Talent & Total Rewards: The 2027 Class

The Class of 2026 · New this week

Grouped by what they built

Verified against the public professional record in September 2026, before anyone was contacted. Free to appear, as everything on this page is.

Built From Inside

Leaders who joined below the top seat and climbed to run the function. The tenure is the argument.

Angela Bretz

Nationwide

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Angela Bretz

Senior Vice President, Human Resources Business Partner

Angela Bretz served as Nationwide's chief diversity, equity and inclusion officer before moving into the senior HR business partner seat in 2023. Carrying that experience into core HR, rather than leaving it in a separate function, is a structural choice, and it is the one more enterprises are quietly making.

Shannon Ellis

Patagonia

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Shannon Ellis

Head of North America People and Culture and Global People and Culture Operations

Shannon Ellis has spent twenty-two years at Patagonia, and she started in benefits and payroll. Recruiting, then HR management, then the directorship, then the North America function and global people operations, every step of it inside one company. Almost nobody in this class has a longer continuous view of how a people function actually matures.

Molly Hamilton

Southern Illinois Healthcare

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Molly Hamilton

Chief Human Resources Officer & VP of HR

Molly Hamilton was an HR business partner at Southern Illinois Healthcare, then director of talent management, then interim CHRO, and took the role permanently in 2024. Rural health systems compete for the same clinicians as the academic centers without the same brand to do it with.

Ginger King

Kohler Co.

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Ginger King

Chief Human Resources Officer

Ginger King has held four different senior HR seats at Kohler, moving from corporate HR into the Kitchen & Bath Group and back out to the enterprise before taking the top role in 2024. Running the function for a business that spans manufacturing, hospitality and design means the same policy has to work for a plant floor and a resort. She has been on both sides of that problem.

Laura Lawson

United Wholesale Mortgage

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Laura Lawson

EVP, Chief People Officer

Laura Lawson ran marketing at United Wholesale Mortgage before she ran its people function, taking the chief people officer seat in 2014. That is a rarer route than it sounds: she came to the work already thinking about audience, message and brand, and has spent more than a decade applying it to a workforce.

Kim Lazerus

Maverik

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Kim Lazerus

Chief People Officer

Kim Lazerus started in territory HR at Maverik and worked through talent management and the VP People seat before becoming chief people officer in 2023. Convenience retail runs on distributed hourly teams, which is the hardest people problem in the enterprise and the least written about.

Brion Lieberman

Geisinger

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Brion Lieberman

Chief Human Resources Officer

Director, then assistant vice president, then vice president, then chief. Brion Lieberman's entire arc has been inside Geisinger. He took the top seat in 2021, which means he has led people strategy for one of the country's most-studied integrated health systems through the hardest labor market healthcare has ever faced.

David McKinney

AutoZone

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David McKinney

Vice President, Human Resources and Public Affairs

David McKinney's remit at AutoZone has spanned human resources, public affairs and customer satisfaction: three functions that most companies keep in separate buildings. Holding them together forces a single answer to a question retailers usually answer three different ways: what is this company actually like to deal with.

Teresa Nizza

Martin's Point Health Care

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Teresa Nizza

Chief Human Resources Officer

Teresa Nizza arrived at Martin's Point as an HR consultant, ran the executive office, took the VP seat in 2013, and has been CHRO since 2015. A decade in the top role at a regional health plan and care system is a long time to be accountable for the same workforce, and a long time to watch decisions play out.

Nicki Raggio

Paramount

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Nicki Raggio

VP, HR Data Operations & Solutions

Nicki Raggio's background is data analytics: she led it at ViacomCBS and then Paramount, and in 2023 she took that discipline into the people function. Most companies say they want HR to be evidence-led; comparatively few put someone who came up through analytics in charge of the evidence.

