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Team

A community of founders, startup leaders, investors, business coaches, and therapists, advocating for the proactive care of founder mental health.
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Leadership

Jason Cavnar
Executive Chairman of the Board & Interim Executive Director
LinkedIn Profile

Entrepreneur, investor and advisor to philanthropic and cultural leaders on impact. Founder of Vitality Labs. Previously built JFFLabs (leading workforce innovation org); Stand Together Music (works with musicians and media executives to create social change); and API infrastructure company Singly (acquired by Appcelerator/Axway). I am excited to bring these experiences and my passion for human flourishing to FMHP.

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Naveed Lalani
Co-Creator, Board Member
LinkedIn Profile

Entrepreneur, executive, and early-stage investor. Currently, Naveed is the Founder & and CEO of Unwire.ai.  Co-created the Founder Mental Health Pledge to prioritize and destigmatize mental health in the entrepreneurial landscape.

Brad Baum
Co-Creator, Board Member
LinkedIn Profile

Early-stage venture investor turned founder, building in the mental health space. Co-created the Founder Mental Health Pledge to prioritize and destigmatize mental health in the entrepreneurial landscape.

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Alan Woodruff
Board Member, Former Founding Executive Director
LinkedIn Profile

Entrepreneur, marketing executive, and strategic operations advisor across a number of Fortune 500 companies and high-growth startups in Consumer Packaged Goods, Financial Services, SAAS, and Healthcare. With a long-held passion for mental healthcare, I am privileged to use my experience and passion within the field to steward the next chapter of growth in the Founder Mental Health Pledge.

Cristina Poindexter
Strategy & Partnerships
LinkedIn Profile

Serial entrepreneur & venture coach. My mission is to activate aliveness in leaders. I’ve founded two venture-backed brain and mental health companies, led Marketing & Partnerships at Headspace. I got my start in tech at Google, where I helped craft the Google Assistant AI products from ideation to launch. I’m excited to bring together the wellness leadership community across founders, investors, health practitioners, and philanthropies. Together, we have the opportunity to evolve leadership culture in America to create better, more successful companies that generate health & wellness outcomes at scale.

Team

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Kiley Giebel
Operations Manager
LinkedIn Profile

Kiley has spent the last four years juggling a full-time education with her work in venture capital and consulting. She began her career by student consulting for various companies, where she discovered her passion for the entrepreneurial space. As a mental health advocate, she is using her experience to create a movement.

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Alex Auerbach, Ph.D.
Chief Medical Officer
LinkedIn Profile

Counseling and performance psychologist currently working as an executive in professional sports. I've been fortunate to work with the best athletes in the world in the NBA, NFL, MLB, and Olympians, as well as high-performers in other domains like elite military units, Fortune 5 companies, and venture-backed start-ups.

Danish Dhamani
Danish Dhamani
Chief Technology Officer
LinkedIn Profile

Coaching and AI technologist and product executive. Danish is the Co-Founder & CTO of Unwire.ai. He's also Co-Founder & CEO of Orai, tech-enabled presentation skills training helps teams and individuals sound more confident, compelling and concise.

Strategic Advisors

Adrienne Heinz Headshot
Adrienne Heinz, PhD

Dr. Heinz is a Stanford-trained licensed psychologist who conducts research and clinical practice in the areas of resilience, trauma, anxiety, and substance use.

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Aaron Gershenberg

Sr. Advisor & Founding Partner Emeritus, SVB Capital. Over the last 20 years, he has created 10 fund of funds, five direct funds, and five differentiated custom solutions.

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Amanda Price

Head of High Growth Ventures, KPMG Australia’s dedicated startup team. Amanda has been at the forefront of the nascent Australian startup since the early 2000s in a number of senior sales, marketing, and business development roles.

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Andy Dunn

Co-founded the successful men's apparel company Bonobos and served as the company’s CEO for 10 years. Now he is changing the way we think about entrepreneurship and mental health, including through his book "Burn Rate" and as a TED speaker.

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Andy Johns

Mental health advocate and creator of  Clues.Life. Helps high performers transform and discover a higher calling. Board Member at the Heroic Hearts Project, aiding veterans with PTSD to access effective alternative therapies. Former tech exec & VC.

