Change Wave

Ameesh Paleja is the Chief Technology Officer for OfferUp. He oversees the company’s engineering and data science teams and is responsible for all strategic aspects of the technology organization, including infrastructure, security, product engineering, and architecture. Before joining OfferUp, Ameesh was the CTO of Starz and oversaw the modernization of Starz’s technology platform, enabling an international expansion and managing the overhaul of the company’s digital media publishing pipeline. Prior, he spent more than 10 years at Amazon, where he was the founding employee of Amazon’s digital research and development facility in Southern California, managing a team of over 550 employees for products including Amazon Prime Instant Video, Amazon’s Appstore, Cloud Drive, and Kindle. As co-founder of Atom Tickets, Paleja continues to serve on its board as a strategic advisor. He has a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from the University of California, San Diego, and holds 24 patents in digital video and related fields.

Debra McCowan is SVP and Chief Human Resources Officer (CHRO) for NetApp, responsible for developing the global HR strategy and leading the entirety of the function including talent acquisition, talent development and learning, business partnerships, organizational development and effectiveness, total rewards, diversity, inclusion and belonging and operations.

Debra is a change and transformational HR leader with 20+ years of global experience focused on integrating the people strategy with the business strategy to effectively drive performance and growth and promote organizational health. Her success comes from her proven ability to build high performing teams and develop business aligned HR strategies and initiatives while providing strategic and operational leadership, typically in a context of rapid growth, change and maturation.

In her last role as CHRO at Equinix, Debra built a robust global HR function in a fast-paced environment. During her five years with the company, the global HR organization was instrumental in evolving Equinix’s culture, building the company brand and designing and implementing leading-edge value driven programs and initiatives in support of business objectives and to ensure the attraction, retention and cultivation of critical talent enabling growth and helping position Equinix as a market leader.

Prior to Equinix, Debra co-founded the Accelerance Group where as a partner, she provided organizational and systems design consulting services and helped clients lead strategic change more effectively. Debra has also held global executive leadership roles at Avago Technologies (now Broadcom Inc.), Hitachi Data Systems (now Hitachi Vantara), and Telstra Corporation
Debra serves on the Board of Directors for HealthEquity, Inc., the largest health savings account non-bank custodian in the US. She holds a post-graduate diploma in Industrial Relations and HR Management from the University of Melbourne and a B.A. from La Trobe University.

Nolan Church is the Chief People Officer at Carta, a Series E fintech company headquartered in SF. As the CPO, Nolan oversees all employee touchpoints including HR, Recruiting, Total Rewards, Internal Communications and Real Estate. Prior to Carta, Nolan was the Head of Talent at DoorDash as its first hire in HR and scaled the company from 50 to >800 employees in three years. Nolan has also worked at Google in recruiting as the company doubled in size to 60k employees. He studied Political Science and was captain of the baseball team at the University of New Orleans.

Brandon Krieg is the CEO and co-founder of Stash - the financial platform revolutionizing the way millions of Americans save and invest for their future. Brandon has been recognized by Goldman Sachs as one of 2018’s “100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs,” and Stash was highlighted by Forbes’ “Fintech 50 2018”  as well as the Wall Street Journal as one of the "Top Tech Companies to Watch in 2018." Prior to Stash, Brandon spent +15 years in financial services, most recently at Macquarie Securities Group.

Charles is the Global People and Culture Leader at Zendrive, where he leads the global people organization. Charles has been instrumental in Hacking HR’s SF Chapter, bringing thought leadership to the discussion of emerging technologies. With 25 years of significant experience in key leadership roles at high-growth organizations, Charles has successfully reorganized entire company cultures and visions to adopt a “one team,” collaborative approach time and time again. He is active in the transformation of the human resources role in business, publishing and speaking on the changing landscape of the profession.