This Thanksgiving, we’re celebrating and giving thanks to our CMO Series guests as they share their gratitude to the people in their lives that have helped them succeed in their legal marketing and business development careers.

In this special bumper-packed edition of the podcast, we hear their personal stories, the inspiring people, and the advice that has guided these leaders on their paths to success.

We’d like to wish our friends and colleagues a very happy Thanksgiving!

Transcription: 

Intro: Welcome to the Passle Podcast CMO series.

Charlie: Hello, and welcome to the CMO Series podcast, where we talk about everything related to business development and marketing in professional services. On this very special episode, we're celebrating Thanksgiving by catching up with our CMO Series friends to find out who they are thankful for in their careers in the industry. We're so grateful to all of our guests who have taken the time to share their insights with this community to help move it forward. And to kick off this bumper edition we hear from Kate Pearch, Kalisha Crawford, Karen Wilcox, Bob Robertson, and Chris Hinze, who all share their gratitude for their firms, teams, and leadership, both past and present, who have supported them on their career journeys.

Kate Pearch: I'm Kate Pearch I'm the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer at Morris, Manning and Martin. I am thankful to work with people that I truly admire and enjoy, and I've been surrounded by fantastic people for a long time. I've worked for some incredible bosses, and I learned a great deal about law firms and leadership from them, especially our current Managing Partner who has given me an example of true leadership over the last several years. Like all businesses, the past few years have certainly had challenges, but he has helped turn those into opportunities for positive change and for growth. I'm also very thankful for the amazing teams that I get to work with. Both the firm's administrative team, who helped me keep the big picture front and foremost, and also my incredible marketing team because they make me better at my job every day.

Kalisha Crawford: Hi, I'm Kalisha Crawford. I'm the Director of Marketing and Business Development for Ropers Majeski, a mid-size national firm. I'm not saying this because I think she'll listen to it, but I'm very thankful for my current boss, who is the Executive Director of Ropers. She has been the most supportive and creative boss I've ever had, and she allows all of us on the executive team to participate in the future vision of the firm, operate within our areas of expertise, and really give complex strategic advice at the board level, and that's something that I think a lot of folks in these kinds of roles really crave, and it's hard to find. So I’m very thankful for her.

Karen Wilcox: I'm Karen Wilcox, I am the Director of Marketing at Taylor English. So very early on in my career, about two years out of college, I have to be very thankful for Bill Blumberg. He took a chance on me and recommended me for my first Marketing Manager role when I was way too young to be a Marketing Manager, but he thought I'd be great at it. He told the president of our division that I could do the job. Our president said it's yours if you want it. And the next morning, I was the Marketing Manager, all of a sudden I had a $2 million budget. Spent the next two years wanting to throw up every morning because I didn't know what I was doing. But it was the best way to learn. I just got thrown in the deep end, and obviously, I survived it. But I cannot say thanks enough to Bill Blumberg for getting me started on the right track.

Bob Robertson: Bob Robertson, Chief Marketing Officer, Jackson Lewis. I'm thankful for many things, but I'm especially thankful for the people and opportunities that life has brought to me, especially professionally, and for being part of a firm that really values my contribution.

Chris Hinze: Chris Hinze, I'm the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer for Steptoe and Johnson here in Washington DC. I’m very thankful for Serena Simmons. She was the incoming Chief Marketing Officer at Lovells when I first joined there. And I took on the role and she really gave me the complete flexibility and freedom to run the communications function, to build relationships with all of the leadership team, and then to be able to deliver on all of the different aspects of communication, including some of the most difficult parts of reputation management. And just said, “you have the control to do that”. And for that, I've always been extremely grateful. That's not always been the experience that I think others in a similar role have come across. And in fact, I'd also like to give Serena an apology sometime for the grief that I might have caused her along the way. Having now got my own role as the CMO, I appreciate that the chair can look very different and the role can look very different when you're sitting in it. So I appreciate what she did for me even more.

