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Natalie Brown

CEO, Mesirow Financial Holdings

Mesirow’s chief executive sees leaning on others as the key to leading the 87-year-old financial services firm, whose offerings range from family wealth planning to investment banking.

“There is no way that I could be the market expert in a conglomerate of 14 businesses,” says Natalie Brown. “I cannot do that. So what I'm looking for is leadership across those businesses to bring that market expertise to me.”

Brown, who joined Mesirow in 2018 as chief financial officer, was promoted to chief administrative officer in 2020 and president in 2021 before stepping into the top role in 2022. On her watch, the Chicago-based firm passed $300 billion in 2024 assets under supervision.

In addition to surrounding herself with experts, another key to her success is venturing outside her comfort zone. She never shies away from new roles, even if they don't immediately feel like the perfect fit.

“Be open-minded about your opportunities," she says, "because sometimes the role that you think is not going to be any fun is actually going to help you grow the most.”

Case in point: At mutual fund manager Nuveen, where she worked for nearly 20 years before joining Mesirow, Brown managed a team made up of workers in different locations with different roles — including taxes, accounts payable and travel — spread across the business.

“It sounded to me like the island of misfit toys, a job that they were just kind of lumping a bunch of things together and giving it to somebody,” Brown says. “I ended up learning how to adapt my management style to different people and to what they need and meet people where they are, instead of trying to make people meet me where I am.”

Brown, 54, is just as willing to dive into fresh experiences outside of work. She's on the boards of Northwestern Memorial Hospital, After School Matters, Big Shoulders Fund and the Executives’ Club of Chicago. She's a LINK Unlimited Scholars mentor and was appointed to the Dean’s Council of Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business, her alma mater.

“She serves on our executive committee and is an active board member, not just a figurehead,” says Executives' Club CEO Margaret Mueller. “She shows up and participates, despite how busy she is. And she has been a wonderful mentor to me, personally.”

In both her civic and professional life, Brown will keep embracing positions that make her uncomfortable.

“When you get that feeling, I feel like you're growing, right?” she says.

— Mark Weinraub

Rita Sola Cook

President, Bank of America Chicago 

Rita Sola Cook sees the annual marathon that Bank of America sponsors as a showcase for the city that acts as a recruiting tool for companies looking to do business here, as well as for the runners and their families.

“I look at the companies we have worked with for a hundred years and I look at the new businesses that we are banking with, and I am bullish on Chicago,” says Cook, president of B of A Chicago. “I think that we have got tremendous opportunity here. I see more and more small businesses that are wanting to call Chicago their home and find their own niche here.”

She was named to her current position in December 2021. The Chicago office, with 5,300 employees, has deployed $14 billion in commercial loans and more than $500 million in small-business loans 

Cook, 51, joined Bank of America in 1997. She is also the division executive for the Midwest and mid-Atlantic regions of the firm’s private bank.

A Chicago native, she sits on the board of directors at the Chicago Zoological Society and is a member of the board of trustees at Chicago Community Trust, which connects philanthropists with community members and organizations.

“She's brought people to the table at some of our meetings who work for Bank of America, and they are testing creative loan solutions and creative issues to provide financial services to low- and moderate-income people,” says Chicago Community Trust President and CEO Andrea Sáenz. “She uses her team and her team's time to create a more informed sense of what's possible in Chicago.”

In her day job, Cook also is focused on improving communities.

“At the end of the day, we are a financial institution,” Cook says. “If we're doing our job right, we are making financial lives better. We help individuals on a daily basis, whether it's getting their first mortgage or their first car or setting up their small business. We are deploying capital that is helping fuel the economy.”

— Mark Weinraub

Cook's role as the division executive for the Midwest and mid-Atlantic regions of the firm’s private bank has been corrected.

