White House Author

Cynthia joined Peace Corps in 2010 as an experienced strategy and management consultant. As an independent consultant for over ten years, Cynthia worked with household names in the corporate sector, as well as non-for-profits, where her expertise in marketing and media brought considerable success to a wide and varied set of clients in the private and non-profit sectors. Cynthia’s innovative approaches and fresh branding paradigms made her a unique talent in the development and implementation of business plans, where she worked with clients to restructure category dynamics, establish relevance in the marketplace, and build appropriate alliances. Cynthia served as the Vice President of Strategic Planning for Woolworth Corporation, an $8 billion global retailer with 40 different retail formats, where she led the corporate-wide strategic planning process. In that capacity, she identified strategic issues, market trends, and risks; assisted in developing strategic, financial, and capital targets for corporate functions and operating divisions; supported businesses and corporate functions in developing and presenting their strategic plans to senior management; tracked progress of strategic initiatives against plan; and oversaw senior management processes to coordinate, communicate, and integrate initiatives across operating divisions. Cynthia began her business career at McKinsey & Co., where she worked in the retail, media and consumer goods practices for over six years. Cynthia was Senior Program Officer in the Latin American and Caribbean Program of the World Wildlife Fund. Cynthia earned a Bachelor’s degree from Harvard University in Biology and Visual and Environmental Studies, and a Masters in international studies from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from The Wharton School, as a Fellow of The Lauder Institute. She speaks Spanish and Portuguese, having spent over a dozen summers in Latin America. She is also a visual artist.