Charlie: Thank you to all of our guests there. Now, mentorship is so critical in this evolving industry and we're really lucky to be able to share some inspiring stories from the likes of Gillian Ward, Christa Crane, Mark Hunter, and Craig Budner about the inspirational figures who have guided their career paths. But first, here's Kelly Harbour, Chief Business Development Officer at Goulston and Storrs, expressing her heartfelt thanks to her mentors and friends.

Kelly Harbour: So this feels a little bit like the moment when you get an Oscar where there are so many things that have happened to get you where you are and you're up against the clock, to recap the highlights before they cue the music. So with a heart full of gratitude to so many, I'm going to highlight a few people who are really special to me, and I'll try to do it in a bit of rapid succession. So first is Ali Shahidi, he is currently the Chief Innovation and Client Solutions Director at Sheppard Mullin. He was a mentor to me at Bingham McCutchen when I was in the IT department. And he told me about a law firm management Master's program at George Washington University, which I ultimately enrolled in and it dramatically changed the trajectory of my career. The program was designed for full-time working professionals and gave me visibility into all the disciplines of the business of law that I would never have been able to get, no matter which functional area I was in, or even sort of bouncing back and forth as I have in my career. And it was his suggestion sort of pushing me to really consider it. And I think what he saw in me for potential, again, really sort of changed the trajectory of my career. And then Christa Crane, who I know you know, who is the wonderful CMO at Loeb & Loeb, and was at Bingham at the time. I'm grateful to her because I came to her with a little bit of a different background, and I said I had something different to bring to the marketing and business development team. And she took a chance on me, and again is someone who just believed that I could accomplish things for the firm, and that was really the point at which I began to really specialise in marketing and business development. And then Patrick Fuller, who is the Vice President of Legal Intelligence at ALM, he's both brilliant in terms of industry knowledge and incredibly generous with his time and his network, and he's introduced me to approximately 1 million people that I have learned from and many of whom I consider friends. And last but not least, my team. If you're doing this job right, every day in the C-suite is a trust fall, and I simply couldn't do what I do without them. And I don't hesitate to take that leap every day.

Gillian Ward: Hi, I'm Gillian Ward. I'm the Global Chief Marketing Officer at BCLP. Well nobody gets to where they are without a whole army of people helping them get there. But thinking about two people in particular who helped me. One is a lady by the name of Susan Van Dyke in Vancouver, Canada, who, when I took my first legal marketing job, was the interim CMO at the firm that I was hired to. And thanks to Susan, she showed me the ropes, she taught me the language of a law firm. she gave me back my sense of humour when it was flagging somewhat being new to the business. And she showed me how to survive, how to work with the partners, how to interact with them and understand what the value of the team should be. I’ll always be grateful to Susan. If it wasn't for her, I'm not sure I would still be here today. The second person would be Andy Baker, who was the Managing Partner at Baker Botts. When I moved down here to Houston, and I've said this before, it was a bit like moving from the Canadian Football League to the NFL, or from the third division football in the UK to the Premier League. And Andy showed me how law firms really run, taught me the economics of law firms, taught me the dynamics that affect the ability to drive business internally, and without that understanding of how these firms actually make money, I don't think I would have been able to have the impact that I've had on the two firms that I've worked for down here, and appreciate really where the partners are coming from, how difficult the market is and what it takes to run a profitable firm. The other people are people who have worked for me along the way, so many of them. As I say, we're only successful by the team that we work with. People who have worked with me, Stephen Hastings on the PR side, great business development directors that we brought up, and we've all grown up together into these roles. It's been a team effort, and business development is a team sport.

Christa Crane: I'm Christa Crane, CMO at Loeb & Loeb. I am thankful for so many people, honestly. But in particular, I think the great mentors that I've had in my career, namely there have been a few very special Chairs and COOs, they took a chance on me, they supported me, they were generous with their time and continue to be. And really, they've helped me grow. I know that I wouldn't be where I am today without them.