Lisa Duarte

Equity partner, Croke Fairchild Duarte & Beres

Lisa Duarte is a driving force behind the rapid ascent of law firm Croke Fairchild Duarte & Beres, which has quickly assembled a team ofinfluential attorneys,including heavy hitters with expertise in city and state government. Leveraging her experience as the Pritzker administration's first assistant deputy governor for budget and economy, as well as her time as chief of staff for Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s economic council, Duarte and her firm of around 100 attorneys are edging out the competition for high-profile projects and top legal talent in Illinois. 

“She is one of the best counselors and strategists you're going to find who understands how to make government work and how to advocate for a particular topic," says Steve Koch, a former deputy mayor under Emanuel who focused on economic development.

Duarte, 44, whose main focus is government affairs and regulatory law, says the firm has plans to continue to expand, beginning first with its burgeoning real estate practice that it launched in the second quarter of last year. That means Croke Fairchild will likely be looking for larger office space in the city in 2025, she says.

Duarte — a founding member of the Chicago Latino Caucus Foundation and a board member of the Illinois Legislative Latino Caucus Foundation, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Choose Chicago and the Latino Victory Fund — also plans to continue her efforts leading and organizing the Latino community, which proved adecisive demographic nationwide in the November election. 

“I look forward to working with groups to figure out how we can harness the power of that vote for that community,” she says.

It's an agenda that relies on her blend of civic and legal experience.

“There's just not a lot of people with that level of inside knowledge of how both City Hall and Springfield work,” says Koch. “And that’s a very potent combination.”

— Brandon Dupré

Karen Freeman-Wilson

President and CEO, Chicago Urban League

Karen Freeman-Wilson has served as a judge, the mayor of Gary and Indiana’s attorney general, leading communities and serving the public for decades.

It's a background that has given her a “richness of perspective” and “unmatched leadership qualities” that are invaluable to any organization, says Vickie Lakes-Battle, executive director for the Chicago metro region at community development financial institution IFF.

Now in her fifth year as president and CEO of the Chicago Urban League, Freeman-Wilson, 64, says she's in a role that shares similar objectives with her previous life as an elected official. 

“The consistent theme of my career has been my desire to use public policy to really improve the lives of people that I saw and served,” she says.

And the Urban League, which advances economic and racial equity for Black Chicagoans, has big plans to do just that in 2025. Freeman-Wilson says a focus of the nonprofit this year will be entrepreneurship support through capital access, education and career development programs on the South Side.

The nonprofit plans to open its Empowerment Center in June, a more than 15,000-square-foot building in Chatham that will offer expanded workforce development programs and entrepreneurship initiatives, serving thousands of residents in some of the city’s most disinvested areas each year.

The Chicago Urban League also plans to continue studying the barriers to homeownership, the subject of a task force the nonprofit created last year. It served 2,918 people through homeownership, rental, foreclosure prevention and financial counseling in the fiscal year that ended June 2023 (the most recent figures available).

Transitioning from politician to nonprofit leader has allowed Freeman-Wilson to sharpen her civic focus.

“Now I don’t have to worry about more of the mundane tasks you do as an elected official,” she says. “I can spend all my time on the areas and policies we as an organization want to emphasize.”

— Brandon Dupré
 

Christy George

CEO, Intersect Illinois

After selling Chicago to Democratic donors, Christy George is back to selling companies on Illinois.

Asthe new CEO of Intersect Illinois, George is picking up where she left off as a first assistant deputy governor for economic development before her 13-month stint as executive director of the host committee for the Democratic National Convention.

George, 39, helped deliver one of Gov. JB Pritzker’s biggest economic development wins as governor: theGotion electric-vehicle battery plant in Manteno.

“A huge reason that project is where it is today is because of her work,” says Deputy Gov. Andy Manar, her former boss. “She worked through any number of challenges incredibly well.”

A big part of her job at Intersect Illinois, the state’s public-private partnership for business recruitment and retention, is to collaborate with Manar, as well as Kristin Richards, who leads the state Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity, to pursue and close deals.

“We have more projects in the pipeline than before . . . larger, more capital-intensive projects,” George says.

