Institute for Executive Education Advisory Board:

Ann Rossino 

Katherine ("Kit") Williams 

Kerry Benson is executive vice president, managing director at Hill Holliday. Benson helps build strategies around critical talent and recruitment and leads the Liberty Mutual and Safeco accounts. For Liberty Mutual, she has helped develop and launch award-winning brand strategies around the idea of responsibility. Benson also worked with P&G to launch Dunkin’ Donuts coffee in the grocery channel, with a campaign that helped sales triple projected forecasts and win the Ad Age Best New Product Launch Award for 2008. Before joining Hill Holliday, at Kirshenbaum Bond & Partners in New York, she led the Citibank AAdvantage Cards, Schieffelin & Somerset, Biore, and several fashion accounts. She also worked at Ogilvy & Mather on Verizon and Seagram’s spirits. Benson serves on the 4As Eastern Region Board of Directors and the 4As New England Council. She earned her BS in Business Administration, majoring in marketing, from Bryant University.

David First is vice president of Learning and Development at Suffolk Construction, a Boston-based construction management company that has been nationally recognized for its education initiatives many times under his leadership. Training Magazine ranked his company 18th across all industries and one of the best in construction management in the country. First's entry into the field of corporate learning came by way of a career in education, teaching mathematics. First also coached basketball in prep school and college. He has presented at multiple conferences and served on various committees and boards. First's areas of expertise include leveraging the subject matter expert model, conversion of subject matter experts to effective instructors, needs assessment, just-in-time team and project performance assessment, college hire programs, acquisition facilitation, and driving change through learning activities.
First holds a bachelor's and master's degree from Union College.

Eugene (“Gene”) I. Lee, Jr. is president of the Specialty Restaurant Group (SRG) for Darden Restaurants and a member of the company’s Executive Team. The SRG currently includes the restaurant brands The Capital Grille, Bahama Breeze, and Seasons 52, and focuses on building and operating restaurant companies that deliver a differentiated, upscale dining experience, and/or are not designed to become nationally advertised brands. Lee joined Darden in 2007 after the company acquired RARE Hospitality International, where he had been President and Chief Operating Officer. Lee had been with RARE since January 1997, serving initially as executive vice president of Operations for its Bugaboo Creek Steak House division. He became executive vice President of operations for RARE’s LongHorn Steakhouse division in October 1997 and was promoted to COO of RARE the following year. He was named president of RARE and elected to its Board of Directors in 2001. Lee's 20-plus years of restaurant operating experience includes two years as senior vice president of Operations for Uno Restaurant Corp. and several management positions with York Steak House Systems.
A native of Massachusetts, Lee has an MBA from Suffolk University in Boston.

Steven McCarthy is senior vice president, Benefit Plan Services at Fidelity Investments. McCarthy lives and works in North Carolina. McCarthy earned his MBA from Suffolk University.

Bonnie Monahan is chief financial officer at Margarita's Management Group which owns, operates and franchises a network of full-service restaurants located throughout New England and New Jersey. She is responsible for all of company's financial management. Prior to Margarita's, she served as vice president and treasurer of Dunkin' Brands Inc., where she led the company's recapitalization and initial public offering. Prior to Dunkin' Brands, Monahan served as vice president of strategic planning and business development at The Timberland Company, vice president of investor relations at Staples and has held senior corporate finance positions with Reader's Digest, PepsiCo and Sears. Monahan started her career in investment banking before entering the corporate sector. Monahan co-founded the Granite State Quest, a cycling fundraiser that benefits Massachusetts General Hospital. The Asian Women in Business recognized Monahan with its 10th annual Corporate Leadership Award, and Monahan was inducted into the New York City's YWCA Academy of Women Achievers in 1998. Monahan is a first-generation American.
She earned an AB in economics from Smith College and an MBA from the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business.

Auro Nair serves as associate general manager of JAX® Mice & Services (JMS), the Jackson Laboratory’s nonprofit genetics resources and services arm. In this role Nair is responsible for leading all product development and customer-facing functions of JMS. Prior to joining The Laboratory, Nair served as vice president, Worldwide Marketing and North American Sales with Caliper Life Sciences, Hopkinton, Massachusetts, where he was responsible for commercialization of Caliper’s products and services. He was with Caliper and its predecessor company, Zymark, since 1997. Previous to that, Nair managed Quality Compliance and Analytical Services at Glaxo’s FDA-approved site in Singapore, where he had been since 1990.
Nair is a graduate in chemistry from the University of Science in Penang, Malaysia, and holds a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Oklahoma. He has an Executive MBA from Suffolk University in Boston.

Ann Rossino is a finance director at Above Water Sensors Programs, Raytheon Company Integrated Defense Systems (IDS). In her previous role as CFO of Global Business Operations, she was responsible for all financial activities, including program financial analysis and controls, earned value management, budgeting and proposal activities for Raytheon Anschuetz in Germany, Raytheon Australia, Sarcos, Solipsys, and RISCO. Previously, Rossino was finance manager for Civil Security and Response Programs (CSRP) encompassing Homeland Defense Programs since November 2006, finance manager for Patriot Ground and Missile Production Programs since February 2005, and finance manager for Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensor System (JLENS), Rapid Aerostat Initial Deployment (RAID) and Affordable Ground Based Radar (AGBR) programs within Integrated Defense Systems.
Since joining Raytheon in 1979, Rossino has acquired a broad set of experiences in business management and finance, including financial planning manager for Ground Combat Systems; manager of Raytheon’s Financial Leadership Development Programs at Global Headquarters; and finance manager for the Electronic Design, Digital Systems, Radar Systems and Electro-Optical Laboratories. Other positions include finance manager-Technology Proposals, and manager-Overhead and Profit Forecasting. Rossino is currently a member of the Women Unlimited Forum for Executive Women (FEW) and an active mentor and coach for finance employees identified as high potential both within and outside Raytheon.
She earned a bachelor’s degree in finance from the University of Massachusetts and completed Raytheon’s Middle Management Program. She is a qualified Raytheon Six Sigma Specialist.

Katherine “Kit” Williams is the founder and president of Compass Consulting. Williams specializes in executive development, focusing on career consulting, coaching, and global learning and leadership development design and implementation. She is currently consulting with numerous corporate clients, including Genzyme and Dover and moderates executive education programs for Harvard Business School. For the past five years, Williams created and led the Genzyme Leadership Institute, which encompassed all management and leadership programs, as well as internal and external coaching around the world. She also led the consulting for Genzyme’s high growth areas and emerging markets including Asia Pacific and Latin America. Prior to joining Genzyme, Kit founded two firms which concentrated on leadership and career development; both were successfully sold to publicly-traded companies. Kit has also had extensive experience as a strategy and development consultant and coach, and is known for her expertise in start-ups and turnarounds. Clients have included chief executives and their teams, at Merck, Genzyme, Raytheon, Hewlett Packard, Agilent, Dassault Systemes and JP Morgan. Kit began her career as an investment banker with line management responsibility for project finance in commercial and investment divisions at Citibank and First Pennsylvania, now Wells Fargo. She currently serves on the Board of the Redwood Athenaeum, America’s oldest library, and is Junior Warden of Old North Church in Boston.
Williams has an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and an undergraduate degree from Rosemont College.