Mark Hunter: I'm Mark Hunter. I'm responsible for all marketing business development with Hicks Morley, a labour employment firm in Canada. So I was asked who I'm thankful for meeting in my legal career. And I think it's important to note that my first experience in legal wasn't really very good. There was a lot of finger-pointing and cliques and people that I will never want to work with again. I also met some unbelievably incredible people. But that first experience wasn't one that made me want to stay in legal. It was actually my second experience. And when I was asked about who made a difference in my career, it was definitely the person I met at this role, she mentored me right up until her retirement this year. We held very similar values of learning, sharing, and making each other better, and also about making others around us better. She taught me simple things like, it wasn't about us, it wasn't about what we needed, it was about what the lawyers needed and how we could be better with them. She helped me understand the importance of networking within the group, with my peers, introduced me to a lot of people, but also gave me rope to be my own self, be myself, and figure out what works for me. And this year, I'm actually incredibly lucky to be able to give her a lifetime achievement award for a legal association in Toronto for everything she has done for other people. And so, absolutely, if there's one person that's made a difference in my life, that was the Chief Operating Officer of my second law firm.

Craig Budner: I am Craig Budner, the Global Strategic Growth Partner at K&L Gates, and I am most thankful for Vester Hughes, who was the named partner of Hughes and Luce, and a second father of sorts to me, who taught me a few things. One was to slow down a bit, everything was not a race, and to really do things deliberately. And the second was, and most importantly, to treat even your worst opponents, your toughest adversaries, as the professionals that they are, to treat them with respect and dignity. As a litigator, that's just such an important lesson to hear. Vester was a tax lawyer, one of the best in the country. But that was a message that really helped me, and I'm thankful for him and all of his wisdom.

Charlie: We all seek guidance and direction from those closest to us. And our next group of guests are all connected by their deep gratitude to family members, friends and mentors who have inspired them professionally, but have also impacted their lives and opportunities on a personal level.

Marianne Merritt Talbot: I am Marianne Merritt Talbot. I am the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer at Bailey & Glasser LLP, which is a national law firm here in the US. I am most thankful in my career to Phil Hirschkop who was one of the two lawyers who won the very famous Supreme Court case of Loving vs Virginia, and I'm grateful to him for two very specific reasons related to my career and my family. So first, I'm grateful to Phil for hiring me out of law school completely green, but really wanting to make a difference. And for being my mentor, teacher and boss for over a decade and for teaching me not only how to be an impactful trial lawyer, but he taught me how to think creatively, and how to think about how we can always do what we do every day in business and in our lives, how we can do it better. So I'm grateful to him for that. And then, very secondly, and even more importantly, honestly, I'm grateful that he won the case of Loving vs Virginia because that case opened the door for me to become a mother. I am the adoptive mother in a transracial family, and he opened the door not just to my career, but to me having a beautiful, gorgeous firecracker of a daughter who I adore.

Susanne Mandel: Hi, I'm Susanne Mandel, the Head of Business Development and Marketing for Lowndes. I'm incredibly thankful for all the people who've been on my marketing team at each of the firms I've worked at. They have all been, and currently are, hardworking and committed to doing nothing less than their best. I'm thankful to my colleagues around the country who have often provided support, encouragement, great advice and ideas. It all started though, with two incredible mentors and role models that I've been so fortunate to have in my business life. And it may be surprising to learn that both are men - my father and the law firm partner who first hired me. Both taught me valuable leadership lessons about leaving your ego at the door, making sure the people who are on your team feel valued and are recognised for their talent and their hard work, and empathetically helping others to learn and grow. They both really supported and encouraged my career choices and growth, and they never judged me based on my gender or, frankly, even on any failures. They encouraged me to take risks and embrace change, to be confident in all my choices, and, frankly, to learn from those choices, whether successful or not. So it was really their wisdom that guided me through so many facets of my life. I can only hope I've been able to pay it forward by being as supportive, encouraging and compassionate with all the people whose paths I've crossed in both my professional and my personal life.

