As business team lead, Kelly Yamanouchi edits and write business stories. She started at the AJC in 2008, joining the paper from the Denver Post. She has a bachelor's degree from Harvard University and a master's degree in journalism from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism.

Carrie Teegardin is a reporter and part of the investigative team at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She is a graduate of Duke University and has won numerous national journalism awards. She was a lead reporter on the AJC's award-winning Unprotected series, which prompted Georgia to reform its requirements for senior care homes in 2020. She was a lead reporter on the AJC's Doctors & Sex Abuse national investigation, which was a Pulitzer finalist. She was a lead reporter on the AJC’s Borrower Beware series, which won a Gerald Loeb award in 2006. She has written extensively about health care, unfair business practices and the criminal justice system.

With a career spanning IBM, Google, and SAP, Dr. Anise Mastin is a global enterprise marketing executive specializing in B2B demand generation, adoption, and customer retention. Focused to enable C-Suite decision makers to effectively address prioritized business imperatives by transforming complex challenges into compelling, actionable business solutions.

As a go-to-market strategist, Anise leads growth initiatives for two critical lines of business—Spend Management and Digital Supply Chain—enabling global enterprises to optimize spend, ensure compliance, AI-powered visibility and unlock interoperability across their enterprise. 

Anise earned a BBA with emphasis in Information Systems Management from Belmont University; an MBA with emphasis in Brand Management from Vanderbilt University and a DMin with emphasis in Theology from Life Christian University. She resides in Atlanta, GA as a passionate advocate for people, causes, and community through purpose-driven leadership.

Jessica Bryant is a seasoned sales and marketing executive and currently serves as SVP, Head of Marketing for NCR Voyix, a platform-powered leader in unified commerce for the retail and restaurant industries. With over 25 years of experience in B2B technology, Jessica is known for her strategic leadership, creative problem-solving and ability to drive results through high-performing teams.

Throughout her tenure at NCR Voyix, she has held multiple leadership roles, including Head of Sales Operations, Global Demand Generation Leader and Interim General Manager for the Small Business Restaurant segment. Her diverse experience reflects a deep understanding of business strategy, operational execution and customer engagement.

Before joining NCR Voyix, Jessica held marketing management roles at Recall Inc. and the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce. She also serves on the Georgia Restaurant Association Board of Directors, contributing her expertise to support and advance the industry.

Aniket Maindarkar is a business leader with over thirty years of experience across sales, marketing, strategy, and operations for global companies. He has a deep understanding of the Technology & BPO industries and has steered international businesses spanning from 150$Mn to $1bn+ revenues.

As CMO at Firstsource Solutions, he is playing the dual role of building the brand and driving the pipeline for the organization. In addition to marketing, Aniket also is responsible for the growth function including pre-sales, inside sales, sales operations, and enablement.

His core focus right now is transforming the marketing function to a growth function – and enabling the organizations objectives to grow faster than any other company in the same category. This requires a restructure of the organization while infusing tech and AI at scale and enabling the talent.

Aniket advocates that a champion mindset originates from clear business objectives and the adoption of streamlined work structures for enhanced organizational efficiency.

Outside of his professional endeavors, Aniket holds a profound commitment to creating a positive influence on society and the environment. An eternal optimist with a fervor for adventure sports like windsurfing and sailing, he has embarked on hiking expeditions in locations including Switzerland, Norway, Iceland, Patagonia, Peru, Bhutan, Tibet and Nepal.

Anya Johnson is the Vice President of Marketing and Commercial Strategy for TNT Sports at Warner Bros. Discovery. In this role, Anya is responsible for leading marketing strategy, creative, and execution efforts for Unrivaled, College Football Playoff, Big 12 College Football, and TNT Sports on truTV, including live game coverage and surrounding studio and long-form programming. Additionally, Anya leads the Commercial Strategy team that is responsible for developing revenue-focused initiatives and tentpole packages across key sports calendar and cultural moments, as well as leading Fusion priorities across WBD’s US Nets, Max, Warner Bros. Theatrical, and other verticals to ensure cross-promotion of prioritized IP across TNT Sports’ league properties and app/social inventory.