Scott Russell

PGA TOUR Superstore

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Scott Russell

Chief Stores and Human Resources Officer

Scott Russell came from Macy's, where he ran employment, talent acquisition and HR shared services, joined PGA TOUR Superstore as SVP of human resources in 2018, and in 2022 took on the stores organization as well. Owning HR and store operations in one seat is genuinely unusual, and it puts the people function on the same side of the table as the P&L.

Jamie Sackman

St. Louis Blues

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Jamie Sackman

Chief People Officer

Jamie Sackman came to the Blues as a senior director in 2014, became vice president in 2018, and has been chief people officer since 2021. Before that she ran her own HR consultancy. A professional sports organization is a small corporate staff wrapped around a very public product, and she has built the function for both halves.

Laura Scavone

Smoothie King

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Laura Scavone

Chief People Officer

Laura Scavone was deputy HR director for the City of Vancouver, Washington before she joined Smoothie King as VP of human resources in 2018; she became chief people officer in 2022. Moving from municipal government to a franchise system means learning an entirely different relationship between the brand and the people who wear it.

Gustavo Serbiá

Hair Cuttery Family of Brands

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Gustavo Serbiá

Chief Human Resources Officer

Gustavo Serbiá led HR at The Millennia Companies and Crescent Hotels before joining Hair Cuttery as head of human resources in 2020; he became CHRO in 2026. Salons, hotels and property management share a workforce shape (dispersed, frontline, service-first), and he has now built the function for all three.

Brought In At The Turn

Hired at the moment the company changed shape: scaling, integrating, repositioning.

Daisy Auger-Domínguez

Digital Asset

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Daisy Auger-Domínguez

Chief People Officer

Daisy Auger-Domínguez became chief people officer at Digital Asset in 2025. She is also a contributing writer at Forbes and sits on the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council, which makes her one of the few people in this class who both runs a people function and writes publicly about the craft of running one.

Becca Boyd

SmartBank

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Becca Boyd

Executive Vice President, Chief People Officer

Becca Boyd has led the people function at SmartBank since 2020, and serves as president of the East Tennessee Compensation and Benefits Association. Running a regional bank's rewards while presiding over the region's rewards community means one person sees both what a single employer pays and what the market around it is doing.

Dan Chappell

Seacoast Bank

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Dan Chappell

EVP, Chief Human Resources Officer

Dan Chappell spent a decade as an SVP and human resource executive at Bank of America before joining Seacoast Bank as chief human resources officer in 2014. Twelve years building the people function at a community bank, with the operating memory of a global one, is an unusual combination in regional banking.

Martha Delehanty

Commvault

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Martha Delehanty

Chief People Officer

Martha Delehanty spent more than two decades at Verizon, including as CHRO of Verizon Wireless, before joining Commvault as chief people officer in 2020. Moving from a company of that scale to a software business is a deliberate change of instrument, and she has spent six years making the case that the discipline transfers.

Brent Strehlow

ONEOK

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Brent Strehlow

SVP, Chief Human Resources Officer

Brent Strehlow founded and ran TMI Leadership Consulting for nearly three decades, advising chief executives, leadership teams and boards on culture, integration and organizational alignment, before he took the top people seat at ONEOK in December 2023. Coming inside to run the function for a Fortune 500 energy company in a period of growth and transformation is the rare case of an adviser being asked to do the thing he spent a career advising on.

Laura R. Garza

Dyson

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Laura R. Garza

Chief People Officer

Laura Garza came to Dyson in 2021 from Nissan, where she was global head of talent and, before that, global head of HR transformation. Transformation work at a global automaker is a particular education: it is done at scale, across cultures, and with very little tolerance for theory.

Katie Greseth

Calm

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Katie Greseth

VP, People

Katie Greseth joined Calm in 2024 from BrightInsight, where she led the people function, and came to that from a human capital role at Rally Health. Running people at a company whose product is mental wellbeing raises an obvious internal standard, and it is not a comfortable one to be held to.

Stephen Grossi

Triumph Financial

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Stephen Grossi

EVP, Chief Human Resources Officer

Stephen Grossi was EVP and chief human resources officer at BOK Financial for eight years before joining Triumph Financial in 2019, having started in HR business partnering at PNC. He has now led the people function through two very different periods of change in financial services.