Jennifer Manton: Hi, thanks for having me. I'm Jennifer Manton, Chief Marketing & Business Development Officer at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel, here in New York City. I am thankful to my mother for my legal marketing and business development career because without her I never would have had the focus and determination to pursue any career. My mother's advice always was to be nimble and to be flexible and look for opportunities. And like most folks in the legal marketing industry, you don't graduate from college and aspire to become a CMO in a law firm. It happened very organically and it happened because I followed my mother's advice and I took one opportunity and one door opened and then I went through another door and I looked to expand my options. I started out in accounting marketing and as an administrative assistant, doing a lot of writing and communications work for a very small accounting firm. I was able to leverage that experience into a large regional accounting firm and an established marketing and communications department. Thanks to my work with some of the law firms that were referral sources to the accounting firm, I was able to get an opportunity to apply for the first-ever marketing manager job at a small firm in Pittsburgh. And it really was just recognising that there were places to go. And while I might have had in my mind an overall picture of where I wanted to be, I was really thankful to have the support of my mom always saying, look at what's in front of you, go through that door and see where it leads you. It's not forever. You can pivot if it doesn't work out. And I'm very grateful for that and I've always done that and it's led me to where I am today.

Murray Coffey: Hello, my name is Murray Coffey, and here are some things that I'm thankful for. And I think the first thing that we've been asked to talk about is who you are thankful for in your career in the legal industry and why. And there's really three groups of people or three people that I'm thankful for. I started my career as a lawyer in the public defender's office in Chicago, the Cook County Public Defender's office. I spent a lot of time in the appeals division, and there was a guy who ran that division called Jim. His name was Jim Reddy, and he gave me the phrase ‘ignore the goofs and wizards’. We had lots of people in that department who thought that they were ready to move on to the Supreme Court of the United States and wrote these incredibly complicated briefs that almost always lost. The reason that phrase was great and why I'm thankful for it is that Jim helped me very early on in my career, is always focus on the simplest solution to any issue first. And what he said and what I think is right is that it's almost always the right direction to take. Start out simple and then go to more complexity if you need to. But if you don't start out simple, you're a goof and a wizard. I'm thankful to Jim. I’m also thankful to every person who was willing to show me some grace in my career, whether they corrected my grammar or were patient with me as I tried to learn something new, or when I made the same mistake twice, which I've been known to do. And so anybody who showed me grace, who was patient with me, I thank you. Thank you. And, of course, my spouse, who has shown me unwavering support, patience, and real partnership in the truest sense of the word.

Charlie: Firm leadership and culture are vital when it comes to creating an environment for marketing and business development professionals to thrive. Our next guests express their thanks to the leaders and firms who have provided opportunities for success.

Catherine Zinn: Catherine Zinn, Chief Client Officer at Baker Botts. Today I am genuinely grateful to have a job, so I'm particularly grateful to the leadership of Baker Botts, and more specifically, to work at a place where I feel like I can bring my authentic self and thereby support the team members that I work with to do the same. I just truly couldn't be more grateful to be in an environment where I feel like I can thrive and support others in doing the same.

Tamara Costa: I'm Tamara Costa with BLG, and there are some amazing professionals in this industry. So, aside from the colleagues, mentors, and bosses I've had the privilege to work with over the years, I think we truly grow from our more challenging experiences. So when I really think about it, I'm thankful for the difficult people who challenged me and pushed me, because it is from those interactions that I grew stronger and more resilient.

Angela Quinn: Hi, I'm Angela Quinn, I'm the Chief Client Officer at Husch Blackwell. I am thankful for a couple of people. First, I'm thankful for our Chief Executive, Paul Eberle. He is a wonderful supporter and lets us, in our legal, marketing and business development team, do what we think we need to do. He has a lot of confidence in the team and lets us run with it. And I'm also thankful for our team, our client development team. We have put together an amazing team of smart, dedicated, kind, generous, and creative people who have really come up and support our attorneys and have allowed us to do some really creative things over the last five years.

