Carol Fishman Cohen is the CEO and Co-founder of iRelaunch, a full-service career reentry company focused on bringing professionals back into the workforce after extended leave. iRelaunch works with employers worldwide to build and expand in-house career reentry programs, produces the iRelaunch Return to Work Conferences, and leads a community of more than 120,000 relaunchers looking to return to work. Cohen, a relauncher herself, hosts the 3,2,1 iRelaunch podcast and writes regularly for Harvard Business Review. Her TED talk, "How to get back to work after a career break," has nearly 3.7 million views. 

Comfortable and confident in building and nurturing relationships with potential and existing partners, Colleen returned to the corporate world with iRelaunch as a Business Development Executive after taking a career break. Her previous roles included President of Globetrotter Properties with Harlem Globetrotters International where she was responsible for all new business development, daily operations, and long-term strategies for this world-renowned sports entertainment brand. 

While on a career break, Colleen led several volunteer community endeavors and consulted on projects, from nonprofit to startup companies, to provide solutions that increased overall productivity and business growth.  A graduate of the University of Illinois with a BS in Biology and Communications, she lives in the Chicagoland area with her family and enjoys travelling, cooking for friends and family and being outdoors with her husband, daughters, and high-energy puppy.

Trina serves as the U.S. Accounting & Internal Controls Offering Portfolio Leader for Deloitte’s Risk and Financial Advisory Practice focused on improving trust, transformational change and resilience for audit, finance, IT, and treasury organizations. As a Partner in Accounting & Internal Controls, she enjoys collaborating with her clients to explore emerging business and digital trends, anticipating the associated risks, and developing innovative strategies to manage risks more effectively. In addition, Trina is currently serving as a member of the Deloitte U.S. Board of Directors.

Trina leverages her twenty-seven years of client service experience, background in IT and accounting, and deep experience in SAP to lead advisory projects and global internal control audits at some of Deloitte’s largest clients. She has led and engaged with cross functional risk committees related to crisis management, emerging risks, accounting and compliance, enterprise IT initiatives, process transformation, and M&A transactions to advise her clients on proactive risk management. She is a CPA in Ohio and Illinois.

Prior to her current role, Trina served as the U.S. Chief Quality Officer for the Risk & Financial Advisory Practice. In this role, she led the strategic, reputational, and operational risk management for the business, leveraging predictive risk analytics to anticipate and manage risks in the portfolio. In her leadership role as the Technology Risk Service Area Leader, Trina ran business operations for one of the four segments of the Advisory practice.

From an industry perspective, Trina served as Vice Chairman - U.S. Industrial Products & Services Leader across Deloitte businesses, including Risk & Financial Advisory, Consulting, Audit and Tax. Trina has over two decades of experience advising clients in the manufacturing industry. She has written and spoken on Deloitte research initiatives such as Cyber Risk in Advanced Manufacturing, Industrial Products industry trends, Digital Supply Networks, Risk Assessment Practices in Manufacturing, and Women in Manufacturing.

Trina is a passionate and active mentor and developer of our professionals at Deloitte. She is a frequent speaker and facilitator at Deloitte’s leadership development and inclusion initiative courses.

Carol Fishman Cohen is the CEO and Co-founder of iRelaunch, a full-service career reentry company focused on bringing professionals back into the workforce after extended leave. iRelaunch works with employers worldwide to build and expand in-house career reentry programs, produces the iRelaunch Return to Work Conferences, and leads a community of more than 120,000 relaunchers looking to return to work. Cohen, a relauncher herself, hosts the 3,2,1 iRelaunch podcast and writes regularly for Harvard Business Review. Her TED talk, "How to get back to work after a career break," has nearly 3.7 million views. 

Mari brings a breadth of experience to the Senior Manager, Client Services role, in which she supports the Client Services function of iRelaunch. Earlier in her career, Mari worked at financial services and technology organizations where she held a variety of positions in project management and financial analysis. Mari joins iRelaunch following a career break during which she took care of her family and volunteered extensively in her community. She has an MBA from the University of California at Berkeley and a BA from the University of Notre Dame.

