarie is widely recognized for her pro bono work on behalf of two foster children which led to the elimination and holding of the unconstitutionality of the 20-year-old ban on gay adoption in the State of Florida. | |
| Valeria Chapa General Counsel, Latin America Honeywell International As General Counsel for Latin America, Valeria provides general commercial, corporate governance and compliance advice to Honeywell's operations in LATAM with over 18,000 employees in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Peru, Venezuela and Uruguay. Before joining Honeywell, Valeria was a partner at Baker & McKenzie based in Monterrey, Mexico. She also worked at the firm’s New York (2004) and Mexico City (2006-2008) offices. She holds a JD from the Universidad de Monterrey, Mexico (Cum Laude, 2001) and a Master of Laws (Harlan Stone Fiske Scholar, 2004) from Columbia University in New York. In 2015, Valeria co-founded an NGO formed by Mexican in-house and law firm attorneys called Abogadas MX, which aims to increase the representation of women in leadership positions through initiatives that promote networking, professional development and leadership opportunities for women attorneys. This network currently includes over 170 attorneys and organizes quarterly diversity events in Mexico. Through Abogadas MX, Valeria launched an innovative mentoring program that pairs 20 senior lawyers from corporations and law firms with 20 junior lawyers to help guide their professional growth. Honeywell, 3M, Ford, General Electric, Home Depot, PepsiCo, Novartis, Microsoft & JPMorgan are participating in 12-month pilot phase along with law firms like Baker & McKenzie and Greenberg Traurig. Valeria is a 2013 Fellow of the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity (LCLD) and an active supporter of the Women in the Profession initiative led by the Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice of the New York City Bar. | |
| Roxana Kahale Partner Kahale Abogados Roxana is founding partner of Kahale Abogados. Ms. Kahale was secretary of the IBA's Women’s Interest Group (WIG) since 2006 and is currently co-chair. As from 2010 she is a member of the Council of the PPID of the IBA. As secretary she helped to organize in 2007 the WIG breakfast in the Latin American regional IBA, organized panels in all IBA sessions including inviting Supreme Court Justice Elena Highton as key note speaker in the Buenos Aires IBA WIG lunch and organized and co-chaired the London WIG 4th Conference. Additionally she is Vice Chair of the Media Law committee of the IBA. | |
| Patricia Menéndez-Cambó Vice President and Secretary Greenberg Traurig Patricia remains actively involved in the strategy and operations of her clients' business, providing practical solutions and serving as a catalyst for launching, growing, and maintaining successful businesses. Patricia previously served as Subdirectora General for Telefónica S.A. and General Counsel to a number of their subsidiaries and affiliates, assisting them in relation to their global expansion. During her tenure as in-house counsel, she also served as a Director for a number of entities within the Telefónica Group throughout Latin America, Europe and Asia.
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| Dee Sekar Editor: Global Diversity Chambers and Partners Dee Sekar is a UK qualified solicitor and Corporate Counsel & Global Diversity Editor at Chambers & Partners. For the last 3 years, Dee has worked extensively on the Chambers Women in Law programme. She created the Chambers Women in Law blog which has established a global online discussion and community of female lawyers. In September 2013, Dee devised the Chambers Women in Law seminars. To date, she has moderated nine Women in Law seminars in the USA and Latin America. In just under a year, Dee has created a strong working relationship with hundreds of in-house lawyers in the USA and Latin America and works closely with the ABA Commission on Women in the Profession, DirectWomen, Juridico de Saias (Brazil) and Association of Corporate Counsel (Brazil).
In January 2015, Dee launched the Chambers Diversity program which encompasses gender, minority lawyers, LGBT, physical and social mobility and corporate social responsibility in the legal profession.
Through research, seminars and awards, Chambers Diversity will be bringing a unique perspective to global diversity in the legal profession. Covering UK, Europe, Asia, USA and Latin America, the programme will give a platform to the most outstanding lawyers who have shown a real commitment to advancing diversity in the law. Chambers Diversity will also investigate the recruitment, retention and promotion of diverse lawyers in companies, law firms and barristers' chambers and will monitor this progress over time.
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| Ana Siegel SVP + General Counsel for Hispanic Enterprises & Content NBCUniversal | |
| Daniel Winterfeldt Founder InterLaw Daniel is the Head of International Capital Markets and the Diversity & Inclusion Partner for CMS Cameron McKenna LLP. Daniel is a US securities partner and has over 14 years-experience practising in the London and New York markets. At the 2012 FT Legal Awards, Daniel Winterfeldt was recognised with the only individual award, being named the Legal Innovator of the Year for his work building the capital markets practice as well as founding and co-chairing both the Forum for US Securities Lawyers in London and the InterLaw Diversity Forum. In 2013 he was admitted to the Bar of the Supreme Court. Daniel is the founder and Co-Chair of the Forum for US Securities Lawyers in London (the “Forum”), a trade association representing over 1,500 US-qualified lawyers practising at a number of law firms and financial institutions in the London capital markets, as well as market participants including securities exchanges, settlement systems and registrars. Founded in 2006, the Forum is an independent, self-funded organisation dedicated to addressing issues of, application of and compliance with, US securities laws in the London and international capital markets. For additional information on the Forum please visit www.tffuslil.com .
Daniel is also the founder and Co-Chair of the InterLaw Diversity Forum for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (“LGBT”) Networks, an inter-organisational forum for the LGBT networks in law firms and all personnel (lawyers and non-lawyers) in the legal sector, including in-house counsel and has over 1,500 members and supporters from more than 70 law firms and 40 corporates and financial institutions. For additional information on the InterLaw Diversity Forum please see www.interlawdiversityforum.org.
The InterLaw Diversity Forum has published groundbreaking research on Career Progression in the UK Legal Sector (www.interlawdiversityforum.org/publications) and is currently spearheading the Apollo Project (www.theapolloproject.net) sponsored by Lloyds Banking Group, National Grid, CMS and Data_Morphosis with patrons including the Lord Mayor of London and the general counsels of National Grid and BT. The goal of the Apollo Project is to help give organisations the practical tools to help make effective cultural changes by leveraging on the examples of best practice that exist throughout the legal sector and beyond. The Apollo Project seeks to reach out for examples of best practice backed up by evidence and will serve as a resource for them along with details on how they can be adapted for other organisations.
Daniel has also spearheaded the Athena Project at CMS, an art exhibition with portraits by photographer Leonora Saunders of senior women in our firm, our clients and government. The Athena Project aims to highlight female role models and leaders in our firm, our clients and the UK government. It is a way to put a face to all the research and reports that state there has been limited progress towards equality in the workplace and that there is an urgent need for widespread cultural change.
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