Speaker Biographies

Mahfuz Ahmed
Chief executive officer and principal founder, Digital Intelligence Systems LLC

Ahmed is the CEO and principal founder of Digital Intelligence Systems LLC (DISYS), a global IT consulting services company. As CEO and current chairman of the board of directors, his primary role focuses on continuous strategic planning, securing strategic opportunities for his company, financial management, operations, and overseeing a growing portfolio of DISYS services. Ahmed possesses more than 25 years of applicable information technology and leadership experience. Ahmed prides himself on leveraging a process automation approach, his project management expertise, industry insights and innovative technical skills in order to provide services that accelerate project completion and drive client cost savings. Recognition of Mahfuz’s leadership includes the Washington Business Journal’s 40 under 40; E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year of the Greater Washington, DC, Region; member of the Young Presidents’ Organization; a governor’s appointment to the George Mason University Board of Visitors; a distinguished alumni award from GMU’s School of Engineering; features in multiple publications including the Washington Post and Wall Street Journal; Entrepreneur of the Year honor from the Capital Region Minority Supplier Development Council; and inclusion in Staffing Industry Analysts’ 100 Most Influential People in the Staffing Industry list.

Thomas Bailey
Managing director, Houlihan Lokey

Bailey is a member of Houlihan Lokey’s business services group. He specializes in advising clients in the human capital management, information technology, and professional services industries on sell-side and buy-side mergers and acquisitions, debt and equity financings, and strategic alternatives assessments; he also leads the practice group for Houlihan Lokey. Prior to joining Houlihan Lokey, Bailey was a director at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey in the technology and services mergers and acquisitions group. Before that, he was with middle-market investment bank Childs Advisory Partners, where he focused on mergers and acquisitions for small- to middle-market IT and professional services companies.

Bert Bean
Chief executive officer, Insight Global

As CEO of Insight Global, Bean leads a team of more than 4,000 employees across 66 offices in the U.S. and Canada, employing more than 30,000 consultants and serving more than 3,000 customers. He is a 17-year veteran of the staffing industry and began his career at Insight Global as a recruiter. Since being named CEO in 2018, his relentless focus on growing people personally, professionally, and financially has led to strong success, with company revenue nearly doubling. Through his leadership, Insight Global’s business has expanded to include the creation of Insight Global Health and Compass, which aids clients in company cultural transformation, leadership development, and talent management strategy. He also transformed Insight Global’s vision and accelerated its commitment to social equity. With this commitment, Insight Global hired its first director of diversity, equity, and inclusion to create a division that solely focuses on the implementation of diverse practices for employees and clients. In 2022, Bean spearheaded ensuring access to free counseling services for all offices and employees. Insight Global is an industry-leading talent solutions company and has been named a “Best Place to Work for Women” by Fortune for four years running.

Joanie Bily
President, RemX division of EmployBridge Holding Co.

Bily is president of the RemX division of EmployBridge Holding Co. She is responsible for the division’s growth strategy, including sales, marketing, operations, recruiting, and employee development. As an employment industry expert, she is often called upon to discuss the job market, careers, and workplace trends and speaks to the talent supply and demand cycles that impact U.S. employers. She is frequently featured as a keynote speaker at industry conferences, and her commentary on the employment market has been featured on several media outlets.

Brian Delle Donne
President and chief operating officer, Talent Tech Labs

Delle Donne has been a leading force in driving innovation throughout his career, having served in president and chief operating officer roles at both public and privately held engineering project companies and staffing firms. He started his career in the power generation sector and moved to the environmental engineering field before coming to the staffing industry. Throughout this span he has amassed a wealth of insight into effectively applying innovation. Talent Tech Labs is entirely focused on analyzing technological developments in the field of talent technology. The company helps buyers and users of talent technology solutions gain a better understanding of the complex market and provides them the strategic direction to transform their business through the intelligent use of technology.

Susan Dietrich
Principal owner, TOPS Staffing LLC, AllTek Staffing and Resource Group Inc., e-Staff Consulting Group, AccountStaff Inc., Sterling Office Professionals, and TVS Inc.

Dietrich is a principal owner of TOPS Staffing LLC, AllTek Staffing and Resource Group Inc., e-Staff Consulting Group, AccountStaff Inc., Sterling Office Professionals, and TVS Inc. She began the western chapter of the Pennsylvania Staffing Association, an ASA-affiliated chapter, and served as its president for three years. Dietrich also has served on the ASA chapter leadership council and the chapter past presidents committee.

Jennifer Lee
Senior economist and managing director, BMO Capital Markets Economics

Lee has been with BMO Capital Markets Economics for over two decades and is perhaps best known for her analysis on the U.S. economy, as well as her commentary analyzing financial market and economic activity in Europe and Japan. Her entertaining, easy-to-understand and call-it-like-it-is writing style has earned her a devoted following. She is also one of the primary authors of the department’s hugely popular “A.M. Notes,” providing analysis of major global economic and political events. She is also co-author of “Rates Scenario,” covering currencies and markets outside the U.S. and Canada. Lee is also a regular in the media and is a frequent guest on Bloomberg.

Katrina Leslie
Founder and chairman, Swipejobs Inc.

Leslie is the founder and chairman of Swipejobs Inc., one of the leading W-2 digital staffing platforms in the U.S. Swipejobs’ platform operates in all 50 states and has more than 1.2 million temporary employees and 155,000 customer users. Swipejobs also operates a nationwide staffing firm primarily focused on the light industrial sector. Since its founding in 2014, Swipejobs has grown organically and through acquisitions, with the strategy of converting temporary employees and customers of traditional staffing firms to its digital platform. Before Swipejobs, Leslie founded, built, and sold three other companies focused on staffing, technology, and data.

