A swindle helped place Edelman on his career path. He and his wife, Jean, sought financial advice — only to discover that their adviser had been scamming them. As a result, committed to helping others avoid similar situations, the couple founded Edelman Financial Services in 1986. In 2018, it merged with a West Coast firm to form Edelman Financial Engines.
Along the way, Edelman became a New York Times bestselling author and national radio host, as well as a Barron’s Hall of Fame inductee. In 2021, he ended his weekly radio show after 30 years, but Edelman now hosts daily podcast “The Truth About Your Future” and founded the Digital Assets Council of Financial Professionals, which offers courses on cryptocurrency.
He is an Alzheimer’s Drug Discovery Foundation board member and has made significant donations to Rowan University, his alma mater.
FIRST JOB: I started a window-washing business at age 17.
MOST RECENT BOOK READ: “In the Hurricane’s Eye: The Genius of George Washington and the Victory at Yorktown,” by Nathaniel Philbrick
SOMETHING I’D NEVER DO AGAIN: Watch “Howard the Duck”
Assuming her current role in 2021, Wakefield served as interim president and CEO twice for the Greater Richmond Partnership, a regional economic development organization for Richmond and the counties of Chesterfield, Hanover and Henrico. She has also been the partnership’s chief operating officer and senior vice president of marketing. Previously, she served as Orlando Economic Development Commission’s (now Orlando Economic Partnership) marketing and communications vice president for 11 years, and she earned her master’s and bachelor’s degrees at the University of Central Florida and the University of West Florida.
The partnership works closely with the Virginia EconomicDevelopment Partnership and local economic development officials to attract business investment in the state’s capital region. Among GRP’s recent triumphs is the Lego Group’s groundbreaking this year on its $1 billion manufacturing plant in Chesterfield County. Since January 2022, GRP has helped secure 12 projects that are expected to invest $1.48 billion in the region.
Wakefield is an International Economic Development Council board member and is active on several regional boards, including the University of Richmond Robins School of Business’ Executive Advisory Council.
WHAT MAKES ME HAPPIEST: Watching teen movies with my kid
Alger, who joined JMU in 2012, has led the public university to new heights. In the past two years, the university received R2 research classification from the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education, joined the Sun Belt Conference and the FBS level in NCAA Division I football, and saw the graduation of the first cohort from the Valley Scholars Program, which provides scholarships for first-generation students from the Shenandoah Valley. Alger also led JMU’s $251 million fundraising campaign that concluded last year.
Alger, who has a bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore College and a law degree from Harvard, previously served as senior vice president and general counsel at Rutgers University, and before that, as assistant general counsel at the University of Michigan. He is chair-elect of the Council of Presidents for the Association of Governing Boards of Universities and Colleges and serves on the national board of directors for the American Association of Colleges and Universities.
IF I HAD A TIME MACHINE, I’D MEET:James Madison — I’d love to hear his thoughts on the progress and state of our democracy.
With oversight of the entire Port of Virginia system, Edwards is responsible for its marine terminal facilities in Hampton Roads as well as the Virginia Inland Port in Front Royal.
Formerly CEO of TraPac, Global Container Terminals and Ports America, Edwards joined the port authority during the pandemic in January 2021, a challenging time for the maritime industry, which experienced widespread labor shortages and supply chain snarls amid a worldwide increase in demand for consumer products from overseas. However, the Port of Virginia fared well, processing record amounts of cargo.
In 2022, the port processed more than 3.7 million 20-foot-equivalent units at its terminals, and cargo tonnage was up 11% from 2021. For fiscal 2022, the port generated $124.1 billion in output sales, $41.4 billion in Virginia labor income and $5.8 billion in state and local taxes and fees.
This year, Edwards says the port will invest $1.4 billion to expand overall capacity and cargo handling capabilities. The General Assembly is also studying the possibility of adding a Southwest Virginia inland port.
A graduate of England’s Aston University, Edwards also serves on the Virginia Economic Development Partnership board.
Lingo became dean of Regent University‘s law school in June, after former North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Martin left to become founding dean of the High Point University School of Law. Lingo has guided Regent Law toward records for enrollment, median LSAT and U.S. News & World Report rankings. In the publisher’s 2023 to 2024 Best Law Schools rankings, Regent ranked No. 125, rising 17 places from the prior year.
Before becoming dean, Lingo co-founded Regent University’s Robertson Center for Constitutional Law. He also served as the school’s associate dean for academic affairs. In 2020, Regent University presented him with the Faculty Excellence Award, and in 2022, Regent’s student bar association named him professor of the year.