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Anita Hossain Choudry

Co-founder and CEO of The Grand, a platform for group coaching to help founders and employees navigate transitions at the intersection of work and life.

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Aparna Ramaswamy

As the Chief Human Capital Officer at Techstars, Ramaswamy has experience across a diverse portfolio of global businesses and industries. She has a recognized track record of shaping change by aligning people and culture to enable businesses to scale and solve complex problems.

Adam Schiff

Adam Schiff is the Founder & CEO of CultureSpeed Communications, a multi-faceted communications agency working across industries including business, tech, media, healthcare, sports, venture capital, finance, real estate, retail, e-commerce, consumer, philanthropy, and more.  

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Brad Feld

An early-stage investor and entrepreneur since 1987. Co-founder of Techstars, Foundry Group, Mobius Venture Capital, and Intensity Ventures. Entrepreneur mental health supporter and advocate.

Don Samoil

Don is a Managing Partner of Trusted Scale, Founder Institute Philadelphia  Adviser, Angel, and avid supporter of Founder Mental Health.

Eric Ries

Eric Ries, author of "The Lean Startup" and creator of the Lean Startup methodology, has significantly impacted global business practices. He founded several startups, including IMVU, and has advised various firms and corporations. Currently, Eric is the Founder and Executive Chairman of the Long-Term Stock Exchange (LTSE).

Keegan Walden, Ph.D.

Keegan coaches the founders of venture backed startups, leveraging his experience as a founder who helped raise $100M and build Torch to the series C stage, and his training as a psychologist. He also writes widely on leadership with an emphasis on how to work with the personality traits common to founders.

Jerry Colonna

Jerry Colonna is the CEO and cofounder of the executive coaching firm, Reboot.io. A highly sought-after coach and speaker, he is also the author of Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up. For more than 20 years, he has used his experiences as a CEO, investor, journalist, college professor, and, lastly, coach to help people lead with humanity, resilience,
and equanimity.

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Michael Freeman, MD

Dr. Michael Freeman is a psychiatrist, serial entrepreneur, executive coach, entrepreneurship researcher, and behavioral health systems architect. Dr. Freeman serves as a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, a Mentor in the Entrepreneurship Center at UCSF, and a founder of the Econa Global Center for Entrepreneur Mental Wellness.

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Morra Aarons-Mele

Morra Aarons-Mele is a global speaker, best-selling author, and entrepreneur. Winner of the 2023 Media Award from Mental Health America.

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Paul English

Founder of Boston Venture Studio. Previously co-founded and successfully sold six startups — Kayak, Lola, Moonbeam, GetHuman, Boston Light, and Intermute. Mental health advocate and supporter.

Ryan Rutan

Founding Partner and CMO of Startups.com. Expert marketer and serial entrepreneur helping startups find customers, grow their businesses, and raise capital without sacrificing equity on the world’s largest dedicated platform for startup success.

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Saki Georgiadis

Founder of Evio, a venture capital firm investing in the future of mental healthcare. Saki has over a decade of investing in the mental health space and has backed companies such as Calm and BetterUp

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Sherry Walling, PhD

Helping smart people do hard things. Focused on entrepreneur mental health, psychedelic science, and system change. Living in joy and grief. Movement is medicine. TEDx speaker.

Silvia Cavalcanti

CMO of Endeavor Global, Endeavor is the leading global community of High-Impact Entrepreneurs in underserved markets. Together, the community creates a Multiplier Effect by inspiring each other to dream bigger, supporting and investing in each other to scale faster, and providing a platform to pay it forward.

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Ute Stephan, PhD

Professor of Entrepreneurship at King's Business School, King's College London, a Fellow of the International Association of Applied Psychology, and an expert on the Psychology of Entrepreneurship.

Vanessa Roberts
Vanessa Roberts

Creator of FounderWell, which helps founders and leaders scale their companies responsibly- without sacrificing what matters most. Lead Strategic Coach at SaaS Academy.

Vineet Rajan

Vineet served as an officer in the US Marines for over a decade holds an MBA and Certificate in Public Management & Social Innovation from Stanford University and a Masters in International Relations (w/ Distinction) from the University of Cambridge. Co-founder and CEO of , a mental well-being platform that connects every employee to care, helping them live a more fulfilled life.

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