Meet Our Advisory Board

Rizan Mohsin is a builder of innovative, value-based healthcare programs with extensive experience in academic medical centers, non-profit community health clinics and national and international associations. She currently serves as a Section Administrator at the University of Chicago Medicine Comer Children's Hospital. As a designer of transformative, cost-saving initiatives that increase clinical impact and access to care, she focuses on putting patients first. Recognized as a best practice and solutions focused thinker, she is exceptionally skilled in providing stability during times of crisis. 

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Rizan values continuous learning, networking, and volunteering in order to enhance the health and cultivate the success of her communities. She enjoys serving as a mentor to students early in their leadership journey, is an active member of her local ACHE chapter and serves as a member of the UAMS MHA Board of Advisors. She is an active member of the inaugural Advisory Board of Owlsevations, LLC, a career service firm. Rizan served as a Stuart A. Wesbury Postgraduate Fellow with the American College of Healthcare Executives and earned her Masters in Healthcare Administration from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.

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Marla V. Plummer Hillery, a native Chicagoan with roots in West Englewood, attended Robert Lindblom Technical High School. Marla continued her education at the prestigious Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University, where she earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Journalism. Later, Marla attended the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she received a Master of Science Degree in Special Education.

 

Editing, writing, information gathering, knowledge/lifelong learning, and sharing resources with others are part of Marla’s DNA. Upon completion of her collegiate education, Marla, a multi-faceted professional has had the opportunity to share her talents in diverse professional spaces. Over the course of her career, Marla has used her skills and related proficiencies at global associations like the American Bar Association; higher education settings like City Colleges of Chicago; international law firms like Mayer Brown LLP; and textbook publishing companies including Scott, Foresman Publishing, McDougal Littell, and Riverside Publishing.

 

While the majority of Marla’s professional career has involved publishing, editorial services, and classroom instruction, more recently she transitioned into location data and technology with HERE Technologies, a leading, global, platform company. After a decade at HERE, Marla’s latest career path interest has her flexing creative muscles in digital marketing.

 

As an entrepreneur, Marla, aka Resources Unlimited, has used her editorial expertise to assist a variety of business organizations and individuals. Whether she is Marla Plummer the print journalist, or Marla VP Hillery, the editor, proofreader, and educator, her goal is the same --- to dispense accurate, useful, and solution-oriented information that offers utility.

 

This introduces things Marla has done, titles held, schools attended, and employers worked with. But who is Marla, really?

 

Marla is a Christian woman of faith, a daughter, sister, niece, granddaughter, cousin, sister-in-law, etcetera. Notwithstanding the relationship with God Almighty, Marla’s favorite roles are mom/mother and friend.

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Leadership and professional development guru Candace D. Washington helps keep individuals and organizations on the growth track by empowering emerging leaders with professional development skills to accelerate performance, take ownership of their career journey, and thrive at their highest levels.

 

For years navigating career roles across various industries, as a diverse rising leader and millennial, Candace faced many barriers to success, failures, and lessons learning the hard way that young talent need far beyond book smarts to navigate, lead, and succeed. Interpersonal skills are pivotal to success.

 

As a result, Pivotal Impact was founded. Candace and her team is on a mission to help midsized and fast growing companies empower young professionals and their managers with essential skills and inclusive cultures that drive performance, innovation, and belonging. Thus, elevating engagement and retention of talent as companies grow and scale.

 

Her career experience spans across Fortune 500 corporations, academia, and not-for-profit. Prior to founding Pivotal Impact, Candace served as Senior Lead of Training and Development at the University of Chicago. She's an alum of University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and received her MBA, with emphasis in Learning and Development from Roosevelt University. When not immersed in her work, you'll find her enjoying time with family, traveling to connect with different cultures, bowling, mentoring, and dancing (albeit she's not any good at it ;-) )

She lives in and LOVES Chicago! Go BEARS!

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