2017 June Speed Mentoring Bios

MENTORS

Maria Contrino

Director of Implementation Services, Navisite

Maria is the Director of Implementation Services for Navisite, a Spectrum Enterprise Company. Navisite is a leading international provider of enterprise-class, cloud-enabled hosting, managed applications and services.

A dynamic leader with over 25 years’ experience managing IT application and infrastructure support operations. Maria’s management experience encompasses large scale IT product/application implementations, building onshore/offshore support operations, as well as managing infrastructure & application maintenance and support.

In her career Maria consistently produces results and provides focused strategies that move initiatives forward. As a manager she motivates her team through training and teamwork, to ensure goals are achieved together.

Maria holds a BS from Lesley University and an MBA from Northeastern University.

Stacy Fitch

Vice President, Production Operations, ESPN

As ESPN’s vice president, production operations, Stacey Fitch is in charge of the management and strategic direction of the Bristol and Charlotte Production Operations groups. In this role, she leads the teams responsible for production control room and studio operations, highlight and feature editing, and network operations. Collectively, these groups employ more than 500 operators, coordinators and managers. She assumed this position in 2015.

A 20-year veteran of ESPN, Fitch has held a number of roles with increasing amounts of oversight. Most recently, as senior coordinating director since 2011, she was in charge of network operations for ESPN’s domestic and international networks and edit operations for all news and information productions. As senior director, production operations (2008 – 2011), she led the operations team responsible for launching Digital Center 1, SportsCenter and NFL in high definition.Other professional accomplishments include leading the team of technical directors for the launch of the ESPNEWS network and earning “Technical Team Studio” Emmy awards for “This is SportsCenter” and the NFL Draft in 2003 and 2005.

Fitch was originally hired at ESPN in March 1996 as a studio tech II and was promoted twice in 1997 – to studio tech III in May and to technical director in December. In January, 2000, she was promoted to supervisor, studio & tech operations, in June 2003 to manager, production operations, and in October 2005 to director, production operations.

Before joining ESPN, Stacey spent 12 years in local television directing primetime news in the Western New York and Connecticut markets and worked for PBS in Rochester, New York as a host/engineer of a weekly show featuring Jazz artists.

Fitch is a strategic leader who is committed to developing others. She is actively involved in WICT at the national and chapter level, and in 2012, received the WICT New England “Woman to Watch” award. Additionally, she is a graduate of the Betsy Magness Leadership Institute-Class XXIII. In 2014, Stacey was selected as a mentor for the American Corporate Partner program which helps veterans with career development by creating opportunities for mentoring and networking with professionals from national corporations and select universities.

Fitch holds a bachelor of arts degree in communications from the State University of New York College of Brockport.

Jill Frederickson

Vice President, SportsCenter and News Editorial Operations, ESPN

Jill Frederickson, who has been with ESPN since 2003, was named vice president, SportsCenter and News Editorial Operations, in 2016. She was previously senior coordinating producer, SportsCenter and News Editorial Operations.

Frederickson oversees the news desk, assignment desk and event news team as well as the talent producer unit. She manages the central nerve system of ESPN’s journalistic decision-making, editorial communication and logistics. Her groups support ESPN’s flagship program, SportsCenter, and other studio shows, sporting events and digital platforms.

She helped create ESPN’s Universal News Group, which launched in 2015 and was established to foster increased communication between ESPN platforms. She also has played a large role in developing new and more efficient ways for ESPN to use technology to distribute information and video from the field.

Prior to overseeing Editorial Operations, she spent three years managing ESPN’s Bureaus, made up of producers and reporters who provide news and information coverage for all studio shows. Before she joined ESPN’s news gathering efforts, she led all of ESPN’s event Motorsports production, including NASCAR and the IndyCar Series. In addition, she oversaw ESPN’s NASCAR studio production, including the former NASCAR Now and NASCAR Countdown programs. While continuing her coordinating producer duties, in 2010 she produced the final seven NASCAR Sprint Cup race telecasts of the season, culminating in the championship event in Homestead, Fla.

