HONOREE

Lynn Whitcher

General Counsel
MD7
Southwestern Law School

Lynn Whitcher is general counsel of MD7, a mobile infrastructure solutions consultancy serving wireless operators across 19 countries and five continents. Prior to joining MD7 in 2013, Whitcher was a transactional and litigation attorney at McGuireWoods, a prominent AmLaw 100 firm with over 20 offices worldwide where she served as co-chair of the Women's Leadership Forum for the Los Angeles Office and on its recruiting committee. Whitcher believes “the rising tide raises all ships” and is dedicated to investing in the current and future leaders of the wireless industry and the legal profession through her work leading the education committees for the Women’s Wireless Leadership Forum, a volunteer association devoted to the education, advancement, and support of women in the wireless communications industry, as well as the California Wireless Association, an organization helping businesses grow, fostering connections between people, and impacting lives through charity support. Her current responsibilities include commercial contracts, employment, diversity, real estate, trademarks, litigation, compliance, data privacy and cross-border data transfer, data security, artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Whitcher is also a champion for diversity, equity and inclusion. She was recently selected as the host of AGL Media’s new Diversity, Equity & Inclusion series, where she interviews diverse leaders fromacross the wireless network infrastructure on topics such as making the industry more accessible to the next generation of young leaders, narrowing the digital divide, and ensuring fair access to broadband.
Whitcher also serves on the Board of Directors for the Japanese American Bar Association, where she founded their San Diego Committee, and on the Board of Governors for the Asian Pacific American Women Lawyers Alliance. Earlier this year, she spoke on the violence facing the Asian American community.
She cites "The Inside Counsel Revolution," a book written by Ben H. Heineman, Jr., former General Counsel of General Electric as an influence. It taught her that the GC maintains the balance of high performance, sound risk management, and corporate integrity. She believes this is an important obligation because when this balance is achieved, companies will success on a number of levels.

FINALISTS

Bryan Atwater, Esq.

General Counsel
davisREED Construction, Inc.
Loyola Law School

Bryan Atwater, the general counsel for davisREED Construction, has been an in-house construction attorney in SanDiego since 2010. During his time at davisREED, which began four years ago, Atwater has become a trusted advisor to the organization’s board of directors and is responsible for all aspects of the REED companies’ legal affairs throughout the United States. Atwater received a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Whittier College, his juris doctor from Loyola Law School, and his master’s degree in business administration from San Diego State University. Outside of his day job, Atwater makes an effort to give back to the community. He and his wife Brielyn have fundraised for several years for Rady Children's Hospital as well as St. Gregory the Great Catholic School.

David Chernek

General Counsel/Chief Compliance Officer/Corporate Secretary
Cascade
Financial Services
Boston College

David Chernek is an accomplished lawyer, general counsel and senior executive leader with over 30 years of experience.
Chernek is currently the general counsel and chief compliance officer at Cascade Financial Services, a specialized nationwide mortgage lender owned by funds advised by Centerbridge Partners. At Cascade, Chernek is responsible for the legal, secretarial, compliance, regulatory, internal audit, vendor management, licensing and quality control functions. Chernekhas broad legal andoperational experience, which includes change management, corporate governance, regulatory affairs, labor and employment advice, contract management, compliance systems, and themanagement of high-profile legalmatters. Chernek previously spent 15 years in private practice at two prominent national lawfirms (Latham & Watkins and Heller Ehrman) specializing in complex litigation, financial services andantitrust suits, including five years as a shareholder (Heller Ehrman). Chernek’s corporate experience prior to joining Cascade included positions as theheadof litigation at Indymac Bank and the general counsel at Prospect Mortgage.

Alex Robertson

General Counsel/In-House Counsel
Native-ly
Pepperdine School of Law

Alex Robertson has always had a strong passion for working with creative people in groundbreaking fields, helping them protect and profit from their imaginations and ideas. Graduating from Pepperdine School of Law with an emphasis in entrepreneurship, technology and business, Robertson worked with a number of tech startups in the “Silicon Beach” area, including a medical device startup creating 3D-printed prosthetic limbs for victims of war-torn areas, analyzing business investments and regulatory compliance in the growing commercial space sector, and working as part of the team to bring the vision of the Hyperloop transportation system to reality. Today he works as part of the general counsel team for cutting-edge cannabis company Native-ly, focused on changing the world through augmenting and improving wellness and the human experience. In the last two years, there have been a number of significant industry-first partnerships spearheaded by Robertson and team, ultimately setting the standards for cannabis business sports partnerships.

Alexandra Shapiro

General Counsel
Omaze
George Washington University Law School

Alex Shapiro began her career as a litigator in the healthcare regulatory space before transitioning in-house in 2013 to Conifer which focused on datadriven health solutions. Her first general counsel position was at Heal, where she worked on increasing accessibility by expanding their consumer services across six states. While her early career in healthcare was driven by a desire to help people, themission and potential impact of Omaze was something she couldn’t pass up, and she joined the company as general counsel in 2017. Shapiro has built out and extended Omaze’s ability to scale its impact. She has done this by expanding Omaze’s relationship with CAF America, a globally recognized, U.S.-based charity that enables Omaze to make grants quickly and efficiently. Omaze has now raised $150 million to support over 400 charities through grants from CAF America.