Elizabeth is a career relauncher with over 15 years of experience designing, implementing and managing programs that drive impact at the intersection of diversity and inclusion, talent acquisition, corporate social responsibility, and employee engagement. She is recognized for her strategic planning and execution, project and stakeholder management, and recruiting and training skills. As Managing Director at iRelaunch, Elizabeth plays a key role in the company’s pioneering work, advising progressive and innovative employers on career reentry program options to leverage diverse talent pools.

Elizabeth brings a wealth of personal and professional experience in the career reentry space to iRelaunch. After a 15-year career gap, she relaunched at Oracle without the support of a formal career reentry program. With a focus on the Company’s diversity and inclusion goals, she drew on her personal relaunch experience to define, pilot and expand Oracle’s Career Relaunch Program. Elizabeth was also the architect and manager of Oracle’s global, community-based Corporate Social Responsibility program. She expanded the program to over 25 countries, recruiting and training community leaders around the world.

Elizabeth earned an MBA in Finance from Denver University and a BA in History from Trinity College in Hartford, CT. She was trained in Design Thinking techniques by Stanford’s dSchool, and has served as an advisor for ReBoot Accel, a recruiting firm that helps companies hire, advance and empower women. She lives in the San Francisco Bay area with her husband, Carl, and loves spending time with her two boys, being active outdoors, entertaining friends, and taking road trips.

Jesi Marin is a driven Executive and a proven action leader with more than 20 years of success spanning human resources, operations, B2B, B2C, staffing, and talent acquisition. Leveraging extensive experience in collaborative leadership, Jesi is a valuable asset for companies requiring expert assistance with growth, talent acquisition and development, team building strategies, as well as short- and long-term strategic planning and implementation. Her broad areas of expertise include strategic decision marketing, talent acquisition and branding, negotiations, revenue optimization, budget planning and management, staff development, recruitment process outsourcing (RPO), business intelligence, mentoring, executive collaboration, HR, B2B, B2C, and HR. Jesi has led all recruiting and hiring activity for the Information Technology and Creative teams and has collaborated with industry leaders including Disney. Earlier in her career, Jesi was the VP and Recruiting Manager with JPMorgan Chase, and in this role, she developed and executed hiring strategies, and managed a sourcing budget to improve ROI, and she led all planning, workforce, and resource management for 4,000 new hires annually. Jesi joined Lockheed Martin in 2018, where she led recruiting and onboarding teams to support one of the largest business areas. Currently Jesi heads up the Early Career and Diverse Talent recruiting for Rotary and Mission Systems at Lockheed Martin. Jesi obtained her BASc in Business Administration and Management from Kean University, and she is a Certified Six Sigma Certified. She is fluent in Punjabi.

Anjali Sinha is a Senior Manager in the Talent Acquisition team at Deloitte and serves as the National Leader for Innovative Recruiting Solutions. She has 21+ years of experience in various talent leadership positions including Talent Acquisition, Talent Advisory, Innovation and Learning. She has experience in supporting global clients across business verticals and geographies. Anjali is passionate about building deep client relationships, translating business strategy into equitable people initiatives and implementing solutions to support critical business imperatives. In her role as the National Acquisition Leader for Innovative Recruiting Solutions, Anjali focuses on creating equity in opportunity through programs like Encore, that focus on bringing professionals back to the workforce.

I’m delighted to be part of the IRelaunch community. Over the last decade, I’ve had the privilege of coaching dozens of relaunchers and I’m always thrilled to see them step back into the workplace with renewed confidence.

I believe we are all works in progress and that each one of us is meant to continue growing and stretching ourselves, personally and professionally. I founded Bright Evolution Leadership Coaching, LLC with the goal of helping my clients evolve into the next, better version of themselves. In my work with relaunchers, I have guided my clients to be intentional about their return-to-work strategy and to be authentic to who they are – coaching them to own their professional path and their career break.

For the last 20 years, I’ve worked with MBA students and business leaders from all industries and sectors, from startups to Fortune 500 companies. I’ve worked at three graduate schools of business and spent the last 15 years at the MIT Sloan School of Management, most recently serving as the Director of Alumni Career Services. In this role, I coached over 2,000 business students and executives (including relaunchers), helping them successfully navigate leadership challenges and critical transition points in their careers.

