WorkingNation logo with the tagline of "Covering the Future of Work"
DONATE
Search

Sherry Lansing

Executive Committee

During almost 30 years in the motion picture business, Sherry Lansing was involved in the production, marketing, and distribution of more than 200 films, including Academy Award winners Forrest Gump, Braveheart, and Titanic. Throughout her film career, Lansing earned a reputation as a trailblazer, a visionary leader, and a creative filmmaker.  In 1980, she became the first woman to head a major film studio when she was appointed President of 20th Century Fox.  Later, as an independent producer, Lansing was responsible for such successful films as Fatal Attraction, The Accused, School Ties, Indecent Proposal, and Black Rain.  Returning to the executive ranks in 1992, she was named Chairman and CEO of Paramount Pictures and began an unprecedented tenure that lasted more than 12 years (1992 – 2005). Lansing currently serves as Chair of the Board of Directors of the Universal Music Group.  

The Sherry Lansing Foundation (SLF), a nonprofit organization dedicated to cancer research, health, public education, and encore career opportunities, was formed in 2005.  Among the SLF’s initiatives is the EnCorps STEM Teachers Program, founded by Lansing to transition corporate professionals and military veterans into top quality California public school math and science teachers.  Lansing is also a co-founder of the Stand Up To Cancer initiative, which funds collaborative, multi-institutional cancer research “Dream Teams.”

In addition, she serves on the boards of the Broad Museum, the Carter Center, the Entertainment Industry Foundation, the W.M. Keck Foundation, the Lasker Foundation, the Pacific Council on International Policy, and Scripps Research – as well as the Advisory Board of the Y&S Nazarian Center for Israel Studies and the Executive Committee of WorkingNation.  Lansing served on the University of California Board of Regents from 1999 – 2022.

In recognition of her philanthropic endeavors, she has received the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award; induction into the National Women’s Hall of Fame; the American Association for Cancer Research Public Service Award, the Horatio Alger Humanitarian Award; the UCLA Women in Philanthropy Icon Award; and the Stem Cell Action Leadership Award, among numerous other honors.  In 2011, Lansing pledged five million dollars to the University of Chicago Lab Schools, where she attended high school 

She graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Science Degree from Northwestern University in 1966. 

Get the latest from WorkingNation
DONATE
Terms of Use
Privacy Policy
Our Mission
Contact Us

© Copyright 2025 by Structural Unemployment, LLC dba WorkingNation

Dana Beth Ardi

Executive Committee

Dana Beth Ardi, PhD, Executive Committee, is a thought leader and expert in the fields of executive search, talent management, organizational design, assessment, leadership and coaching. As an innovator in the human capital movement, Ardi creates enhanced value in companies by matching the most sought after talent with the best opportunities. Ardi coaches boards and investors on the art and science of building high caliber management teams. She provides them with the necessary skills to seek out and attract top-level management, to design the ideal organizational architectures and to deploy people against strategy. Ardi unearths the way a business works and the most effective way for people to work in them.

Ardi is an experienced business executive and senior consultant who leverages business organizational transformation through talent strategies. She uses her knowledge and experience to develop talent strategies to enhance revenue and profit contributions. She has a deep expertise in change management and organizational effectiveness and has designed and built high performance cultures. Ardi has significant experience in mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, IPO’s and turnarounds.

Ardi is an expert on the multi-generational workforce. She understands the four intersecting generations of workers coming together in contemporary companies, each with their own mindsets, leadership and communications styles, values and motivations. Ardi is sought after to assist companies manage and thrive by bringing the generations together. Her book, Fall of the Alphas: How Beta Leaders Win Through Connection, Collaboration and Influence, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. The book reflects Ardi’s deep expertise in understanding organizations and our changing society. It focuses on building a winning culture, how companies must grow and evolve, and how talent influences and shapes communities of work. This is what she has coined “Corporate Anthropology.” It is a playbook on how modern companies must meet challenges – culturally, globally, digitally, across genders and generations.

Ardi is currently the Managing Director and Founder of Corporate Anthropology Advisors, LLC, a consulting company that provides human capital advisory and innovative solutions to companies building value through people. Corporate Anthropology works with organizations, their cultures, the way they grow and develop, and the people who are responsible for forming their communities of work.

Prior to her position at Corporate Anthropology Advisors, Ardi served as a Partner/Managing Director at the private equity firms CCMP Capital and JPMorgan Partners. She was a partner at Flatiron Partners, a venture capital firm working with early state companies where she pioneered the human capital role within an investment portfolio.

Ardi holds a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo as well as a Masters degree and PhD from Boston College. She started her career as professor at the Graduate Center at Fordham University in New York.

Share Bio