Happy Pride! This month we’re celebrating our community by highlighting some of our most impactful LGBTQ+ operators and investors. These leaders have all influenced their fields, given new thought to how things have been done, and inspired people beyond their own communities to pursue new dreams and opportunities. They are not only excellent at what they do, but they live proudly doing it.

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Aubrey Blanche-Sarellano

Senior Director of People Operations & Strategic Programs, Culture Amp

Senior Director of People Operations & Strategic Programs at HR technology company Culture Amp, Aubrey has dedicated her life’s work to designing and implementing equity-creating solutions for the tech workforce and its ecosystem. She’s brought multiple DEI-focused products to market and has deep expertise in business development and product management. As a regular speaker and writer on equity and accessibility, Aubrey is featured in a variety of media outlets and on stages across the world.

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Angie Coleman

Director of Community, Operator Collective

Angie (me!), OpCo’s Director of Community, has a love for community. Previously at companies such as Snowflake, Lesbians Who Tech, Zendesk, and Dropbox, Angie has built resilient and functional member communities that inspire and delight the industry. Whether it’s a five thousand person summit or an intimate dinner for a select few, Angie is consistently thinking up new ways and systems to bring people together. When she isn’t working, Angie spends her time outside, with friends, and usually buried deep in nature.

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LaFawn Davis

Senior Vice President, Environmental, Social, & Governance, Indeed

LaFawn is currently SVP of ESG at Indeed, where she leads teams that focus on Sustainability, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging, Accessibility, Social Impact, Inclusive Hiring Products and AI Ethics. The focus of Indeed’s ESG commitments are to close the opportunity gap, break down bias and barriers, and conserve the environment. She’s a recognized tech exec with over 15+ yrs of experience working on DEI initiatives at leading global organizations like Google, Yahoo, PayPal and Twilio and is consistently celebrated as one of the most influential and innovative queer women in the industry - she’s #20 on this year’s Fast Company Queer 50 list! 

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Emily Heath 

General Partner, Cyberstarts | Board Member, Norton LifeLock and LogicGate | Former SVP, Chief Trust and Security Officer, DocuSign

Responsible for securing information systems across global, Fortune 100 companies for more than 25 years, Emily has been dedicated to security from the beginning of her career. A former detective for the UK Financial Crimes Unit, Emily led joint investigations with the FBI and SEC before going digital and joining BeachBody as their IT Executive Director. BeachBody turned into AECOM, then United Airlines, followed by DocuSign, where she most recently served as the SVP of Chief, Trust and Security Officer. She is consistently recognized as a top CSO operator and is quite literally in the Hall of Fame. Emily sits on the boards of Norton LifeLock and LogicGate GRC Platform, advises multiple startups, and serves as a general partner and advisor to Cyberstarts, a venture capital firm investing in the future of cybersecurity.

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Nichole Mustard

Co-Founder and Chief Revenue Officer, Credit Karma

In 2007, Nichole helped found Credit Karma, the early fintech startup re-engineering consumer finance. She oversaw the company’s development from a three-person founding team into a major disruptor in the financial technology space with more than 1,300 employees, a +$4 billion valuation and more than 100 million members across the US, Canada and UK. CreditKarma was acquired by Intuit in 2020 for $8.1B and continues to operate independently. A true customer champion, Nichole is the architect of Credit Karma’s win-win-win business model and has been instrumental in scaling it, finding the right mix of financial partners, and optimizing data science capabilities to ensure members and partners get the most value from their products and services. 

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Katherine Rice 

Partner, GingerBread Capital

Katherine Rice has successfully built and scaled brands and businesses for over 30 years. While doing so, she developed quite a track record for volunteering, advising, and mentoring in and around her community. In 2021, she joined Joe Biden’s President's Commission on White House Fellowships as Chief Policy Advisor, LGBTQ+. Katherine is currently a partner at GingerBread Capital, a venture fund focused on investing in the next generation of women leaders.