In addition to my private coaching practice, I am honored to teach as a Fellow with the Simmons University Institute for Inclusive Leadership and coach on career platforms The Muse and Landit. I am a recommended Executive Coach at MIT, Columbia Business School and Stanford GSB.

My Education and Certifications include:

• B.A. in Journalism & Communication from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• Ed.M from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education

• Executive Coach (CPCC) through the Co-Active Training Institute

• PCC with the International Coaching Federation

• Assessments: Certification in Gallup Clifton Strengths, MBTI, and Positive Intelligence

You can find out more about me at nextevolutioncoach.com

Simran joined iRelaunch as Director, Global Growth Markets in September 2022. Based in London - UK, Simran’s addition to the team has further expanded our international presence and fortified our position as truly global pioneers in the career re-entry space.

As a global HR leader, Simran brings diverse industry experience having held various leadership roles with multi-national organisations across the United Kingdom, Continental Europe and India. With her experience spanning across the HR spectrum within Talent Acquisition, Diversity and Inclusion, Leadership Development and Talent Management, she has a deep appreciation for the diverse talent challenges faced by large global organisations. In addition, Simran’s client-centricity and passion to impact business results, make her a strategic business partner and trusted advisor to C-suite executives.

In her prior role at Cognizant, a Fortune 200 organization with 300,000 employees, Simran was instrumental in conceptualising and designing their global flagship Return to Work program, thus making her a trusted partner for firms seeking to establish or further enhance a global corporate return to work program.

Ashley Miller has recently made a career pivot from Goldman Sachs Private Wealth Management where she managed client portfolios and investment strategies to Diversity Recruiting. As a diversity recruiting program manager she is able to connect with the brightest and the best diverse talent through the Returnship Program; Ashley is a 2021 Returnship participant.

Prior to Goldman, Ashley helped teams and athletes find success both on and off the court. After spending almost two decades working for both the WNBA and the NBA, she understands the importance of sport- and it is not simply winning or losing – it is the power to unite people no matter the age, gender, or skin color to connect for a common passion.

Over the past 20 years Ashley has played on, coached officiated, and worked for many teams achieving success along the way. In addition to her mentoring locally with Girls in the Game North Texas and nationally with USA Basketball’s Women in the Game, the pinnacle of success came in 2012 following a WNBA Championship and invite to the White House under then President Barack Obama.

Ashley is passionate about representation in the workplace and showing younger generations the opportunities to work in areas not commonly inhabited by women and people of color.

Ashley hold a BS in Movement and Sports Science from Purdue University.

Cristina is a San Francisco native, born to Mexican immigrants. She developed resiliency early on, which led her to become the first in her family to graduate college and then to a 25-year career dedicated to fighting social and economic inequities. First advocating for underrepresented students and then shifting to focus on creating career pathways.

In her current role as Senior Global Diversity Talent Acquisition Partner at Workday, Cristina leads the recruitment, strategy and program development for Career Returners globally. She also supports various diversity recruiting initiatives focused on increasing diverse representation in North America and EMEA.

Returners hold a special piece of her heart after seeing her sister struggle to relaunch at first after an eight-year break but then found an incredible employer that valued her experience. Cristina is excited to continue advocating for Relaunchers at Workday and in her community.

Cristina holds a BA in Psychology and Ethnic Studies Certificate from the University of San Francisco, and a Masters in Social Work and PPS credential from San Jose State University. She has served as a preschool Board Advisor and a clinical social worker. Cristina is a humbled mom to a curious, artistic and athletic teenager. Exploring with her family new places while traveling, reading, biking, strength training and dancing until her feet hurt is what makes her feel alive.