Danny Guillory

Gametime

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Danny Guillory

Chief People Officer

Danny Guillory was chief people officer at Glassdoor and served as interim chief people officer at Dropbox before joining Gametime in 2025. Having run people at a company whose entire product is workplace transparency is an unusual credential to bring to the seat.

Patty Hoppenstedt

Wilson Bank & Trust

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Patty Hoppenstedt

Chief Human Resources Officer

Patty Hoppenstedt became chief human resources officer at Wilson Bank & Trust in 2025, after leading human resources at Southwestern Family of Companies. Community banks compete for talent against national institutions without national compensation bands, which makes this a genuinely strategic seat rather than a supporting one.

Joyce “JJ” Jelks

Roc Nation

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Joyce “JJ” Jelks

Head of Human Resources

JJ Jelks came to Roc Nation in 2026 from FanDuel, where she led employee experience and inclusion, and before that was head of people and culture at Wieden+Kennedy. Agencies, sports betting and entertainment all run on creative talent that will leave if the environment stops being worth it. She has now built for all three.

Jenny McCauley

Kirby

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Jenny McCauley

Chief Human Resources Officer

Jenny McCauley was SVP, chief administrative officer and CHRO at Southwestern Energy for over a decade, and vice president of human resources at BG Group before that; she joined Kirby in 2025 after several years consulting independently. Energy and marine transportation share a workforce that is operational, mobile and safety-critical.

Kim Nero

GATX

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Kim Nero

Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer

Kim Nero joined GATX in 2021 from Ferrara Candy Company, where she was vice president of human resources, having come up through talent management and acquisition. Railcar leasing is a long-cycle, capital-heavy business, and building a people function against that time horizon is a different exercise from building one for a consumer brand.

Andy Ortiz

Cedars-Sinai

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Andy Ortiz

SVP & Chief Human Resources Officer

Andy Ortiz came to Cedars-Sinai in 2016 from Health Net, where he was SVP of organization effectiveness and chief people officer, and was CHRO at Western Dental before that. A decade leading the people function at one of the country's best-known academic medical centers covers the entire modern arc of healthcare workforce strategy.

Dave Osswald

Molson Coors Beverage Company

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Dave Osswald

Chief People and Culture Officer

Dave Osswald joined MillerCoors as chief people and diversity officer in 2018 and carried the function through the formation of Molson Coors Beverage Company, becoming chief people and culture officer in 2024. Integrations are where people functions are actually tested, and he has led one from inside.

Tchernavia Rocker

Revlon

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Tchernavia Rocker

Chief People Officer

Tchernavia Rocker joined Revlon in 2024 after four years at Under Armour, latterly as EVP and chief administrative and people officer. Consumer brands in the middle of a reset need a people leader who can hold operations and culture at once, and her remit at Revlon extends into the business itself as strategic advisor for ethnic hair care.

Jeff Weber

Breeze Airways

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Jeff Weber

Chief People Officer

Jeff Weber joined Breeze Airways in 2025 after building the people and operations function at Xevant, and before that as EVP of people and places at Instructure. Standing up the people function at a young airline means writing policy for a workforce that is unionized, safety-regulated and geographically scattered from day one.

Ed Welsh

Planet Fitness

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Ed Welsh

SVP, People & Culture (Head of HR)

Ed Welsh has built people functions for franchise businesses more or less throughout his career: chief people officer at OVME Aesthetics, partner and chief people officer at Atticus Franchise Group, before joining Planet Fitness in 2025. The franchise model splits the workforce between corporate and franchisee, and getting culture to travel across that line is the whole job.

The Rewards Architects

Benefits, compensation and total rewards. The people who decide what a job is actually worth.

