Karen Mildenhall
Verified Expert in Finance
Growth Expert
Phoenix, AZ, United States
Toptal member since June 6, 2022
Karen is a Fortune 500 transformative corporate executive with over 20 years of expertise leveraging the connection between strategy, risk, operations, people, customers, communications, and P&L management while leading and advising senior leaders on large-scale strategic and operational change. She established a track record of collaboratively leading globally diverse teams to create groundbreaking change in over a dozen industries. She has a dozen business turnrounds in her career.
Career Highlights
Education Highlights
Certification Highlights
Case Studies
Expertise
- Change Leadership
- Executive Coaching
- Management Consulting
- Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A)
- Organizational Change Management (OCM)
- Organizational Design
- Public Speaking
- Risk Assessment
Work Experience
President | CEO
KM Leadership Solutions
- Led the post-merger integration of an advertising company of two competitors. Evaluated, planned, and designed the parent company and Newco's HR, IT, operations, services, and production. Trained process design teams and completed PMI in six months.
- Re-energized an end-to-end system implementation previously stalled for 12 months. Identified problems, sticking points, and issues and facilitated teams creating solutions. Completed the project within the original timelines and budget.
- Evaluated a real estate management company to prepare for due diligence. After end-to-end evaluation, I delivered recommended changes to increase business valuation by 20%. The owner implemented the changes and kept the business.
- Designed and implemented the new global structure of a company to support its rapid growth strategy by focusing on simplicity and leveraging its strengths. The company is seeing up to 60% growth in some locations.
Change Program Lead and Culture Strategist
Owens Corning - Manufacturing Operations
- Advised team leaders for the enterprise-wide New Hire Task Force, helping them navigate the complexity of the project and the differing agendas of key executive leaders.
- Helped task force leaders to organize, prioritize, and the project. This enabled them to execute plans that positioned US plants to have remarkably improved onboarding and training for new hires.
- Delivered just-in-time leadership coaching to project leads as they were grappling with diverse expectations across the senior leadership team.
- Offered ways to apply change management principles to help plants prepare, execute, and sustain proposed changes from the task force.
Executive Vice President | Resident Managing Director
Aon
- Turned around the chronically worst-performing office in the US. Deep double-digit negative margins sustained 25% within one year and a 25% compounded growth rate for four years.
- Designed and implemented the net promoter score (NPS) process for AZ operations. Created high-performing service teams receiving a cumulative 9.5 client NPS for three years. This resulted in over 90% client revenue retention year-over-year (YoY).
- Evaluated target company risks for confidential private equity (PE) firms. Implemented post-merger risk management and employee benefit programs for 30% of the PE targets acquired.
- Integrated a post-merger risk management program for an M&A carve-out in Asia-Pacific. Trained the acquired company's finance staff on risk management solutions and processes and negotiated a $50 million recovery from post-deal earthquake damage.
- Overhauled processes and workflows to streamline work and utilize available technology while using design thinking. This included customer service process design, sales process design, and process implementation.
- Negotiated a fast $50 million claims payment within a fiscal year quarter for a global tech company impacted by an earthquake in Japan. Major claims payments for most catastrophic losses often require years to negotiate.
Board Chair
American Red Cross
- Provided critical strategic leadership for the board and chapter operations during unprecedented national, regional, and local changes. Advised American Red Cross C-suite on changing priorities.
- Increased board engagement at 100% in donations and critical activity participation. Updated board governance practices, board development, recruiting, and performance measures.
- Terminated chapter CEO, led new CEO selection, and changed chapter leadership team. Created a new chapter strategy resulting in nearly 100% fundraising improvement, community service delivery, and KPIs.
- Developed a women's philanthropic group called Tiffany Circle, inviting high-net-worth women to participate in Chapter fundraising. Established over $1M in new local funds from members. Helped the British Red Cross launch its Tiffany Circle.
Managing Director
Marsh
- Recommended Marsh's US M&A strategy for middle-market growth.Created a separate company, funding, and strategy to acquire companies in the US. This plan resulted in approximately $2 billion in annualized revenue.
- Consulted four publically traded global companies in M&A risk and post-merger integration for deals impacting over a $6 billion market capitalization.
- Acted as the executive leader for the US middle-market insurance services with over $500 million in annual revenue and approximately 1,800 colleagues. Implemented TOM and design thinking practices.
- Owned profit and loss responsibility and achieved 13% YoY growth. Led a team to simplify operations, processes, and systems in a matrixed organization.
