2026 Annual Summit: The Adaptability Advantage: AI, Culture, and the Future of Work

Subha V. Barry is a C-suite leader and an advisor who brings a unique perspective on the alignment of corporate culture to talent strategy and business results. As a transformational change agent, she has a proven record of identifying and accelerating new business creation, driving sales, and increasing profitability.

Subha is president of Seramount where she drives the firm’s vision, strategy, and business development. Subha joined Working Mother Media (WMM) in 2015 and during her tenure she dramatically improved margins, expanded its portfolio through growth in high-value consulting and learning and development, exponentially grew their client roster, and recruited talented executive leaders to amplify subject matter and functional expertise. In 2021, Subha oversaw the brand’s transformation from WMM to Seramount, a leading strategic professional services and research firm dedicated to building high-performing, inclusive workplaces. Today, Seramount works with 450+ organizations globally, including half of the Fortune 500, to help our partners navigate today’s talent and DEI landscape.

Previously, Subha was senior vice president and chief diversity officer at Freddie Mac, where she served on the firm’s management committee and led their foundation. Prior to her time at Freddie Mac, Subha spent 20+ years at Merrill Lynch as managing director and their first global head of diversity & inclusion where she built their D&I strategy, infrastructure and execution plans from the ground up. She also created a highly successful Multicultural Business Development Group to focus their wealth management business on diverse and multicultural communities bringing in over $8 billion in new assets and $50+ million in annual revenues in just three years. She began her career at the firm as a financial advisor where she was a top 100 advisor among 16,000 in the firm.

Subha is a former adjunct professor at Columbia University’s SIPA, and currently serves on the Boards of SHRM Foundation, Rice 360, Rutgers Cancer Center and the Rutgers Institute of Women’s Leadership. She is also a Board Advisor at PE-owned Snowden Lane Partners. In the past, Subha has served on a variety of Boards as Board Chair, Head of Nominating & Governance, Finance, and HR and DEI Committees.
A native of India, Subha holds a BA from Bombay University and an MBA and MS in Accounting from Rice University. She enjoys golfing, reading poetry and rallying for social change. She has two grown children and lives in Naples, Florida and New Hope, PA with her husband.

Diana Forster is a Senior Director of Research at Seramount. She is a survey researcher, statistician, and writer with experience delivering actionable research to government, corporate, and academic clients.

Diana directs content development for Seramount’s Federal Policy, Strategy, and Crisis Communication Resource Center and has also led major research projects on Gen Z, attitudes towards DEI, mental health and well-being, and AI. She joined Seramount in 2022 as an Associate Director on the Consulting team.

Previously, Diana was a researcher with the American Institutes for Research (AIR). There, she worked with the Department of Education on projects related to K-12 education. Diana was also a founder and vice-chair of Women in Support of Equity (WISE), AIR’s first employee resource group for women.

Prior to her time at AIR, Diana worked for eight years with the Center for Talent Innovation (now Coqual).

Diana holds a BA in political science and history from the College of Charleston, an MA in political science from the University of Arizona, a PhD in political science from the University of Florida, and an MBA from Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business. She lives in Bethesda, Maryland, where she enjoys reading and writing fiction, riding her Peloton, going to the movies, and volunteering as a dramaturg with local theatres.

Ripa Rashid (she/her) is the Managing Director of Seramount’s Chief Diversity Officer Collaborative and a member of Seramount’s leadership team.  In this role, she oversees the CDOC research agenda, driving innovation, and collaborates with Seramount’s partners to foster inclusive cultures and systems where all talent can thrive and business outcomes are maximized. Ripa is a senior executive with over 20 years of experience in diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and has held C-suite roles across talent, DEI, and culture, with deep expertise in the media and financial services sectors. Most recently, she served as Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer (CDIO) at Consumer Reports and previously held leadership roles at Cowen (a Wall Street investment bank acquired by TD Bank), Time Warner, and MetLife.