Continuing to grow the economy is crucial to Pritzker’s political future. George will have to help make the case to legislators to continue investing in economic development even as they face their most challenging budget in years. The majority of the Intersect Illinois budget comes from state funds.

“Not one dollar is guaranteed,” says George, who used to oversee the state’s economic development budget. She’ll point to EV deals with Gotion and Rivian and quantum-computing projects withPsiQuantum andIBM as reasons for legislators to double down.

After leading day-to-day operations for the DNC host committee, which raised a record $97 million for the Chicago convention, she’s accustomed to asking for money. 

"I had not had that much fundraising experience before I did (the) DNC," she says. "I was comfortable calling businesses to ask what is going on, but I wasn’t calling CEOs. Now I feel comfortable doing those things myself.”

She’s also more comfortable delegating responsibility. It’s a skill that will come in handy as she builds out the staff at Intersect Illinois with experts in fields the state is targeting, such as advanced manufacturing, life sciences and technology.

Manar points to another important skill George brings to her new job:

“She’s a very serious leader," he says. "She also has a wonderful sense of humor that’s a huge plus.”

—John Pletz

Julie Giese 

President, Chicago Street Race, NASCAR

Julie Giese still has the rejection letters she received from racetracks in the late '90s. With a degree in agriculture marketing — and a childhood growing up on a dairy farm in Colby, Wis. — her skills, at least on paper, didn't seem designed for the business of high-speed stock car racing.

Today, many of the people who signed those letters are now her peers.

As president of the Chicago Street Race, Giese, 47, presides over one of NASCAR's boldest innovations, leading the team that turns the Loop into a motorsport speedway. When famed drivers like Chase Elliott and Kyle Busch break 100 mph on DuSable Lake Shore Drive this July, Giese can claim some credit for the spectacle. Another win on her watch: hundreds of millions of dollars ineconomic impactfor Chicago. 

"There wouldn't be NASCAR in Chicago without Julie," says Richard Gamble, interim president and CEO of Choose Chicago, the city's tourism arm. 

Giese is one of about a dozen NASCAR employees who work in the city full time. She moved to Streeterville from Arizona shortly after getting the Street Race gig in 2022. Her job, she says, is "to be a face in the community, a leader in the community, and represent NASCAR year-round outside of just those two days when we're racing downtown."

"She wanted the challenge," Kara Bachman, executive director of the Chicago Sports Commission, says of Giese stepping into the leadership role. "She very much stuck her hand up." Bachman, who also has a strong hand in putting on the annual race, praised Giese for being a collaborative, transparent and community-focused representative for NASCAR over the last three years. 

Giese was a member of the original team that explored the feasibility of racing here and helped get the green light for the inaugural July 2023 event from race and city officials.

"I get to be an advocate for NASCAR, be an advocate for Chicago, and really work through how those two things come together," she says.

This summer, with the third rendition of the Chicago Street Race, Giese and her team will welcome some 50,000 attendees to Grant Park. They'll put on a show for Chicago — and make Chicago into a show for the rest of the world to watch on NBC.

To be determined: whether NASCAR or the city wants to welcome the race back for a fourth or fifth year, which their original deal made optional. But while what's around the bend for the race here is far from certain —NASCAR just lostone of its leading local sponsors — Giese is keeping her eye on the road.

"Right now, our focus is on year three of the agreement," Giese says. "As we lead into that, we'll start to look at what that means for the future with years four and five. Those are options that we both have, and those conversations will happen at some point, I'm sure, but right now, our focus is on the planning for the third year."

When NASCAR does decide the future of the race, expect to see Giese in the driver's seat.

— Jack Grieve

Ashley Duchossois Joyce

Chair, Duchossois Capital Management

Ashley Duchossois Joyce is eager to make her mark as part of the next generation of Chicago leaders. 

“I have been shadowing my father for pretty much my whole life,” she says. “I am really excited to take my new role and get more involved. I am going to get in there. I have never been a wallflower.”