Sarah Scaturro is a Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DE&I) Talent Program Leader overseeing the strategy and execution of Glide – Relaunch, Wells Fargo’s professional return-to-work program, or “returnship”, while supporting the team’s mission to identify and develop outstanding talent for the organization with a lens on diversity and retention. Glide – Relaunch is a paid returnship-to-full-time program for U.S.-based professionals looking to return to the workforce after taking a career break of at least two years. Glide – Relaunch offers the support and resources needed to relaunch careers at Wells Fargo and hires 100+ professional participants annually. In addition to providing oversight for Glide – Relaunch, Sarah engages and consults with partners across the company on DE&I talent programming and strategy and helps promote DE&I learning at Wells Fargo. 

Sarah joined Wells Fargo’s brokerage division in 2008. During her 14+ years in financial services, she has held roles in communications compliance, retention and recognition initiatives, event planning and management of large national programs and conferences, and diversity and inclusion talent programming. 

Sarah graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with her Bachelor of Arts in International Studies, a core concentration in Communications, and a Minor in Spanish. A St. Louis native, she now lives in Charlotte, NC and in her spare time she enjoys traveling, embracing new experiences, and live music.

I have coached and mentored ambitious professionals my entire career. I have also had the opportunity to recruit, hire and manage countless others. But it wasn’t until the boutique consulting firm, where I was a senior executive and worked for 20+ years, was sold, that I had an opportunity to discover my true calling ... as a career coach with a special focus on relaunchers.

I’ve worked with relaunchers who have taken short (1-3 years) and long (15-20 years) career breaks and have found them to be bright, energetic and highly accomplished. Too often they might lack confidence or have an uncertainty of focus that may derail their search. That’s where I can help. Each client is unique; so we will create a customized plan based entirely on your needs. Whether we’re creating a strategy for your search, preparing for an interview or keeping you accountable and focused, the goal is for you to present your best self in all aspects of the job search. While I won’t sugarcoat things, or let you be unrealistic, I will be your sounding board, advisor and biggest cheerleader.

In addition to decades of “on the job” training, I also have an MBA in Finance from DePaul University, a BA in Business Administration from Augustana College (IL), am a Certified Administrator of Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and Strong Interest Inventory assessments, a Mock Interview Consultant for Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management and a Volunteer Advisor at the Career Resource Center, as well as a frequent speaker on today’s job search and reentering the Workforce.

Learn more about Mary Beth and 2nd Career Consulting

Hello my fellow relaunchers! Thinking back to 2002 when I first took time off (7 years) after the birth of my second child, I had no idea where I would be 20 years later. Fast forward to now, I am so glad to have zig-zagged my way to career coaching and look forward to sharing some of my experiences with you.

I started out with a fairly linear career path by completing my computer science degree and then working at IBM in sales. After receiving an MBA, I worked for Monsanto developing business in China, and then for a Silicon Valley life science startup opening up channels in major Asian markets. My career path seemed pretty obvious during that phase of my career. When I re-entered the job market after my time off, there were definitely many false starts and career detours that led nowhere. In hindsight, I wish I had the iRelaunch roadmap to make sense of the ambiguity I faced. Upon reflection, I appreciated having had time for some trial and error and for immersing myself in the community building at our local school.

When I did find my way back as a paid professional, I discovered that learning and teaching were my best strengths. First, becoming an adjunct at UCSD led me to coaching and mentoring STEM founders and professionals. Then leveraging that experience in online learning, I became a facilitator for HBS Publishing for their global management training programs.

Even though I have thoroughly enjoyed the many impacts I have had as a teacher and mentor, I realize that the 1:1 interaction from coaching has been the most rewarding. In becoming certified as a “First 90 Days” (the onboarding best-seller) transition coach, I have been helping many Fortune 500 (including Nike, Google and Qualcomm) leaders acclimate to their new roles as they get promoted to enterprise leadership.

From my experiences, I know that building and belonging to a community is the most important lesson I have learned. I look forward to sharing what I have learned from my own journey with you as well as experiences I have picked up along the way from the classroom to the boardroom.

Welcome, everyone, and I’m so excited to meet you! I’m Sara Dickison Taylor, President and Founder of Celebrate Life by Design, LLC. As a certified Executive and Leadership Coach, I have helped countless individuals maximize their life potential and turn their wildest dreams into reality. Whether it be transitioning to a new job after being out of the workforce for years, building your brand, accentuating your leadership team, or rediscovering that missing piece in your soul, get ready for your next adventure.