Bill Dinger

Providence

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Bill Dinger

Group Vice President of Caregiver Benefits & Wellbeing

Bill Dinger spent nine years at The Walt Disney Company working on healthcare innovation and labor support before joining Providence in 2021. He now designs benefits for caregivers inside a health system, which means building healthcare for the people who deliver it, a problem with no clean external benchmark.

Rebecca Gristina

University of Virginia

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Rebecca Gristina

Benefits Director

Rebecca Gristina came into the University of Virginia through compliance at its physicians group, moved to senior benefits specialist, and has been benefits director since 2018. A large public university's benefits population spans faculty, clinicians, researchers and facilities staff: several workforces under one plan document.

Mary Jakubowski

BASF

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Mary Jakubowski

Head of Benefits, US & Canada

Mary Jakubowski's route to benefits ran through finance: strategic functional controller, then director of HR planning and strategy, then head of regional analytics, digitalization and innovation management, and since 2021 head of benefits for the US and Canada. Benefits leaders who arrived via the controller's chair read a spend differently.

Janel Lancaster

UNC Health

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Janel Lancaster

System Vice President, HR Services, Technology & Total Rewards

Janel Lancaster moved from system director of compensation to system executive director of total rewards, HR data and customer experience, and since 2023 has held the system vice president seat. Putting rewards, HR technology and service delivery under one leader is a structural bet, and UNC Health has made it.

Olga Lozada

The Cigna Group

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Olga Lozada

Head of Global Benefits and Wellbeing

Olga Lozada was VP of benefits at Charter Communications and senior director of global rewards at Energizer Holdings before joining The Cigna Group in 2024. Designing benefits inside a health services company means your own program is a working argument for the product.

Richard McDonald

The Coca-Cola Company

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Richard McDonald

Head of Global Benefits

Richard McDonald spent twenty-nine years in global health and benefits at Johnson & Johnson before joining The Coca-Cola Company in 2021. Three decades in one discipline at one company, followed by a move to another of the world's most recognizable employers, is about as deep a benefits career as exists.

Frank McLaughlin

Volvo Group

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Frank McLaughlin

Head of Executive Compensation

Frank McLaughlin has been with Volvo Group since 2000, moving through global mobility management, a stint at Renault Trucks, the global mobility directorship, and into executive compensation in 2014. Twenty-six years is long enough to have designed pay for several generations of leadership.

Allison Oncel

L3Harris Technologies

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Allison Oncel

Vice President, Global Benefits

Allison Oncel came up through benefits strategy at L3Harris: manager, director, senior director, and vice president of global benefits since 2024. Defense and aerospace employers carry unusually complex obligations to their people, and she has built inside them for over a decade.

Jacinto Vallejo

Entegris

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Jacinto Vallejo

Vice President, Total Rewards

Jacinto Vallejo led executive compensation and global mobility, then total rewards, at Otis Elevator before joining Entegris in 2023. Semiconductor materials is a talent market competing directly with the chipmakers themselves, which puts unusual pressure on the rewards design.

Monica G. Williams

Baylor College of Medicine

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Monica G. Williams

Executive Director, Benefits

Monica Williams has been at Baylor College of Medicine since 2014: benefits team leader, then director of health, welfare and compliance, then executive director of benefits. Academic medicine sits at the intersection of the two hardest benefits populations there are: clinicians and researchers.

Kimberly Young

Amentum

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Kimberly Young

Senior Vice President, Total Rewards

Kimberly Young has led total rewards at Amentum since 2018, having previously run health and wellness at Reynolds American. Her remit spans global benefits and HR technology, which is the combination most total rewards functions are still trying to assemble.

The Public Trust

Where the people function is a public institution's ability to staff itself.

Brenda Cox

Salina Regional Health Center

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Brenda Cox

VP/Chief Human Resources Officer

Brenda Cox came to Salina Regional Health Center in 2015 from North Florida Regional Medical Center, where she was vice president of human resources. Eleven years leading people at a regional health center means recruiting clinicians into a community rather than into a brand.

