board of advisors

CO-FOUNDER, SERENA & LILY

Lily Kanter is a serial entrepreneur with extensive experience in the home design industry. She has founded and led four very successful companies as a co-founder and CEO in the past 20 years; including Serena & Lily, Averylily, Boon Supply, and Mill Valley Baby & Kids Home .

Lily spent the early part of her career in accounting and technology leadership. While at Microsoft she was awarded the Frontier award from Bill Gates for innovating their first Retail presence in San Francisco. She left Microsoft in late 2000 to start a family and focus her time and energy on philanthropic causes. She was featured on the cover of Time Magazine in July 2000 as part of the cover story “The New Philanthropists” for sponsoring and mentoring disadvantaged young adults into technology careers.

After having her first child, Lily decided to leave the corporate world and open Mill Valley Baby & Kids Home which ultimately led to the founding of Serena & Lily. She co-founded and led Serena & Lily as the CEO for thirteen years.

Lily also has a deep passion for supporting local communities and launched Boon Supply in Spring 2018. Combined with the company she acquired, Boon Supply has given back $103 million to schools and non-profits enabled by a 40% giveback on every product sold.

Lily and her husband split their time in Waimea on the Big Island of Hawaii and Mill Valley, California and they have three young adult sons. Lily’s other passions include reading, tennis, and travelling globally in search of uncommonly good artisans.

PROFESSOR, HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL

Lynda M. Applegate is the Baker Foundation Professor at HBS and also serves as the Chair of the Advisory Committee for Harvard University’s Masters’ of Liberal Arts in Extension Studies degrees in finance and management. Lynda also continues to play a leading role in developing the HBS Executive Education Programs for entrepreneurs and business owners. In addition to serving as the head of the Entrepreneurial Management Unit, Lynda has held a variety of leadership positions at HBS, including serving as the Co-Chair of the MBA program, Chair of Field Based Learning and as a founding member of the HBS Technology Board. She has also held a number of Harvard University leadership positions, including serving as the Co-Chair of the Harvard Policy Group on Networked Government Services and on the Harvard University Provost’s Technology Advisory Board. Prior to joining the HBS faculty, Lynda was on the faculty of the University of Michigan, University of Washington and University of Arizona. In addition to her academic positions, Lynda also held a variety of leadership positions in the health care industry.

CEO, HALYCON

Kate Goodall is the Co-Founder and CEO of Halcyon, a non-profit dedicated to solving 21st century problems by providing space and access to emerging leaders in social entrepreneurship and the arts. Goodall continues to grow Halcyon’s offerings with By The People, an international arts and innovation festival in partnership with the Smithsonian and numerous organizations throughout DC. In 2016, Goodall helped establish WE Capital, a consortium of leading businesswomen investing in and supporting women and women-led companies. Goodall has served as juror at national and international social entrepreneurship competitions, like the Creator Awards, and MIT Tech Review Innovator Europe & Latin America. She was listed as one of the Washington Business Journal’s Power 100, 40 Under 40, and Washington's New Guard in 2018, Washingtonian’s 2017 Tech Titans, and Techweek 100 DC’s Talent Cultivators. She has two sons who keep her on her toes.

JOURNALIST

Lesli Foster is an award-winning journalist and mainstay of Washington news as a weeknight anchor for WUSA9 evening broadcasts Monday through Friday. She is also part of the WUSA9's Special Assignment Unit – leading our “Impact” coverage that aims to tackle community issues. Lesli joined the station in 2001 and has covered the major events of our times across the area.

Known for her warmth, and ability to share impactful stories that have an effect on our wider community, she thrives on work that touches everyday living. While her work has allowed her to interview many local, national and international luminaries, she most enjoys talking with ordinary people who use their lives to do extraordinary things.

Her career work has been recognized with Emmy, Edward R. Murrow and Associated Press Awards. Lesli received an Emmy Award for Best News Anchor in the Washington, DC market in 2012, and has been nominated for Best Anchor for three consecutive years since 2010. Lesli also earned two more Emmys for reporting on a series on the 40th Anniversary for the March on Washington, and Jeep Gas Tank Fires. All totaled, she has been nominated for nine Emmy Awards. Lesli also received two Edward R. Murrow Awards for stories on the case that helped to coin the term "car jacking" about the case of Dr. Pamela Basu, and Stray Voltage: A Silent Danger. She also won three Associated Press Awards for a series on Jeep Gas Tank Fires, a series on HIV/AIDS and the "Down Low," and the social impact of Olympic Gymnast Gabby Douglas.

She was a featured journalist in the book, Women Journalists at Ground Zero, by Judith Sylvester and Suzanne Huffman, which documents the personal experiences of 24 women journalists who covered September 11th.

Prior to joining WUSA9, Lesli reported for WBAL-TV in Baltimore, where Baltimore's City Paper named her Best TV News Personality. Her career began in her native Michigan, where she was a weekend anchor and reporter for WEYI-TV, an NBC affiliate outside of Flint, Michigan.

CO-FOUNDERS, SURPRISE RIDE

Surprise Ride was founded by sisters Donna & Rosy Khalife. They had grown up in a very creative home. They were fortunate to have a dad who was an artist and facilitated DIY activities for them to do. Having experienced tremendous economic hardship during their childhood, they never had the latest toys or gadgets. They had to find ways to entertain themselves through hands-on projects and experiments. Kids today are growing up differently and spending hours on end in front of screens. They wanted to help busy parents give their kids offline hands-on activities. Surprise Ride was born from this passion for DIY fun and exploration!

In hopes of delivering a monthly dose of play for their customers, Fat Brain Toys acquired Surprise Ride in 2018. The new mission is the same as the old mission: Foster creativity in kids and expand their horizons. Surprise Ride can solve the daily struggle parents face to get their kids off the screens and doing hands-on activities.

AUTHOR, THE CONFIDENCE CODE

Claire Shipman is a journalist, author, and public speaker. She’s the author, along with Katty Kay, of two New York Times bestsellers, Womenomics: Work Less, Achieve More, Live Better and The Confidence Code: The Science and Art of Self-Assurance—What Women Should Know. Before turning to writing, Claire spent almost three decades as an award-winning television journalist. For the last fourteen years, Claire was a regular contributor to Good Morning America and other national broadcasts for ABC News. Before that, she served as White House correspondent for NBC News, where she regularly reported on presidential policy and politics for NBC Nightly News and Today. Prior to that, she worked for CNN for a decade, covering the White House, and she was also posted in Moscow for five years, reporting on the fall of the Soviet Union. Claire’s coverage from Moscow helped CNN earn a National Headliners Award and a coveted Peabody Award. She received a DuPont Award and an Emmy Award for coverage of the 1989 Tiananmen Square student uprising, as well as a DuPont Award for CNN’s coverage of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. She graduated from Columbia College and later earned a master’s degree from the School of International Affairs there. She’s now a member of Columbia’s board of trustees. She lives in Washington, DC, with her husband and their two children and three dogs.