Joyce became chair of Duchossois Capital Management in April 2024, taking over from her father, Craig Duchossois, who now serves as executive chairman emeritus. The privately held firm has active investments in companies including Incline Energy Partners, Churchill Downs and LSL Healthcare.

“I am proud that we have stayed in Chicago,” she says. “My family is invested in Chicago. Our history is here. I would not want to be anywhere else.”

Joyce, 49, has been involved in her family’s charitable works for years, becoming head of the family’s foundation in 2022 after joining full time in 2015. The Duchossois Family Foundation, which celebrated its 40th anniversary last year, does lots of work with veterans groups including the Headstrong Project and Illinois Joining Forces, which Joyce says is a way of honoring the military service of her father and grandfather.

She's also a member of the Smithsonian National Board, has served as chair of Metropolitan Family Services, and is a board trustee of the University of Chicago and the University of Chicago Medical Center. 

Joyce is an active participant in her charitable endeavors, providing much more than just a check, says the chief ofMetropolitan Family Services.

“She naturally wants to be in the details,” says Ric Estrada, president and CEO of the nonprofit. “She does not just go along with whatever we say."

Joyce wants to see more investments in the South and West sides, a goal she has noticed other civic and business leaders also have set. 

“There are a lot of organizations right now that are realizing that we need to work together, put our egos aside and think about Chicago as a whole and not just look at it through our single silo,” she says. "I think people are talking to each other and not holding things so close to their vest.”

Since taking the lead at Duchossois Capital Management, Joyce has been meeting with other executives and government officials about the best ways to serve the city.

“It is a big group that is doubling down on Chicago,” she says.

— Mark Weinraub

Suzanne Yoon

Founder and managing partner, Kinzie Capital Partners

For Suzanne Yoon, identifying and developing leaders is just as important — if not more so — as finding the right company to build out her private-equity firm’s portfolio.

“It is one thing to just say, ‘We want good people,' " Yoon says. “It is another thing to find the right people and assure that they have the right training and are in the right positions. I think companies that thrive . . . adapt quickly.”

Kinzie — a rare women-owned private-equity firm, with 12 employees — closed its first institutional fund, a$150 million stockpile for buyouts of businesses at the lower end of the middle market, in 2023. It started off 2024 bybuying Arctic Industries, a maker of walk-in coolers and freezers, at a time when activity in the private-equity market was slow due to concerns about slowing economic growth and high interest rates.

Kinzie’s other investments include Colony Display, an Elgin-based company that makes customized fixtures for the home improvement market, and GT Golf Holdings.

Yoon believes investing in the right people helps build a strong portfolio, even in the absence of fresh deals.

“I think we get to really, really great outcomes if we are thinking about people first,” she says. “That is really what's going to build resilient organizations that stand the test of time.”

Yoon, 49, is active in the Chicago philanthropic community, serving on the boards of the Chicago Public Library Foundation, HFS Chicago Scholars and the Shedd Aquarium, among other organizations.

She's also on the board of trustees at the National Philanthropic Trust, a Jenkintown, Pa.-based public charity providing expertise to donors, foundations and financial institutions in 70 countries, serving as chair for nearly four years.

“She is one of those rare people where . . . her analytical skills are super, but her human skills, or intuition, her sense of people, her sense of character also are really strong,” says Eileen Heisman, the National Philanthropic Trust's former CEO.

In 2024, Yoon became an inaugural member of the Chicago Bears Women’s Advisory Board, which looks to grow and improve the team’s connection to its female fanbase and create an inclusive environment.

And although being on the board is a thrill for the lifelong Bears fan, Yoon says lessons from the NFL, as well as the other civic organizations she is a part of, translate directly back to the corporate world.

“It is about having the right players,” Yoon says. “And then it's the chemistry of that team that elevates everyone to put in the extra 5% needed to win the Super Bowl.”

— Mark Weinraub