Stephanie Marken
Partner, Gallup

Marken previously served as chief methodologist at Gallup, where she was responsible for sample design, data collection approach, and methodology for Gallup’s public release studies in education and workforce development areas. In this role, she was the sample and design architect for Gallup’s largest education studies, including the Gallup Alumni Survey, formerly the Gallup-Purdue Index, and the Strada-Gallup Education Consumer Survey. Marken also was responsible for individual university projects surveying currently enrolled students and alumni and conducted complex program evaluations. To date, Marken has worked with more than 100 colleges and universities, designing complex research projects to address their unique research questions and measure the long- and short-term outcomes of a college degree.

Daniel Masata
Founder and chief executive officer, Volonte

Masata started Volonte in 2020 with the mission to turn workplace and career change into proactive, positive, and empowering experiences for employees and organizations that engage with the workplace agility platform. Prior to launching Volonte and boutique human cloud advisory firm Skill Principals, he was a senior executive at global human resource services leader Adecco Group for 15 years, where he most recently led the company’s worldwide strategy and digital transformation.

Sara Moss
Vice president, technology advisory, Newbury Partners

Moss helps staffing companies develop tech strategies that deliver strategic business outcomes. As head of Newbury Partners’ technology advisory team, and throughout her 20-year staffing career, Moss has supported a long list of leading staffing companies as they achieved their goals.

Art Papas
Founder and chief executive officer, Bullhorn Inc.C

Papas is the founder and CEO of ASA corporate partner Bullhorn Inc., a global leader in software for the staffing andwor recruitment industry. He was the original architect of Bullhorn’s flagship customer relationship management (CRM) system, which now helps more than 10,000 companies around the world run their businesses. In 2014, Ernst & Young named Papas an EY Entrepreneur of the Year Award winner in New England. Prior to starting Bullhorn, Papas started his career as a software engineer at Thomson Reuters. He is a graduate of Tufts University, holding a bachelor of science degree in mathematics. He currently serves on the Tufts computer science external advisory board.

Paul Pincus
Partner, Ortoli Rosenstadt LLP

Pincus is a partner at the New York law firm of Ortoli Rosenstadt LLP and head of the firm’s private company mergers and acquisitions, and staffing, practices. He is one of the leading M&A attorneys in the U.S. for the staffing industry, having completed more than 85 deals in the staffing industry during the past 35 years ranging in size from under $20 million to more than $200 million in enterprise value. He has represented domestic and international staffing firms in purchases, sales, recapitalizations, and management buyouts, and in transactions with strategic buyers as well as private equity firms. Pincus has written and lectured extensively on M&A topics for the staffing industry.

Matt Rupprecht
Director, PMCF

Rupprecht is a director of PMCF and co-leads the firm’s business services and technology team. He has more than 15 years of experience advising clients with their buy-side and sell-side mergers, acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, and the placement of senior and subordinated debt. In addition, he has extensive experience across multiple segments, including human capital management, advertising, background screening, facilities management services, managed services, staffing, and business process outsourcing. Prior to joining PMCF as an analyst, Rupprecht worked as a consultant at UHY Advisors, a middle-market focused accounting firm, providing litigation consulting and valuation services. Additionally, he has written for numerous human capital management M&A industry publications, sharing his insight into various investment banking topics within the sector.

Bret Schoch
Managing director, Baird

Schoch manages the human capital management practice within the technology and services group covered by Baird. Since joining Baird in 1992, he has been active in a variety of private and public financing and buy-side and sell-side strategic financial advisory assignments, primarily for clients in services-related industries. He has worked with clients across the talent acquisition, talent management, and workforce management sectors building decades long relationships with strategic players and private equity investors.

Jeff Silber
Managing director and senior analyst, BMO Capital Markets

Silber is a senior analyst in BMO Capital Markets’ equity research group, covering the business services and education sectors, including the staffing and information services industries. He is well-known for his deep dives into various industry topics, including his annual overview of the education industry. He was the long-time host and moderator of BMO’s annual Back to School Education Conference, which was considered a premier investor event for the industry. His research has been recognized widely, including on the Refinitiv (formerly Thomson Reuters)/StarMine top analysts list, Institutional Investor’s All-American Research team, the Wall Street Journal’s “Best on the Street” Analysts Survey, the Reuters survey of small- and mid-cap fund managers, and the Zacks.com All-Star Analyst team. Before the StarMine Analyst Awards were discontinued in 2020, Silber won this award for 10 straight years (2011–20), including being named the No. 1 stock picker in the diversified consumer services sector for three years in a row (2017–19).

Tobey Sommer
Managing director, Truist Securities

Sommer is a managing director in Truist Securities’ research division with 22 years of experience covering the services sector as an equity research analyst. His current coverage focuses on the commercial and government services sectors, including human capital management, consulting, business services, education, insurance distribution, and federal information technology contractors. He has been recognized by Thomson Reuters, the Wall Street Journal, and TipRanks for earnings accuracy and stock picking.

Jim Tiller
Global chief information security officer, Harvey Nash and Nash Squared

As an internationally recognized cybersecurity authority on cyberrisk management, security technology, and industry leadership, and with multiple patents for innovation in security solutions, Tiller brings to a broad collection of unique capabilities and experience to drive business enabling cybersecurity strategy, architecture, and services for Harvey Nash and its clients globally. He is a published author on information security technologies and strategy and an internationally recognized expert in the development of solutions combining excellence in risk management, technology, and operations. Prior to joining Harvey Nash, Tiller held key cybersecurity leadership roles at organization such as British Telecom, Hewlett Packard, and Bell Labs, overseeing security services, solutions, and innovation.