Amanda Bruno: Hi, my name is Amanda Bruno, I'm the Global Chief Business Development Officer at Morgan Lewis. I am thankful for our alumni, our clients, and my colleagues. It's been so wonderful over the 18 and a half years that I've been here to develop so many of those relationships.

Linda Orton: Hi, I'm Linda Orton. I'm the founder of Linda Orton Consulting, and I'm delighted to be here. I'm very thankful for a number of people in the legal industry. I grew up in it. It's my first home. And although now I've worked across all professional services, it still feels like where I started, in my most comfortable place. In each role, I was fortunate to work with wonderful teams, lawyers, corporate leaders, and even vendors who taught me about the law, operations, and technology, but perhaps most importantly, about leadership. There are so many people that I'm grateful for, but Joanna at Proskauer and Bob at Clifford Chance taught me so much about managing and appreciating my team, about respectfully disagreeing, and mostly about allowing my natural curiosity to lead. I had colleagues and bosses who taught me profound lessons about patience and persistence, about organising my thoughts and running projects, about the politics of a job, and truly what made me happy in a professional life. But mostly I found a tribe of colleagues and vendors who became the dearest of friends, and that started at an LMA conference in Opryland in the early 90s. Some of my closest friends were made in those early years as a consultant. I've also been so fortunate to work with thousands of lawyers from global law firms. They've helped make me who I am, the strong part, and I'd like to think the kind side too.

Katie Munroe: This is Katie Munroe. I am the Chief Marketing Officer for Zuckerman Spaeder here in Washington DC. I've got a long list of influential characters in my legal marketing story, but I'm probably most thankful for having such a wonderful mentor in Deirdre Christin, one of your recent podcast guests. Not only is she just whipsmart and incredibly talented, but she was very generous with constructive guidance and when I worked for her, really rewarded hard work and dedication by opening lots of doors for me to take on new responsibilities, try new projects and stretch. I really think we could all be so lucky in our legal marketing careers.

Charlie: Teamwork and collaboration are so important when it comes to marketing and business development success, and our next guests share their appreciation for the support and commitment of their teams, colleagues and peers.

Amanda Schneider: I am Amanda Schneider, Chief Marketing Officer of Epstein, Becker and Green. I am thankful for my marketing and business development team at Epstein, Becker and Green, they inspire me daily. I'm constantly impressed by their work ethic, creativity and spirit of collaboration, and nothing makes me more pleased than a compliment from an attorney on the quality of their work.

Julia Bennett:  My name is Julia Bennett and I am the CMO of Brown Rudnick. I am thankful for the people in my marketing department at Brown Rudnick. They are kind, they are tenacious, they are high energy, collaborative, technically expert, and just all around fun to work with. They know how to have a laugh and I'm really thankful for that. I'm grateful for how they've supported and welcomed me as a new member of the team and for their love for each other and the firm, and their creativity and their loyalty. I could go on forever, but I don't have forever. So I will just end by saying that I'm so thankful for Louise and Shawn, Kate, Meredith and Camilla and Stephen, Cristina and Karena and Emily, Chloe and Fi and Flo, Lauren, Alexa, Daniel, Harbir, Sam and Ben. You all mean so much to me personally and professionally and I'm really blessed to have them on the team with me.

Debra Hare: Hello, my name is Debra Hare and I am privileged to serve as the Director of Business Development, Training and Coaching at Morgan Lewis. Collectively, I am thankful for the team of professionals I work with at Morgan Lewis. While we sit in different departments and may be new to the business, or seasoned veterans, every single person I interact with brings a dedicated and committed approach to providing exceptional client service. Additionally, when I interviewed for this role, all of the individuals I met used the word collaboration, and every day I continue to see this collaborative spirit embedded in the firm culture, and for that I am grateful.