Prior to joining Regent, Lingo was a partner in King & Spalding’s Trial and Global Disputes practice group, where he represented three of the Big Four accounting firms.
Lingo graduated first in his class and summa cum laude from Grove City College and earned his law degree with honors from Harvard Law School.
HOW I UNWIND FROM WORK:Walking our dog, Scout, with my wife
A Richmond native, Freeman has been Universal’s CEO since 2008 and president since 2006. From 2001 to 2005, he was the corporation’s general counsel and secretary, and he worked at law firm Hunton Andrews Kurth (then Hunton & Williams) in the early to mid-1990s.
The world’s largest supplier of tobacco leaf, Universal Corp. posted fiscal 2023 net income of $124.1 million, up 43% from 2022. While results for the company’s plant-based ingredients operation were flat, Freeman said in March that he expected the soft margins would be temporary. Freeman also announced Universal would pay an annual common dividend of $3.20, marking the 53rd year in a row the company has increased its dividend payments.
Universal has three divisions: Universal Leaf, which purchases and processes tobacco for sale to tobacco products manufacturers; Universal Ingredients, which produces vegetable and fruit ingredients, flavorings and extracts; and Universal Enterprises, a value-added agricultural business.
The University of Virginia and Yale Law graduate also serves on the boards of Richmond-based Tredegar and the Mutual Assurance Society of Virginia. An avid goose and duck hunter, he is vice chair of the Delta Waterfowl Foundation’s board.
DuVal, who has led the Virginia Chamber since 2010, oversaw the launch this summer of the chamber’s WiseChoice Healthcare Alliance, a multiple employer welfare association to offer health care plans for small businesses. Made possible through new state legislation, WiseChoice was the first such self-funded health insurance consortium in Virginia.
A longtime advocate for Virginia’s businesses, DuVal served as Virginia’s secretary of commerce and trade from 1998 through 2002, a period when Virginia attracted 1,500 economic development projects with a combined $13.7 billion in investments. He also has served as mayor of Newport News, president and CEO of real estate firm DuVal Associates, and president and CEO of Kaufman & Canoles Consulting.
A graduate of James Madison University and American University’s Washington College of Law, DuVal led the creation of the chamber’s Blueprint Virginia, an economic development strategic plan intended to help guide elected officials’ decision-making for the next decade. DuVal and the chamber have also been active in advocating for a relocated FBI headquarters to be built in Virginia; the state is competing with Maryland for the agency’s new headquarters.
Hallock, who joined UR as its president in 2021, launched a new strategic plan for the private university this year that includes more faculty, increased and simplified financial aid and greater community involvement.
In March, UR announced a $25 million gift — the second largest in the university’s history — from alumni and longtime donors Carole and Marcus Weinstein to fund a center focused on student learning at the school’s library. A $625,000 grant from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute received in 2022 supports a six-year program to discover and address barriers that prevent students’ sense of belonging at the university.
As UR’s new president, Hallock dealt quickly with simmering controversy over two buildings named for people who were enslavers and/or supported racial segregation, including the university’s founding president. UR’s board voted to rename those buildings and four others last year.
Prior to his time at UR, Hallock spent 16 years at Cornell University, where he served as dean of the business college. A labor market economist with a Ph.D. from Princeton, he has authored or edited 11 books and more than 100 publications and is a co-founder of PayStandards, a software-as-a-service company.
Huseman is one of the most prominent representatives of Amazon.com in Arlington, where the e-tailer held a grand opening for the first buildings on its HQ2 East Coast headquarters campus in June.
A former U.S. Department of Justice attorney and associate general counsel for the Federal Trade Commission, Huseman leads Amazon‘s federal lobbying work and its community engagement efforts in the Western Hemisphere, including a project to make ocean shipping environmentally cleaner. In Virginia, Amazon has more than 36,000 employees, and HQ2’s Metropolitan Park will have about 8,000 workers moved in by the end of 2023.
A graduate of the University of Oklahoma College of Law and the University of Nebraska, Huseman serves on numerous professional and community boards, including the Information Technology Industry Council, Signature Theatre and the Mountain Gorilla Veterinary Project, for which he is board president. He also was part of the Blueprint Virginia 2030 Steering Committee, which created the Virginia Chamber of Commerce’s economic development plan for the state.
FIRST JOB: Working for Walmart in my Oklahoma hometown. It’s where I learned the importance of a customer service mindset.
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