As a Certified Career and Executive Life Coach with the International Coaching Federation, I hold a Bachelor of Arts degree from Colby College and am a certified graduate of Coach University. Always the consummate student, I also choose to delve further into my coaching craft with Dr. Martha Beck, renowned New York Times bestselling author and Oprah’s favorite life coach.

I formally served as Co-Chair of the Pediatric Patient Family Advisory Council (PPFAC) at Boston Children’s Hospital/Dana Farber Cancer Institute and have spoken internationally as an advocate of patient and family-centered care for families, caregivers, and patients. Before my exciting coaching career, I spent almost 20 years as a top recruiter and Vice President for a Boston-based staffing agency helping individuals find the jobs of their dreams.

When I’m not coaching, you can find me laughing and dancing with my forever patient husband, trying to slow down the growth of my two amazing teenagers and enjoying walks with our ever-active golden retrievers. Come and join the ride - I promise you’ll be happy you did!

Learn more about Sara.

Matthew Temple is the Senior Director of Alumni Career & Professional Development for the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, where he manages a team of 11 people who deliver career and executive coaching to 65,000 alumni globally. He has coached clients on a range of career issues including self-assessment, networking, resumes, interviewing, negotiating, and starting/buying a business. Matthew has presented hundreds of career workshops in Brazil, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States. He has been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, The Times of London, and the Chicago Tribune. Matthew has worked as a Career Coach with Harvard Business School and the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

Matthew has coached senior executives as well as emerging leaders in high potential and leadership development programs. His areas of focus include leadership, building and managing high performing teams, onboarding, communications, and executive presence. He earned an Organizational and Leadership Coaching Certification from Northwestern University. He is certified in the Designing Your Life, DISC, Gallup Strengths, Hogan Assessment, Voices 360, Korn Ferry Leadership Architect, and MBTI. Matthew has coached executives on leadership, communications, and management at companies including Amazon, Bain, Boston Consulting Group, Facebook, GE, Goldman Sachs, Google, JP Morgan Chase, McKinsey, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, and Unilever.

Previously, Matthew served as the Director of International Business Development for Ask.com, where he helped establish, manage, and staff joint ventures worth over US$200 million in Asia, Europe and Latin America. He worked in private equity, M&A and corporate finance for Credit Suisse and Deutsche Bank. He has lived and worked in Asia and Europe. Matthew holds a BA from Harvard University, an MBA in Finance, Marketing and Organizational Behavior from Kellogg School of Management, and an MS in Learning and Organizational Change from Northwestern University.

Learn more about Matthew.

Carla joins iRelaunch after her second career break in the role of Business Development Executive. She has worked in London, Frankfurt, and the U.S., and her previous roles include positions in equity sales at Morgan Stanley and business controls at Bank of America. During her first career break to raise her family, she participated in Bank of America’s Returning Talent Program and was hired to a full-time role. When her family relocated from London to the New York area, Carla took another career break while actively volunteering at her alma maters and children’s schools.

As a relauncher herself, she is passionate about championing professionals who have taken career breaks and promoting opportunities for them. She holds a B.A. from Georgetown University and a MBA from Columbia Business School.

Kelly Duncan is currently the Head of Wealth Management Services and Operations, focused on driving operational excellence and collaborating across the organization to best serve Vanguard’s Ultra High New Worth (UHNW) clients. Kelly has been at Vanguard, and in the Financial Services industry, for over 14 years. The vast majority of her time has been spent serving retail clients in variety of different roles across UHNW, Sales, and Client Experience and Digital. Kelly holds a BBA in Economics and Legal Studies from Temple University and an MBA from Drexel University. Additionally, Kelly has her series 7,63,66, and 24. Outside of work, Kelly enjoys spending time with friends and family and volunteering in her local community as well as with Big Brothers, Big Sisters. She spends most of her time with her husband Zach, her son Coulson (5), and her daughter Olivia (2). Her family loves to travel and explore new cities and try new restaurants.