- Served as the executive leader and negotiator of the US number two brokerage center, delivering brokerage services for 1,000 clients from five branch offices in the Western US.
- Led 25 insurance brokers and achieved a 48% YoY adjusted growth rate of $360 million with top insurance carriers and over 1,000 specialty global insurance companies.
- Provided internal coaching, training, and consulting with VP level and higher for five offices regarding pricing services strategies and negotiation tactics. Increased engagement pricing by 3–5% while other markets experienced price decreases.
- Provided risk evaluations and strategies with the Fortune 1000 and middle-market companies, including the board of directors presentations.
- Provided executive redirection to national IT projects for the middle-market segment in the US. This included current workflow evaluation, process redesign, and implementation. Corrected previously had significant scope creep and budget overruns.
- Created national subject matter expert practice for worker's compensation risk. Provided thought leadership, problem-solving, business development resources, and client retention support to over 40 US offices.
Commercial Business Executive | Regional Commercial Lines Manager | National Product Manager
USF&G Insurance
- Designed, developed, and executed US business strategy for acquiring and retaining large commercial accounts. Turned loss leader product into 35% net profit in less than 12 months and created 31% net profitability improvement across all operations.
- Managed $250 million in commercial business in 24 western states. Created the top-performing region for profitability and service. Simplified processes and procedures for field offices and increased profitability and growth by over 15% in 12 months.
- Led two US offices simultaneously, including the AZ, NV, UT, and ID territories, and turned the poorest performing office into a top-rated growth, profitability, quality, and service. Delivered 60% growth YoY for AZ and NV.
- Spearheaded the post-merger integration management when the company was acquired. Led employee selection and integrations for the AZ, NV, UT, and ID offices. Retained all the acquired company's employees for more than three years post-integration.
Education
Master’s Degree in Business Administration (MBA)
Loyola University of Maryland - Baltimore, MD, USA
Bachelor of Science Degree in Health Sciences – Environmental and Occupational Safety and Health
Brigham Young University - Provo, UT, USA
Certifications
Certificate in Private Company Board Governance
Private Directors Association
International Mergers & Acquisitions Expert (IM&A)
Institute for Mergers and Acquisitions
Certified Professional Coach
Center of Coach Certification – ICF accredited
Certified Safety Professional (Retired)
Board of Certified Safety Professionals
Skills
Finance
Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A), Risk, Profit & Loss (P&L), Pricing Strategy, Due Diligence, Value Creation, Cross-border M&A, P&L Forecasting, Valuation
Geographic Expertise
United States
Industry Expertise
Industrial & Manufacturing, Hygiene & Personal Care, Health, Worker Health & Safety
Data & Analysis Software
Salesforce
Other
Executive Coaching, Post-merger Integration, Change Leadership, Change Management, Public Speaking, Organizational Change Management (OCM), Consulting, Risk Assessment, Strategy, Leadership, Team Leadership, Board Leadership, Board Presentations, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Business Consulting, Executive Presentations, Executive Consulting, Team Mentoring, Team Management, Global Team Management, Cross-functional Team Leadership, Team Building, Transformational Leadership, Business Transformation, Corporate Culture, P&C Insurance, Business Strategy, Management Consulting, Stakeholder Interviews, Stakeholder Management, Implementation, M&A Strategy, Corporate Development, Customer Service, Price Negotiations, System Implementation, Microsoft, Zoom, Safety, Project Management, Decision Modeling, Due Diligence Consultant, Corporate Governance, Process Mapping, Process Improvement, Sales Process Management, Board Reporting, Sales, Process Design, Board Decks, Work Process Design, Board Development, Senior Executive Management, Senior Executive Recruiting, Executive Reporting, Execution Risk, Global Risk, Business Continuity & Disaster Recovery (BCDR), Project Leadership, Decision Support, Leadership Strategy, Teams, Leadership Training, Operational Risk, Culture Development, Customer Analysis, Sales Strategy, P&L Management, Business Development, Business Models, Business Modeling, Business Process Modeling, Operating Models, Organizational Design, Stakeholder Engagement, Stakeholder Analysis, Stakeholder Mapping, Program Management, Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG), RFP Negotiation, Slack, Influencers, Salesforce Knowledge, Process Flows, IT Project Management, Organizational Readiness, Customer Journeys, Customer Research, Public Sector, Business Continuity, Customer Success, Interviews, Media, Target Operating Models, PMI, Coaching, Environment, Waste Management, Organizational Development, Physics, Industrial Relations, Adult Learning, Compliance Training, Liability Insurance
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