Building on our engaging time together at CGI America where we shared the stage with Chelsea Clinton in June, 2012, we are pleased to report that Ms. Joan Walker, EVP for Corporate Relations at Allstate Insurance Company, is confirmed to speak and to Co-Chair a Working Group Session at the upcoming HOPE Global Financial Dignity Summit in Atlanta, Georgia.
Inspired by a positive challenge by Chelsea Clinton at CGI America, Joan is leading up a company-wide effort to explore ways in which Allstate and Operation HOPE might 'do more' together in underserved communities across the nation. More on this later.
A little about Ms. Walker below.
Executive Vice President, Corporate Relations
Allstate Insurance Company
Joan H. Walker is executive vice president, corporate relations, for Allstate Insurance Company, and a member of Allstate's senior leadership team. She is responsible for external and internal communications for The Allstate Corporation and its subsidiaries.
Before joining Allstate in 2005, Walker was executive vice president of marketing and communications for Qwest Communications International. She was responsible for all external and internal communications and corporate marketing. Her marketing responsibilities included advertising, brand management, market research, database management, web marketing and sales communications.
Previously, she was senior vice president, global public affairs for Pharmacia. She had a similar role at Monsanto before the company's merger with Pharmacia & Upjohn. Walker was senior vice president of corporate communications at Ameritech from 1996 to 1999. She earlier served as a partner in the Bozell Sawyer Miller group and in governmental and educational roles.
Walker currently serves as a member of the board of trustees of the Arthur W. Page Society, the Insurance Education Institute, the Business Civic Leadership Center, WTTW-11, the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum and the Chicago Architecture Foundation. She previously served on the boards of numerous Chicago community organizations, including the Art Institute of Chicago, Brookfield Zoo, the Chicago Children's Museum, Prentice Women's Hospital Northwestern Memorial and the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.
Walker received a bachelor's degree in sociology from Douglass College at Rutgers University and a master's degree in sociology from Rutgers University.
John Hope Bryant is a thought leader, founder, chairman and CEO of Operation HOPE and Bryant Group Companies, Inc. Magazine/CEO READ bestselling business author of LOVE LEADERSHIP: The New Way to Lead in a Fear-Based World (Jossey-Bass), the only African-American bestselling business author in America, and is chairman of the Subcommittee for the Under-Served and Community Empowerment for the U.S. President’s Advisory Council on Financial Capability, for President Barack Obama. Mr. Bryant is the co-founder of the Gallup-HOPE Index, the only national research poll on youth financial dignity and youth economic energy in the U.S. He is also a co-founder of Global Dignity with HRH Crown Prince Haakon of Norway and Professor Pekka Himanen of Finland. Global Dignity is affiliated with the Forum of Young Global Leaders and the World Economic Forum. Mr. Bryant serves on the board of directors of Ares Commercial Real Estate Corporation, an NYSE Euronext publicly traded company, and a division of $54 billion Ares Capital.