In 2018, Ripa co-founded and co-led Seramount’s consulting division, advising Fortune 500 companies and professional services firms on innovative DEI practices to shape inclusive, high-performing cultures. Earlier, she served as Co-President of the Center for Talent Innovation (CTI, now CoQual), a renowned think tank in the DEI space, and founded Hewlett Consulting Partners, CTI’s advisory arm. Her early career includes global consulting roles at Booz & Company (now Strategy&), PwC, and Mitchell Madison Group, where she advised financial services and media clients on strategic growth, risk management, and operational excellence.

Ripa is an adjunct professor of management at NYU Stern School of Business, where she teaches an MBA course on inclusive leadership. She is the author of three books on DEI: Winning the War for Talent in Emerging Markets: Why Women are the Solution (Harvard Business Review, 2011), Growing Global Executives (Rarebird, 2015), and Disrupt Bias, Drive Value (Rarebird, 2017). Her thought leadership also extends to over two dozen articles and insights papers featured in publications like Harvard Business Review and Strategy & Business.

A sought-after speaker and panelist, Ripa has addressed audiences at the UN, OECD, International Women’s Forum, Diversity Woman, ADCOLOR, ASCEND, and the National Diversity Council, among others. She has been invited by companies such as Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, Aetna, Infosys, and Standard Chartered Bank to share her expertise on DEI.

Ripa holds an AB cum laude in Astronomy and Astrophysics from Harvard University, an MA in Cultural Anthropology from NYU, and an MBA in Finance and Management from INSEAD. She has been named one of the “Outstanding 50 Asian Americans in Business” by the Asian American Business Development Council Ripa is an active member of the Harvard and INSEAD alumni communities, the INSEAD Global Women in Business Club, and the South Asian Executive Women’s Network. She serves on the Board of One To World, a nonprofit dedicated to global education, and advises Monumental Me, a professional development platform. Ripa has lived and worked in over a dozen countries and currently resides in New York City with her husband and their two sons.

Laura Sherbin, PhD is Managing Director of Research, Assessment and Strategy at Seramount. She is an economist who specializes in the creation of advantage through inclusion and diversity. Most recently, Laura was co-president at the Center for Talent Innovation (CTI) in New York City, a premier think tank and content provider that studies global workplace diversity.

Laura has co-authored several Harvard Business Review articles, including “How Diversity Can Drive Innovation,” “How Gen Y and Boomers Will Reshape Your Agenda,” and “Off-Ramps and On-Ramps Revisited,” as well as the Harvard Business Review research report titled “The Athena Factor: Reversing the Brain Drain in Science, Engineering, and Technology.” She has also taught a Women and Globalization course at the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University.

Laura built the rigorous data analytics machine and team that have been core to innovative approaches to measuring and tracking employee experiences. She is known as a leading expert in applying diversity and inclusion data to human behavior in organizations and using such data to quantify how workforce sentiments and satisfaction affect company bottom lines.

Laura holds a BS in math and economics from the University of Delaware and earned her PhD in economics from American University. She currently resides in Irvington, New York, with her husband, their four children, and their dog, Gus. Laura has always loved math and numbers, but when not working, she also enjoys baking, traveling, and meditating.

Nichelle Wash is a Director on the Advisory team at Seramount. She is a results-focused DEI leader who specializes in supporting key areas of DEI strategy. She has been the chair of DEI councils and quasi-government boards, building support for the senior leadership team to integrate DEI throughout their lines of business. This work resulted in culture and change management for employees across the enterprise that was focused on sustainability and scale. She has also overseen diversity recruitment and outreach efforts for organizations, providing real solutions to attract and retain employees with a focus on diverse hiring strategies. Nichelle is a sought-after facilitator who has delivered workshops around DEI for over a decade. She was recently recognized as Woman of the Year for her role in designing and delivering DEI education; hosting a precollege camp to increase the number of girls interested in coding and entrepreneurship; and she sourced projects to address homelessness and support pathways to housing security across her home state of Indiana.

Nichelle is an alumna of Indiana University Bloomington, where she started her career in health care and biomedical research before pivoting to a career in higher education. In her self-healing time, Nichelle enjoys listening to audiobooks, playing basketball, dancing to live music, and traveling.