Roy Sexton: I'm Roy Sexton, Director of Marketing for Clark Hill and I am also the 2023 International President of the Legal Marketing Association. I am thankful for a group of humans I met early on when I joined the Legal Marketing Association. Gina Rubel, Nancy Myrland, Heather Morse, Gail Lamarche, Lindsay Griffiths and Laura Toledo. We've all kind of now moved on and gone our separate ways in some respects, but that was the core group. I tell this story a bit, I was at the Orlando conference and shy and nervous, which nobody believes, and feeling very insecure and I was lurking around the pool, nothing good usually comes from that. And they were all there as a social media special interest group, having a meetup. And Gina saw me and she said, “Come over here. Who are you?” Sometimes I cry when I say this because she just wrapped me in love and got to know me during the course of that afternoon. And they became my mentors and my friends, and they have been with me ever since, supporting me, giving me hard truth, and helping show me the way through this profession, and I had always had a fairly serendipitous career until I met them and it really locked in that I like what I do, I like who I support, and I will always credit them for the mentoring they provided me early on, the way they adopted me and the way they've looked out for me ever since.

Charlie: Next up, we hear from guests that share their deep thanks to those that have had faith in their ability and potential and were generous with their wisdom, guidance, and networks throughout their careers in legal marketing and business development.

Valerie Brennan: Hi, I'm Valerie Brennan, I am the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer of Munger Tolles & Olson. There are so many people that I'm thankful for in my career. From the outset of my career, becoming a business person was something that was just the most challenging journey. I did not grow up in a family of business people. I'm also a first generation American, so there were many people early on in my career who took me under their wings and taught me about business, and they really are the reason why I am who I am today. So when I think about it, there's kind of three phases of my career. There's the early phase, right? So the very early days of working in a law firm, one of my earliest experiences was working for an estate planning attorney, and she had a startup law firm. Her name is Peggy Hoyt, and her firm is still going, but I worked for her back in 1998, and this was the time when businesses were still deciding whether they wanted to use email. So it was those types of times. But from her, I learned just the importance of having processes, how to make things more efficient, how to market a law firm, especially a startup law firm, and then also how to communicate with clients. Because even at that early time, and that was my first official job, she was putting me in front of clients. So that was something that I was so grateful for, something I carry with me every day. When I moved on and became a lawyer, there was also another mentor I had when I was at Bryan Cave and that was Stuart Price. And he taught me everything I know about client management, and one of the most valuable lessons that he taught me and that I still carry to this day and share with my teams is to always make a recommendation. And then most recently, now that I'm an official business development and marketing professional, I've had so many people just help me in every part of that transition, including some who have been on this very podcast. But Kimberley Rennick is someone who comes to mind, and she really taught me everything that I know now about business development, from how to leverage data to manage client relationships and to grow client relationships, and also just about interpersonal team dynamics. So I'm just really thankful, I would not be who I am today without these people.

David Bruns: So I’m Dave Bruns, I’m the Director of Client Service with Farella Braun + Martel, we’re a mid-size firm in San Francisco, California. I think the people I am most thankful for are my mentors and they’ve changed over time. At different points they were the managing partner, the chair of a firm, it’s been consultants that I have worked really closely with, I’ve had some really good bosses, I’ve had some really good team members and employees that worked for me and each one of them brought me something and made me stretch so I was learning and growing and being able to become the person I am, and the legal marketer that I am.

Erin Stone Dimry: My name is Erin Stone Dimry, I am the Chief Marketing and Business Development Officer at DLA Piper. I attribute a good deal of my career development and my success to having a broad understanding of our profession, both the legal profession and the marketing position within it. And for that understanding, I'm thankful to a number of individuals. I'm not sure I could point to just one, but members of the leadership team at DLA Piper, both past and present, my peers in other verticals within the firm, many partners at the firm, contacts and friends across my career who take the time to just share wisdom and insights with me, people who pause and answer questions or let you pick their brain on a topic. I think people who are generous with their time and with their knowledge and willing to invest in the development of others are really whom I'm thankful for, and there are too many to name.