Mario Ellis

Beacon Health System

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Mario Ellis

Chief Human Resources Officer

Mario Ellis was vice president of total rewards at WellSpan Health, having come up through compensation, before becoming CHRO at Beacon Health System in 2023. He also teaches as an adjunct instructor at Indiana University South Bend, a rewards specialist who took the whole function and kept teaching.

Daniel Gandarilla

Gulf Coast Blood

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Daniel Gandarilla

Chief Administrative & People Officer

Daniel Gandarilla became chief human resources officer at Gulf Coast Regional Blood Center and moved into the chief administrative and people officer seat in 2025. He is also an adjunct professor at Wake Forest University School of Business, and he leads the people function for an organization whose supply is entirely voluntary.

Gregory E. Muenchen

Hamilton County, Ohio

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Gregory E. Muenchen

Chief Human Resources Officer

Gregory Muenchen was city administrator for Wilmington, Ohio and an assistant HR director at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development before becoming CHRO for Hamilton County in 2023. Federal, municipal and county government are three different employers, and he has now worked inside all three.

Jose Antonio Munoz

YES Prep Public Schools

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Jose Antonio Munoz

Chief Talent Officer

Jose Antonio Munoz was managing director of regional human assets at IDEA Public Schools and, before education, ran human resources and loss prevention at InterContinental. He has led talent at YES Prep since 2020, in a sector where the workforce shortage is the business problem.

Nikki Odom

City of Minneapolis

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Nikki Odom

Chief Human Resources Officer

Nikki Odom was a labor and employment director and assistant general counsel at 3M before moving to Minnesota Community Care and then, in 2023, to the City of Minneapolis. A lawyer who chose to run a people function rather than advise one is a rare shape, and she took the seat in a city where public sector workforce questions are anything but abstract.

Angela Simpson

DC Metropolitan Police Department

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Angela Simpson

Chief People Officer, Organizational Culture and Wellness Bureau

Angela Simpson has led the people function at the DC Metropolitan Police Department through three successive versions of the role: chief people officer, chief people and equity officer, and since 2024 chief people officer for the Organizational Culture and Wellness Bureau. The title changes track a department rethinking what it owes the people who work in it.

Portraits appear as each leader chooses to send one. Recognition here is free and unconditional, and one word removes anyone.

Talent & Total Rewards

The class is forming.

Chief People Officers

Total Rewards and Benefits

Talent and Culture

The long form.

Commercial First

Leading with Empathy Is a Strategic Leadership Imperative

Culture as a Collective Act: Inside Patagonia’s People + Culture Leadership

The People & Culture Power List 2026

Designed the deal

Carried the hard year

Named by peers

Nominated to featured.

Nominated

Recognized

In your own words

Featured

The firms this class names.

Firms that stand beside the class.

Bring someone with you.

Enterprise Finance

Transformation Officers

From Deputy to Decision-Maker

All series

Grouped by what they built

Built From Inside

Brought In At The Turn

The Rewards Architects

The Public Trust

Know an Exceptional Leader?

Put your brand at the center of the conversation

Nominate a Leader

Thank You!

Shopping cart

Talent & Total Rewards

The class is forming.

Chief People Officers

Total Rewards and Benefits

Talent and Culture

The long form.

Commercial First

Leading with Empathy Is a Strategic Leadership Imperative

Culture as a Collective Act: Inside Patagonia’s People + Culture Leadership

The People & Culture Power List 2026

Designed the deal

Carried the hard year

Named by peers

Nominated to featured.

Nominated

Recognized

In your own words

Featured

The firms this class names.

Firms that stand beside the class.

Bring someone with you.

Enterprise Finance

Transformation Officers

From Deputy to Decision-Maker

All series

Grouped by what they built

Built From Inside

Brought In At The Turn

The Rewards Architects

The Public Trust

Know an Exceptional Leader?

Put your brand at the center of the conversation

Leaders Who Define This Space

Commercial First

Culture as a Collective Act: Inside Patagonia’s People + Culture Leadership

Nominate a Leader

Thank You!

Shopping cart