Business and Industry Advisory Council
Members
Tyler Donahue
Company: Country Financial
Charley Edamala
Company: Illinois State University
Tom Faulkner
Company: Discover
Rupendra Jain
Rupendra Jain is Director at NTT DATA Service headquartered in Plano, TX. He lives in Bloomington, IL and manages IT delivery services to a large Insurance account in the region. He has been working in IT industry for 22 years, and has been in leadership roles for 10 years. He graduated in 1995 from Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee India and completed his Diploma in Business Finance in 1996. He also attended executive education program at eCornell University. He has completed PMP, ITIL, CSM, SAFe, TOGAF, AWS Cloud and Machine Learning Certifications. He is a member of Business and Industry Advisory Council (BIAC) and Illinois State BIAC Cyber Security subcommittee.
Becca Johnson
Becca Johnson is a Project Manager with NTT Data currently placed in Enterprise Architecture at State Farm. Becca graduated from Illinois College with a Bachelor of Arts in Mathematics. She later earned an M.B.A. from Illinois State University. Becca was formerly involved with Intern recruiting at Country Financial. She taught IT Project Management at the graduate level for 2 semesters and has been a guest lecturer for IT classes at ISU. Becca held several volunteer positions for the local Komen for the Cure Affiliate. She was a recipient of the Community Service Award at Country Financial in 2009.
Lura Ludolph
Lura Ludolph is a Sr. IT Supervisor at Caterpillar Inc. located in East Peoria, Illinois. She manages a team focused on supporting SAP Applications that run the manufacturing business for over 100 global facilities. Lura’s mother, an ISU Alum, and father, an ISU student and Gamma Phi Circus member, met in the quad of the campus. They instilled a hard-working ethic raising her in their family restaurant in Minier, IL. Lura began her career working for the County of Peoria post-graduation from Illinois State University in the Fall of 1992, and was hired by Caterpillar Inc., nearly 20 years ago. At Caterpillar, Lura has held several positions within and supportive of the IT function. After working as an IT Analyst and Team Lead, she was an IT Buyer and 6 Sigma Black Belt, she moved into a leader role for application support and development, and subsequently spent 3 years rebuilding the Corporate IT Recruiting program. Lura has enjoyed the well rounded experience that Caterpillar has offered her managing the ‘business of IT’ and has allowed her to leverage her strengths as both an individual and leader along the journey. She works with her peers and team to achieve ambitious goals, while remaining honest and loyal. Lura enjoys the continuous learning process and completed her Master’s degree from the University of Phoenix in 2000, while working full-time. She’s married and has two sons, lives in the Peoria area, and in her free time enjoys the outdoors and studying about holistic health.
Katie Mayer
Company: John Deere
Emilie McDowell
Emilie McDowell is a Data Analyst at State Farm. After beginning her career working with data marts and in the data warehousing environment, she now focuses her time on designing and developing analytics solutions in the big data ecosystem. Passionate about data and the endless opportunities, for the last 2 years she has researched and designed multiple solutions in Hadoop to provide advanced analytics capabilities for business areas within State Farm. In addition, Emilie enjoys continuous learning and continuing to refine her skillsets while also growing and mentoring others.
Reginald Michel
Company: State Farm
David Nolan
David Nolan, ’06 Information Systems, is Director of Information Security at Aaron’s Inc. Servant Leader, responsible for all elements of Information Security strategy, operations and programs. He also chairs the School of Information Technology’s Business and Industry Advisory Council. Nolan was previously an Application Security Engineer and leader of the threat, attack and penetration testing services team at Caterpillar, Inc., where he led the creation and execution of Caterpillar’s application security strategy and worked for more than 10 years. He has also held information technology positions with the Central Intelligence Agency and State Farm Insurance. He has been a visiting speaker at ISC2 Security Congress, colleges, corporations and regional ISACA events addressing application security topics.
Barbara K. O'Malley
Company: Northern Trust
Ashesh Patel
Company: Taylor Communications
John Petrillo
John Petrillo is the President of White Oak Technology Group. John graduated summa cum laude as a University Honors Scholar from Illinois State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Applied Computer Science and Mathematics. He has additional certifications in Application Development, Database Administration, and Project Management. John has served on the ISU IT Business and Industry Advisory Council since 2010.
Lance Rogers
Lance Rogers is an Information Technology (IT) Manager at Caterpillar. Lance graduated magna cum laude as a Robert G. Bone Scholar and Presidential Scholar from Illinois State University with a Bachelor of Science in Applied Computer Science and French. He later earned an M.B.A. from Bradley University. Lance is a former Chair and Vice-Chair of the ISU IT Business and Industry Advisory Council. He has been an active Caterpillar recruiter at ISU, regularly serves as a guest lecturer for IT classes, and also teaches a 3 credit-hour graduate IT class each spring. He is a PMI-certified Program and Project Management Professional (PgMP®, PMP®) and an IMA-certified Management Accountant (CMA®). In 2012, he was inducted into the ISU Applied Science and Technology Alumni Hall of Fame. In 2011, he was selected as the ISU School of IT Distinguished Alum.
Elias Sahyouni
Elias Sahyouni is a Cyber Security Analyst at COUNTRY Financial. Elias graduated from Eastern Illinois University with a Bachelor of Science in Business, Management Information Systems. Elias has been involved with the Business and Industry Advisory Council since 2011 when he first attended as a guest (non-participant). He is currently the Cyber Security sub-committee chair on the BIAC. At COUNTRY Financial, Elias is also a member of the IT Intern Recruiting Team. Elias helped with the Illinois State University Association of IT Professionals (AITP) chapter for several years as the Twin City Chapter education director – where the goal is to help develop key skills of the IT professionals at the university.
Gloria Serrao
Company: NSA
Scott Stevens
Company: Integrity Technology Solutions
Jim Vasilou
Company: Taylor Communications
Craig Westerhold
Company: Collective Medical
Olga Zhornitsky
Olga Zhornitsky is a Manager of IT Campus Programs at Discover. Olga graduated from Loyola University with a Bachelor of Business Administration and a Major in Human Resource Management (HRM). She also holds two Masters from Keller Graduate School of Management, an MBA and an MSHR with a concentration in International Business. Olga manages an expanding and successful campus recruiting program. In addition to traditional internships, she developed a new campus direct hire program and created connection/development opportunities for college hires. Olga is a frequent recruiter at ISU and actively participates in university events such as career fairs, mock interviews, panel discussions, and classroom presentations. She focuses on building relationships with faculty and students with the goal of helping students establish a solid career path in IT. Olga also serves as a member of the ISU IT Business and Industry Advisory Council and is chair of the Data Engineering Subcommittee for the Advisory Council.
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