Lee Watts: Hi, my name is Lee Watts, I am the CEO and founder of Ashby & Watts Consulting. When I think about who I'm thankful for, I really have a hard time choosing between two people when it comes to my career in legal marketing and business development. One was my first marketing director when I was at Kilpatrick. At the time, I think it was Kilpatrick & Cody. But now Kilpatrick Townsend, and that is Susan Slifer. I'm still very good friends with her, and she really just encouraged me to really get to know the profession, supported me, helped me to see behind the curtain and understand more of what it took to be a marketing director at a large firm. So I really appreciate perhaps opening up to me and letting me see more about what it takes to be a leader. And the other person I cannot think of where I would be without, my marketing partner at Smith Gambrell. He is Brett Lockwood, and he was my marketing partner, as I mentioned, at Smith Gambrell, and because he trusted me so much and gave me just so much encouragement and it just always helped me to know that he had my back, it helped me to really just do my job without reservation and with a lot of confidence. When you know that someone kind of has your back, you're able to operate and to work at a different capacity, a different level.

Norm Rubenstein: I'm Norm Rubenstein, I'm the Managing Director for Branding at O'Melveny & Myers. If I started to name the people that I'm thankful for, who are often the same people who've influenced me in one way or another, we'd be having this conversation the week before Thanksgiving 2023, because the list would be that long. At a minimum, it would include probably every member of the College of Law Practice Management, every member of the Legal Marketing Association, and dozens of other people that have influenced my professional life over the last several decades. Essentially, I'm grateful for all of my colleagues and my clients, and for other friends in the profession, who, as a rule, teach me something in every engagement or every assignment, and who have always been so incredibly generous with their time and expertise.

Amy Shepherd: This is Amy Shepherd, I am the Chief Marketing and Business Development officer at Ballard Spahr. I am thankful for, there are so many people I am thankful for, who have contributed to my journey in legal marketing and BD, and more than I could ever name in this discussion. But first and foremost, the person who is responsible for me being here, full stop, is Linda Novosel, who was my first connection to the legal world. She was the first person to hire me to go and work at Dechert over 20 years ago and was the first person to open my eyes to this ecosystem and to even understand that this universe existed. And from there at Dechert, I was supported by Bart Winokur, the Chair at the time, Michael Van Kralingen, their COO, Nancy Lasersohn, who was the CMO at the time, and Eileen Kenney, who was the Director of Marketing, who all saw in me an opportunity to leverage my previous marketing, sales and business development experience to bring that value to the firm and really just then set off a series of just unbelievable opportunities that I am so fortunate and still reap the benefits of today. Eileen Kenny was also the reason I joined Ballard Spahr, where I still am today, and have been for the last eleven years. And while I've been here, the support of Mark Langdon, our former Executive Director, Mark Stewart, our Chairman, and our current Chief Operating Officer, Debra Lawrence, and our Chair-elect, Pete Michaud, who have all been instrumental in continuing to support me and open doors. I've also had the benefit of being surrounded by just countless C-suite, other professionals who lead their functions, who have been a source of support, and encouragement, for whom I am eternally grateful, because their support and guidance has made all the difference and helped me be better and help me understand their functions and how together we can help lead the firm. And of course, nothing is more important than the team. I'm so grateful for the team members that I've worked with at every step along the way. Some of those who I am still working with others who have moved on. And every interaction over those years, they've challenged me, they've supported me, they've executed, they have just brought their talents and expertise, and I have learned from every single one of them. And I am just so incredibly grateful. And every day when I think about what we have accomplished as a firm, what I've accomplished as a professional, I know it is absolutely due to their commitment, their success, their brilliance that they've allowed me to tap into and to share with me as we've worked on projects and initiatives over the years. So an endless amount of gratitude and certainly an enormous shout out to the current team that I work with today at Ballard Spahr, who are just extraordinary, and I am so grateful to work with every single one of them.

Charlie: So that's it for our Thanksgiving CMO Series special. From all of us at Passle, we'd like to say a big thank you to all of our guests for joining us. You can subscribe to the CMO series via Apple podcasts, Google Podcasts and Spotify. We'll see you next time.