Meet The Agenda Setters: 10 Groundbreakers Moving The Conversation Forward

The Agenda Setters honors women who shape what their industries pay attention to and move the conversation forward.

Every industry has people who decide what gets discussed and what gets funded. We created this category to recognize the women doing that work, from newsrooms to corporate marketing departments.

The name is intentional. Her Agenda was built on the belief that a woman sets her own agenda, and these ten women set it for entire fields. 

Founder, The Kinship Advisors/Partner, Visibility Media

Alexys has spent two decades where sports and culture meet power. At the NBA, she supported more than 450 players and advised league leadership through moments including the Black Lives Matter movement and the NBA Bubble, which earned her the nickname “The NBA’s Other Coach.” She also designed President Obama’s celebrity engagement strategy, mobilizing voices like Jay-Z and Alicia Keys.

Today she advises elite athletes and executives through The Kinship Advisors and produces films, including Hoops, Hopes & Dreams for Disney, and They Fight for Hulu. Her work with the JLH Social Impact Fund earned the ESPY Muhammad Ali Sports Humanitarian Award. Alexys sets the agenda by deciding which stories from sports reach the wider culture.

“This recognition honors the rooms I have spent my career building at the intersection of sports, culture, and power,” Alexys says. “It tells every woman coming behind me that her story is strategy, her voice carries weight, and the ground she breaks becomes ground others get to stand on.”

Global Head, Corporate Marketing, Novartis

Aliah leads global corporate marketing at Novartis, one of the world’s leading medicines companies. Her team oversees brand strategy and creative, along with digital innovation and integrated campaigns, and she has helped modernize how the company engages audiences around the world.

Her influence extends beyond Novartis. Aliah serves as president of the American Marketing Association’s New Jersey chapter and created Visibility Architecture, a thought leadership platform that examines how technology and culture shape the way institutions are understood. With more than 15 years of experience leading transformation in multinational organizations, she is shaping how large institutions present themselves to the world.

“This recognition is a beautiful reminder that ambition, courage, and conviction matter,” Aliah says. “It affirms the importance of creating opportunities for others while continuing to challenge myself, push boundaries, and embrace what’s possible next.”

Head of Culture & Inclusive Marketing, Pernod Ricard USA

Daneyni leads culture and inclusive marketing at Pernod Ricard USA, where her job is to connect cultural intelligence directly to commercial growth. She brings brand marketing and consumer analytics experience from Coca-Cola and from industries as different as banking and telecommunications.

She also helps write the rules for her field. Daneyni is a two-time Top Hispanic Market Thought Leader and sits on advisory boards including ColorComm and Collage Group. She regularly judges the ANA Multicultural Excellence and Effie Awards. For her, setting the agenda means making sure “culture remains an essential, unshakeable standard for modern brand growth.”

Head of IMPACT, Kraft Heinz

Danielle leads IMPACT at Kraft Heinz, the team responsible for Inclusive Marketing, Partnerships and Culture across the company’s North American portfolio. She developed the company’s inclusive marketing framework and Cultural Compass, an AI-powered cultural intelligence tool.

Her work includes cultural collaborations such as HEINZ x Mustard and KOOL-AID x Nike x Ja Morant. Before Kraft Heinz, Danielle built strategies at Target that connected brands with Gen Z and multicultural audiences. Her motto is “Culture first. Context always,” and she has spent her career showing that our perspectives and lived experiences “have the power to shape industries.”

CEO, GOODR

Jasmine founded Goodr in 2017 on the belief that hunger is a problem we can solve. The company treats food waste and food insecurity as one challenge, and it has recovered millions of pounds of surplus food. Goodr has also opened community markets and school-based grocery stores, and it partners with Fortune 500 companies and professional sports leagues.

Jasmine has pushed major institutions to see surplus food as a resource. She is the author of Feeding Hope and has lectured at universities including Harvard and Stanford. Her approach is practical. “Start with what you have,” she says, “and don’t underestimate what you can change.”

“I’m grateful to be honored alongside women making a difference,” Jasmine says, “and hope my journey encourages someone else to keep going.”

Founder and CEO, Tené Nicole Creative Agency

Nikkia builds visibility for businesses and creates spaces where women’s accomplishments take center stage. Through Tené Nicole Creative Agency, she has represented clients ranging from multimillion-dollar brands to Fortune 50 companies. She also founded Support Your Girlfriends, a community centered on connection and collaboration, and created the Pow(H)er Experience + Awards to celebrate women’s leadership, mentorship, and impact. Her book and app, DIYPR, teach entrepreneurs how to tell their stories and pitch themselves.

Her own story helps explain her commitment to opening doors. “I started with nothing: a teen mom with no degree, no connections, no savings,” she says. “Sixteen years later, I hold a PhD and run a seven-figure agency.” Nikkia uses that experience to help others earn recognition, build relationships, and turn visibility into opportunity.

Global Chief Media Officer, General Motors

Shenan became Global Chief Media Officer at General Motors in January 2024. She leads the automaker’s global media team and launched MediaOne, a collaborative group of strategists, planners and innovators built around transparency and inclusivity.

Her connection to the company is personal. Shenan restored a 1969 Corvette with her father, who drove her to her wedding, and she has an enduring love for classic GM cars. That history and the chance to shape the auto industry’s evolution drew her to GM after two decades in media and advertising.

She arrived with a record of building. Shenan founded Morpheus Media, a digital marketing agency known for its work with luxury, fashion and retail brands. She also served as Senior Vice President and Head of Media at L’Oréal USA and held leadership roles at Publicis and Wavemaker. She is the first brand leader to chair the IAB, which gives a marketer a direct hand in the standards that govern digital advertising, and she sits on the ANA board and the Global Meta Client Council. At home in Bronxville, New York, the family beagle is named Pebbles, after the Flintstones character who grows up to be an advertising executive.

Journalist and CEO of Soledad O’Brien Productions

Soledad is one of the most decorated journalists of her generation, with ten Emmy Awards and three Peabody Awards. She was the face of CNN’s morning shows for more than a decade and anchored the political magazine Matter of Fact for 10 years.

She now sets her own editorial agenda through Soledad O’Brien Productions, which tells stories about social issues. Soledad recently served as executive producer of two Oscar-nominated documentaries, “The Devil Is Busy” for HBO and “The Perfect Neighbor” for Netflix. She has also testified before Congress on media disinformation.

Founder, CEO and Author, McPherson Strategies

Susan founded McPherson Strategies 14 years ago as an impact communications consultancy. She is the author of The Lost Art of Connecting and serves on the boards of The 19th News and the US Chamber of Connection.

Susan has made connection her subject and her method for 30 years. “I am here today because I said yes to the meeting, yes to making the intro, and yes to opening doors for others,” she says. Her personal motto is a question: “How can I help?”

Co-anchor, The Weeknight, MS NOW

Symone became the youngest presidential press secretary in history at 25, on Senator Bernie Sanders’s 2016 campaign. She went on to advise President Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign and to serve as chief spokesperson for Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Black woman to hold that position.

She then moved to the other side of the camera. Symone launched her own show at the network, now called MS NOW, and today co-anchors its primetime program “The Weeknight.” She is also the author of “No, You Shut Up” and a resident fellow at Georgetown’s Institute for Politics and Public Service. Few people have shaped political conversation from inside the White House and from a network anchor desk.

Click here to meet all 50 inaugural Groundbreakers and learn more about the December 1 Gala.