Jennifer Green Godette is the Director of Diversity & Inclusion Client, Business and Partner Engagement at Cognizant, a multi-billion-dollar technology and professional services company. Jennifer leverages her extensive diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), marketing, and client relationship management experience to promote diversity and inclusion at Cognizant and with Cognizant’s clients and partners. This role includes leading Cognizant’s Returnship Program, a 12-week paid experience comprised of training, mentoring, and coaching for experienced professionals who have taken an extended career break and are eager to return to work. Jennifer is also working closely with procurement leadership to strengthen and expand Cognizant’s recently launched supplier diversity program. Jennifer earned her bachelor’s degree in architectural design from the University of Virginia and completed her MBA at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. Jennifer recently moved to Washington, DC where she serves as a basketball mom and chauffeur to her 15-year-old son. Outside of work and watching her son play basketball, much of her time is spent renovating her 100+ year old home and working to make her former hometown Southlake more inclusive.

Rochna Pant has joined the iRelaunch team as Manager, Digital Marketing.

As a fresh postgraduate from one of India's top public schools, Rochna began her career journey infused with Mahatma Gandhi’s ideals, especially his quote- Be the change you want to see in the world. However, over the years she has evolved her mantra into- Accept the things you cannot change and have the courage to change the things you can.

Rochna started her career in the nonprofit industry advocating for kids from disadvantaged backgrounds to help them be the best version of themselves. When some of her students had substance abuse issues, she championed and created a de-addiction program for them despite strong resistance from senior colleagues. That experience helped her channel her innate grit and become a mature, assertive, and compassionate educator. She moved on to further her impact by becoming a teacher educator and then a consultant on a life skills toolkit framework to be adapted in 6 countries.

She was able to double down on causes finding her-when within 2 months of moving to the US, she got an opportunity to lead digital marketing initiatives, conduct workshops, and dive into analytics to build business focus for an organization committed to making women current, connected and confident after a career pause.

To always use her voice for a cause and advocate for the underdog matters to her. Armed with digital marketing in her quiver now, she feels emboldened to make a far-reaching impact and make a difference in the true sense. From being told that her voice does not matter to amplifying voices through Digital Marketing now, she has come a long way.

Zarmeen Hussain relaunched as a Senior Associate, Benefits Analyst at GroupM, a media investment company based in NYC after a 14 year career break. A five year long journey from constant rejections to short term consulting gigs, finally opened the door for her to restart her career in Corporate America in a full time capacity! Her message to all the relaunchers trying to re-enter the workforce is- Keep your “4 P’s" strong- Prayers, Patience, Persistence, and Perseverance and it will happen!

Tad Greener has worked in the energy industry for more than three decades, but a few years ago he experienced some health issues that ultimately prevented him from working altogether. After a nearly two-year hiatus, with the help of managed health care, Tad determined it was time to get back into the workforce. In 2021 he learned of the “Return Utah” program. An ideal program, the opportunity allowed Tad to polish off old skill sets and develop new ones. Importantly, the program allowed Tad to regain his confidence, and he has even been rewarded with job advancement during his time at Utah’s Office of Energy Development.

Priya is a Certified Scrum Master and Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt. With an Agile mindset, she has a passion for customer-centric solutions. She has 7+ years of experience in working various customer-centric and analyst roles in the Finance, and Education industries. She relaunched as a Business Systems Analyst at UC Davis after a 16 year career break! It involved several job applications, interviews, rejections and many other personal factors. Her mantra to everyone is - Keep pursuing your dream job and don't give up!

Carol Fishman Cohen is the CEO and Co-founder of iRelaunch, a full-service career reentry company focused on bringing professionals back into the workforce after extended leave. iRelaunch works with employers worldwide to build and expand in-house career reentry programs, produces the iRelaunch Return to Work Conferences, and leads a community of more than 120,000 relaunchers looking to return to work. Cohen, a relauncher herself, hosts the 3,2,1 iRelaunch podcast and writes regularly for Harvard Business Review. Her TED talk, "How to get back to work after a career break," has nearly 3.7 million views.