WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 12:30PM
Jennifer Blei Stockman
Jennifer Blei Stockman has spent the past 25 years in the non-profit world. Prior to that, she was a business executive and entrepreneur. Since 2005, she has been President of the Guggenheim museums in New York, Bilbao, Venice and soon-to-be Abu Dhabi. She was a founding member of the Museum’s Photography Committee and has chaired the annual gala for a decade. Stockman has been a passionate collector of contemporary art since 1990 and has served on committees at MoMA, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Aspen Art Museum and created the Bruce Museum Council in Greenwich, Conn. For 10 years, Stockman chaired the Republican Majority for Choice (RMC), which defends women’s rights, and is now its Chair Emeritus. She is a former board member of the WISH List (Women in the Senate and House), SUNY Purchase Performing Arts Center, Greenwich Country Day School, Conyers Farm Association and the YWCA, where she founded the Leadership Council and received the Heart of Greenwich award. Stockman began her business career at IBM as a systems engineer and in marketing while getting her MBA in Finance at George Washington University. After rising through management ranks at IBM, she left to become vice president of Sears World Trade. She spun her division off to form Stockman & Associates Inc. (SAI), where she served as CEO until it was sold to US West. SAI was an international business advisory firm specializing in technology with offices in five countries. Stockman has two daughters, of whom she is exceedingly proud.
David Stockman
David Stockman has spent over 40 years in the political and business worlds. He began his career in Washington and quickly rose through the ranks of the Republican Party to become the Director of the Office of Management and Budget under President Reagan. Stockman’s career in politics began in 1970, when he served as a special assistant to U.S. Representative John Anderson of Illinois. From 1972 to 1975, he was executive director of the U.S. House of Representatives Republican Conference. Stockman was elected for three terms as a Michigan Congressman in 1976 and was then asked to join President Reagan’s cabinet as Director of OMB, serving until August 1985. He was the youngest cabinet member in the 20th century. After resigning from his position as Director of the OMB, Stockman wrote a best-selling book, The Triumph of Politics: Why the Reagan Revolution Failed. After leaving the White House, Stockman had a long career on Wall Street. He first joined Solomon Bros and later became one of the original partners at private equity firm, The Blackstone Group. In 1999, Stockman founded his own private equity fund based in Greenwich, Conn. Stockman’s latest book, The Great Deformation: The Corruption of Capitalism in America, is a New York Times bestseller. His current non-partisan blog, www.davidstockmanscontracorner.com has attracted over 50,000 followers and reveals contrarian truths about the economy and foreign policy. Stockman was born in Ft. Hood, Texas. He received his B.A. from Michigan State University and pursued graduate studies at Harvard Divinity School. He and his wife, Jennifer, have two incredible daughters, Victoria Stockman and Rachel Stockman Koven, about whom he loves to opine.
Walter Isaacson
Walter Isaacson is President and CEO of the Aspen Institute, a nonpartisan educational and policy studies organization based in Washington, D.C. He has been chairman and CEO of CNN and editor of TIME magazine. Isaacson’s most recent book is The Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital Revolution (2014). He is also the author of Steve Jobs and several other best-selling biographies. Isaacson is a graduate of Harvard College and of Pembroke College of Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar. He is vice-chair of Partners for a New Beginning, a public-private group tasked with forging ties between the U.S. and Muslim world. He formerly served as chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors. He is chair emeritus of Teach for America and serves on the board of United Airlines, Tulane University, and the Overseers of Harvard University. From 2005-2007, he was vice-chair of the Louisiana Recovery Authority.