Frederickson joined ESPN as a coordinating producer in ESPN’s remote production in December 2003 and was promoted to senior coordinating producer in April 2008.

Prior to becoming staff at ESPN, Jill was a freelance producer, working predominately for ESPN, producing auto racing, X Games, Great Outdoor Games and College Basketball.

She has won multiple Sports Emmy Awards, including for her work on NBC’s coverage of the 1996 Summer Olympics as well as the Opening Tease for the 2006 Indianapolis 500 on ABC. She is a Class XXIV graduate of the Betsy Magness Leadership Institute and was a mentor in the 2014 Global Sports Mentoring Program.

An Indianapolis native, she received a bachelor’s degree from DePauw University in Greencastle, Ind.

Meg Green

Senior Director, Talent Negotiation and Contract Management, ESPN

Meg Green is Senior Director, Talent Negotiation and Contract Management for ESPN. Her responsibilities include recruiting multi-media talent, negotiating employment contracts and managing the Contract Management department. She also oversees ESPN The Fellowship, a training and development program for sports journalists.

Her career with ESPN has crossed both domestic and international borders. As Sr. Director, Programming & Production Business Operations, her team supported 28 departments facilitating annual salary and merit budgets, workforce planning and administration, production personnel scheduling for 500+ employees, and production contract administration for on-air talent and production personnel.

As manager of Multilingual Services, her fluency in Spanish was essential to the company’s growth of two broadcast services to Central and South America. The day-to-day operations of the Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese-speaking broadcast services included recruiting foreign talent and negotiating contracts in Spanish; oversight of talent at major sporting events (including the Mandarin and Cantonese speaking talent), and management of production personnel.

Meg has been a member of WICT New England since 2005. She has served on the board, as a mentor and a member of the Betsy Magness Leadership Institute, Class 24.

Marcia Keegan

Vice President, Production, ESPN

Marcia Keegan, an attorney who rejoined ESPN in 2005 in the human resources department, has served as vice president, production since 2007.

In this multi-faceted position, Keegan participates in the strategic planning and development activities of the Production department in order to maximize content distribution across ESPN platforms. Responsibilities include the oversight of ESPN’s strategy for migrating Studio brands to new platforms, including incorporating the SportsCenter brand within the local ESPN.com websites. She also oversees the unit responsible for handling the approximately 1000 hours of programming produced by outside vendors that airs across ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC. In 2010, Keegan took on responsibility for daytime programming on ESPN and ESPN2. This includes Mike and Mike, First Take, Around The Horn, Pardon The Interruption, Best of Mike and Mike and Outside The Lines. Aligning these programs with Keegan’s prior portfolio of SportsNation and ESPN Sports Saturday on ABC brings a consistency to ESPN’s daytime line-up.

Since 2005, Keegan had been a senior director in ESPN’s human resources department, as the primary point of contact for assigned business leaders and employees in the content division.

From 1989-1997 and from 1999-2005, Keegan worked at the Hartford law firm Wiggin and Dana where, in part, she served as outside counsel for ESPN, advising and representing it on a wide spectrum of employment issues. In her first stint there as an associate, and later as counsel, she also advised and represented ESPN and other employers in administrative matters at various state and federal agencies.

From 1997-1999, Keegan was director of employment services at the Connecticut Business and Industry Association (CBIA), responsible for counseling member companies regarding new developments in employment law and regulation.

Keegan first worked for ESPN 1982-1986 in network operations, as a day of air coordinator and later as a network operations and traffic coordinator.

Keegan received a bachelor of arts degree in political science from Union College in 1982 and received her law degree from Cornell University.

Kerri St. Jean

Senior Vice President, Human Resources, Northeast Division, Comcast Cable

Kerri St. Jean serves as Senior Vice President of Human Resources for Comcast’s Northeast Division, which consists of approximately 22,000 employees and 8.8 million customers across 14 northeastern states from Maine down through Virginia. In this role, Kerri is responsible for leading all facets of human resources and organizational effectiveness strategy for the Division.

