Leadership Through A Storm: Managing Your Team Through A Crisis

Michele C. Lee is a seasoned legal advisor with a track record of successfully tackling high-profile domestic and global disputes. As Senior Director and Associate General Counsel responsible for Twitter's global litigation, regulatory, and competition matters, Ms. Lee routinely handles high stakes disputes involving platform liability, speech rights, privacy, intellectual property, and commercial issues.

She also counsels company leaders about litigation and regulatory risk, and formulates company strategy on competition matters.

Prior to joining Twitter, Ms. Lee advised senior executives at Visa about litigation and competition risk in the payments industry. Before entering the private sector, Ms. Lee was a United States Department of Justice Trial Attorney and prosecuted cases of civil fraud committed against the government.

Megan C. Ryan, Esq. serves as the Corporation’s Chief Legal Officer. As such, Ms. Ryan is the General Counsel/Counsel to the Board for NuHealth/NUMC and A Holly Patterson Extended Care Facility. She oversees all legal, corporate governance, privacy and ethics functions. Ms. Ryan has served as NuHealth/NUMC’s Chief Compliance, Privacy and Ethics officer responsible for investigating any suspicion of fraud, waste, or abuse and has been responsible for maintaining our strong compliance program since 2016. Additionally, she has served as the Chief Compliance Officer for the Nassau Queens Performing Provider System (“NQP”) in the New York State Delivery System Reform Incentive Payment Program (DSRIP) implementing and overseeing the execution of DSRIP, compliance practices at the NQP level and its partnering hubs (NUMC, North Shore and Catholic Health Systems) and has served as a voting director on the NQP PPS Board.

Ms. Ryan brings a wealth of experience and impressive achievements, with extensive academic and legal skills that have prepared her well for the challenges and opportunities of this crucial position. Ms. Ryan is admitted to the New York State Bar and the United States Supreme Court. Prior to joining the Nassau Health Care Corporation, Ms. Ryan served as in house corporate counsel for Liberty Mutual Insurance Company at the firm of Martyn, Toher and Martyn. She had previously worked as an associate attorney in the law firm of O’Reilly, Marsh and Corteselli, P.C., concentrating on banking, real estate, and litigation matters.

Ms. Ryan earned her Bachelor of Science degree from Fordham University as a Dean’s Scholar and Biology Chairman Circle honoree and earned her Juris Doctor from Saint John’s University School of Law. She is a member of the Nassau County Bar Association, Nassau County Women’s Bar Association, New York State Bar Association (NYSB Women in Law; Health Law Committees) and the American College of Hospital Executives. Her paper entitled “An Examination of Regulations and Decisions Concerning the Mandatory Retirement of State Judges” was published nationally in Court Review and was awarded first prize by the AJA. She is also a member of the Nassau County Women’s Bar Association.

Ms. Ryan is the recipient of the 2016 Long Island Power Woman Award. In 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 Ms. Ryan presented at ALM’s national General Counsel Conferences on the subjects that included “Building a High Value Corporate Legal Department in Transformative Times” and “Gold Standards for Legal Department Ethics”. She presented at the “Women, Influence and Power in the Law” in Washington, DC in 2019 and 2020. She was recognized as a Power Woman in Business in 2016, 2019 and 2020. Additionally, LIBN named Ms. Ryan as a “Leader in the Law” in 2017. Megan was distinguished as a “Forty Under Forty “Award recipient in her role as General Counsel in 2018. Ms. Ryan was recognized by the Nassau County Commission of Human Rights for her efforts in World AIDS Day in 2020. She is the recipient of the Indian Association of Long Island Community Award for her work in accessing programs to the community. Ms. Ryan was honored as the Long Island Herald’s Distinguished Leader Award in 2020.

She served as a panelist on Long Island Herald’s Education and Covid-19 discussing hospital operations and school precautions during Covid-19 and discussed her role as General Counsel to the County’s only public hospital (a New York State Public Benefit Corp.) and President of the North Merrick School Board during the pandemic. Ms. Ryan also served as a member of the North Merrick School District’s Re-Entry Task Force. She served as a panelist for Saint John’s University’s School of Law Covid-19 Symposium discussing hospital operations and legal policies during Covid-19. Ms. Ryan’s efforts during the Covid-19 pandemic was recognized in the New York Law Journal and nationally by Law.Com.

Ms. Ryan is the 2020 Irish Echo Community Champion Award recipient and received the national Women, Influence & Power in the Law In House Leadership Award in the fall of 2020.

She serves as a board member for the Butterfly Initiative Project since 2019 and offers pro bono legal advice to the international organization Friends for Good Health.

Ms. Ryan has served as North Merrick Board of Education Trustee since 2018 and is currently serving her second term as BOE President.

Colleen M. Coyle has been General Counsel for the American Psychiatric Association since 2011. Prior to that she was a partner in the law firm of Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, LLP and practiced complex commercial and intellectual property litigation for over 20 years. She has been co-leading APA’s effort to enforce the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act on behalf of APA members and their patients.

Latoya Asia is VP, Global Head of Inclusion, Diversity & Belonging at Verisk Analytics, a leading data analytics and risk assessment firm. In her role, Ms. Asia focuses on enhancing an inclusive culture and greater diversity, and developing and executing initiatives, policies, programs, and training that create measurable impact. Before joining Verisk, Ms.

Asia served as Director, Associate General Counsel at E*TRADE Financial Corporation, providing day-to-day and strategic legal counsel on a range of employment and diversity & inclusion matters impacting the company.

Ms. Asia also drove diversity & inclusion efforts within the company, advising senior leadership and employee resource groups and influencing actions that supported an inclusive work environment. Ms. Asia’s experience also includes service as a strategic human resources and labor relations business partner at a global petroleum additive manufacturing company, a teacher at a K-12 school in Niamey, Niger, and as a labor and employment attorney at an international law firm. Ms. Asia holds a J.D. from the College of William and Mary and a B.S. from Virginia Commonwealth University. Outside of work, she enjoys spending time with her family, international travel, and cooking. She serves on the boards of several professional and civic organizations and is a mentor to many.

Prior to joining E*TRADE, Ms. Asia practiced labor & employment law at a large law firm where her practice predominantly involved representing and counseling employers in the areas of employment discrimination, labor-management relations and general employment litigation. While at the firm, Ms. Asia also gained invaluable experience as an integral member of a complex, multiyear, federal trade secret misappropriation litigation team.

Susan F. Duarte is Director of Legal Affairs at T-Mobile. She provides legal support across the organization, working with executives, business partners, and consultants to implement and realize strategies by eliminating costs. Supervises, leads and has trained up to 10 attorneys and 8 legal staff. Manages 30 outside counsel and legal budgets for internal and external activities. Served as a speaker and presenter at 15 conferences to date on subjects such as social media, crisis management, advertising, cybersecurity, and litigation.

Susan received a B.A from Boston College and graduated from the Columbus School of Law at the Catholic University of America with a Certificate from the Law and Technology Institute. Susan now serves on the Board of the Law and Technology Institute at the Columbus School of Law while also volunteering her time with several community organizations.