Before joining the Sports division, Anya spent eight years at CNN with increasing levels of responsibility. In her last role at CNN, she was the Director of CNN Creative Marketing, where she led all the experiential marketing activations for CNN World wide’s portfolio of brands, including the on-the-ground presence at Sundance Film Festival, SXSW Festival, White House Correspondents’ Dinner weekend, Political Conventions, and more. Additionally, she was responsible for paid media and other tactics to facilitate audience recruitment.

Before her tenure at CNN, Anya held various marketing and content distribution positions at The Weather Channel. She earned a bachelor’s degree in marketing from Georgia State University.

In addition to her work, Anya is passionate about mentoring. She participates in various formal and informal mentorship programs, where she mentors young business professionals and aspiring leaders. Anya is based at the Techwood campus in Atlanta, GA, and enjoys traveling.

Christopher is the Chief Marketing Officer, Digital at Synchrony.

Monique is the Head of Brand Marketing at Mercedes-Benz USA.

Cary Bainbridge currently serves as Chief Marketing Officer for ABM. As part of the executive team, she is focused on ensuring tight integration between sales, marketing, communication, operations, brand, and culture. She oversees all strategic planning, market and client research, creative services, and outbound and inbound marketing.

In her 20 years with ABM, Cary has led both corporate and business-segment marketing and sales operations teams. She was a core driver of the ABM brand transformation and has overseen the brand integrations of 20+ acquisitions.

Prior to ABM, Cary has held various B2B marketing leadership roles in real estate development and construction, telecom, and insurance. She has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communications from Mercer University, is a USGBC LEED Accredited Professional and serves on the governing body for the Atlanta CMO Executive Summit. Cary also serves on the Emerging Leaders Council at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, and is an active supporter of CHOA Sibley Heart Center.

George Huff is the founder and CEO of Opal, the platform that helps marketing teams connect strategy to execution through unified, visual planning. Since founding Opal in 2011 in Portland, Oregon, George has led the company’s evolution from a creative collaboration tool into the marketing industry’s system of record for connected planning. Today, leading brands including Starbucks, SAP Concur, Target, General Motors, and Boeing use Opal to bring clarity, alignment, and confidence to their marketing operations. A lifelong builder and problem solver, George is passionate about helping marketers work with greater purpose and creativity by eliminating the friction that slows great ideas down.

Allie Wilson is the CEO of GhostRanch, a presentation design agency that helps enterprise marketing teams communicate with clarity, consistency, and impact. She leads a world-class team specializing in narrative strategy, visual storytelling, and high-stakes presentation design for product launches, internal alignment, sales enablement, and executive communications. Allie is passionate about partnering with CMOs to elevate presentations from a last-minute task to a powerful lever for brand experience and business momentum.

Sarah Stansberry is the Senior Vice President, Marketing at Fiserv.

Dani Cushion is the CMO at Teads.

Dr. Ramsøy is a world-renowned neuroscientist and neuropsychologist, and the Founder & CEO of Neurons. For over 20 years, he has stood at the intersection of science and technology, equally working with top-tier universities and business schools, and advising Fortune 500 leaders on the adoption of cutting-edge tools to decode human behavior.

A pioneer in the field of applied neuroscience, Dr. Ramsøy specializes in transforming "soft" cultural and cognitive metrics into hard economic indicators. His work helps organizations move from the emotional to the evidential, using AI to predict human responses, such as attention, emotion, and memory, with surgical precision. A trailblazer in science-based tech adoption, Thomas is dedicated to providing leaders with a more sophisticated mirror to manage human capital, ensuring that innovation is grounded in both empathy and the clarity of evidence.

Katie Conrad is the General Manager, Customer Performance and Insights at Delta.

Allison Conrad is the Managing Director at Accenture.

Celia Quillian is the author of AI for Life (Simon & Schuster, 2025). She has been featured as an expert in artificial intelligence by TIME, Axios, PCMag, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, and The TODAY Show.

In addition to her work as an author and educator, Celia serves as Director of AI and Growth at Greenlight, a leading fintech and safety solution for families, where she focuses on responsible AI adoption, product-led growth, and applying emerging technology to real-world consumer problems.

As the creator of the popular TikTok and Instagram channel @SmartWorkAI, she teaches practical, everyday ways to use AI to make life easier at work and at home.

Celia holds a bachelor’s degree from Wake Forest University and an MBA from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School and is an active voice in Atlanta’s technology and marketing community.