Kerri has more than 20 years of experience in the cable industry, and has held various management and human resource positions with Comcast and its predecessor companies, including Cablevision, MediaOne and AT&T Broadband.

Kerri began her career in cable as the Director of Human Resources for Cablevision Systems in Boston in 1989 and later joined MediaOne to lead the HR organization during a time of rapid growth and change as the company launched its high speed data and voice services for the first time. When AT&T Broadband acquired MediaOne, Kerri was promoted to Vice President of Human Resources for the new company’s Northeast Region, where she helped implement the highly successful acquisitions of Time Warner, Colony Cable and Cablevision, and led the change efforts surrounding AT&T’s purchase of MediaOne. After Comcast acquired AT&T Broadband in November 2002, Kerri was instrumental in leading the Region’s transformation from 2,500 employees to 24,000 employees as it became Comcast’s second largest Division. In this role, Kerri developed and implemented progressive human resources strategies and practices that have now become standard operating procedures nationwide.

Kerri earned her bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Flagler College and received her master’s degree from Northeastern University. In addition, she earned a certificate in human resources management from the Northeast Human Resources Association and is a graduate of the Betsy Magness Leadership Institute, the flagship executive leadership program facilitated by Women in Cable Telecommunications (WICT). Kerri also earned her Executive Coaching certificate from Integral Coaching Canada Inc., a leading edge world-wide coaching institute.

Kerri resides in Merrimac, MA with her family and is an active member of her local community where she serves as a board member for City Year, and an active member of WICT.

Tina Thornton

Senior Vice President, Production and Multimedia Sponsorship Integration and Management Operations, ESPN

Tina Thornton – who joined ESPN directly out of college in 1993 – was named senior vice president, production and multimedia sponsorship integration and management operations in May 2015. In her role, Thornton oversees ESPN’s Multimedia Sponsorship Integration (MSI) unit. Launched in 2014, her team works with ESPN sales to maximize multimedia revenue by integrating sponsorships across shows, products and projects, with an added focus on digital opportunities. She also leads the management operations group, including production management, production scheduling and the business/personnel operations team.

From 2001 to 2014, Thornton led the production of our NCAA Championships coverage, overseeing 24 events including wrestling, lacrosse and the Women’s College World Series. And from 2001 to 2016 she led ESPN’s women’s basketball coverage, including the NCAA Women’s Tournament & Final Four.

Thornton joined ESPN as a production assistant in 1993, directly out of college. From 1994-1998, she worked as an associate producer on a variety of events, including ESPN’s Sunday Night Football, Big Ten college football, college basketball, the NFL Draft and several X Games and Winter X Games. Thornton served as coordinating producer from 1998-2006 for a variety of ESPN Outdoors programming, including the Bassmaster Tour, the Bassmaster Classic and the ESPN Great Outdoor Games.

A Cincinnati native, Thornton graduated from Wake Forest University with a bachelor of arts degree in communications in 1993. In 1999, she completed the Simmons College Program for Developing Managers. From 2002-05, Thornton served a three-year term on the Wake Forest Alumni Council, representing nearly 40,000 alumni worldwide.

In June 1998, Thornton was named one of “20 Under 30,” a list of successful, young women, by Working Woman Magazine. She was also accepted into Women in Cable & Telecommunications (WICT) Betsy Magness Leadership Institute for 2005-06 (Class XII). A yearly participant in ESPN’s formal mentoring program, Thornton has served as a mentor since 2002 and was a member of the 2007 Mentoring Advisory Team. She is now a volunteer youth lacrosse coach in her hometown.

Lisa Yarussi

Vice President, Human Resources, NESN

Lisa A. Yarussi serves as Vice President, Human Resources for New England Sports Network. In this role, Ms. Yarussi is a member of the senior team and a performance driven business partner. Her focus is on the development of strategy and HR initiatives that impact progress and success. Engaging the organization through purpose, coaching, and continuous learning. A passionate HR professional for over 20 years, she is a steward of the culture, talent, and performance.