West Coast Gabelli Centennial Reception

The Brincko Family, Adam McDonough, GABELLI ’88, and Donna M. Rapaccioli, dean of the Gabelli School of Business, cordially invite you to a virtual reception for alumni, parents, students, and friends. Our program will spotlight the innovative initiative at the Gabelli School, the Responsible Business Coalition (RBC), and the scholars, students, and faculty who are leading our work in this critically important area. Explore how we’re forging competitive differentiation and inspiring positive, global change through business leadership.

Please note this event will take place at 6 pm PST and 9 pm EST.

Agenda
6 p.m.: Welcome Remarks: Donna Rapaccioli, dean of the Gabelli School of Business

6:15 p.m.: Presentation: Responsible Business Coalition, Dean Rapaccioli

6:20 p.m.: Fireside Chat: Cara Smyth, fellow and founder, RBC; and Frank Zambrelli, executive director, RBC

6:35 p.m.: Presentation: Noor Kaur, GABELLI, ’21

6:40 p.m.: Audience Q&A: Dean Rapaccioli and Lerzan Aksoy, associate dean of the Gabelli School

6:50 p.m.: Networking and Breakout Rooms

7:05 p.m.: Closing Remarks: Dean Rapaccioli

About the Speakers
Smyth is a Gabelli fellow and the founder of the Responsible Business Coalition. She also serves as the chair of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors: Fashion Makes Change. Smyth is the global managing director at Accenture for Resilient Responsible Retail/Sustainability. She joined Fordham University and Accenture from her post as the founding director of the Fair Fashion Center and vice president of Glasgow Caledonian New York College (GCNYC). As global lead of Accenture’s Resilient Responsible Retail practice, Smyth is applying a data-driven environmental, social, and governance (ESG) lens to build new opportunities that capitalize on the demand for end-to-end responsible business transformation—reducing impact, optimizing supply chains, leveraging consumer interest, utilizing smart technology, and innovating Accenture’s services in this emerging sector. As COVID-19 exposed business and process vulnerabilities to investors and consumers, the materiality of ESG is driving it to be the new management approach to future-proof business.

The Fair Fashion Center was formed to incubate scalable business solutions that address the social and environmental impacts of fashion and became home to the industry’s only CEO coalition. Focused on transforming business through collective action, Smyth built a new protocol that leverages the intersection of profitability and sustainability, helping brands and retailers restructure their processes while identifying operating efficiencies and innovations that turn complex global issues into scalable industry opportunities. Working privately and collectively with 41 CEOs, the group represented 250 brands and nearly 15% of the global industry.

Now housed within Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, FMC is a triple-impact solution that catalyzes collective action, builds resilient communities, and reverses the climate crisis. Recognizing we all have a role to play, FMC aligns industry, nonprofits, investors, and customers in the transition to a sustainable world. A former global fashion industry veteran, Smyth held senior executive positions at Jil Sander, Burberry, and other venerable companies. In her role bridging the industry, academia, and a sustainable future, she served as a board member for Glasgow Caledonian University and Sing for Hope, is an RSA fellow, a Tribeca Disrupter, and on the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) Global Sector Advisory Council. She has delivered keynote presentations at conferences including Textile Exchange, Bluesign, Vogue/Condé Nast Greece, Alcantara/Venice International University Climate HOW, and Bloomberg Vanity Fair Climate Exchange.

Zambrelli is executive director of the newly formed Responsible Business Coalition (RBC) at Fordham University’s Gabelli School of Business, supporting the cross-sector collaboration of industry and education to reduce environmental and social impacts—driving toward a future that considers people, planet and profit. A design and branding chief executive, educator, and sustainability expert, his extensive professional experience spans fashion, retail, and the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) implications therein. After more than a decade working for world-class brands, he began the award-winning studio Design Quadrant and, more recently, launched the NYC-based, sustainable luxury brand 1 Atelier. His extension into academia nearly a decade ago was inspired by a desire to better knit the changing demands of industry to curricula.

His broad-spectrum experience has followed the pulse of change in the fashion industry, where his work has been instrumental in the success of companies for more than 15 years, at a roster including Chanel, Calvin Klein, Coach, and many others. He’s a culture creator—whether shaping start-ups for long-term growth or short-term sale—or leveraging his experience to redirect global brands toward more sustainable and regenerative futures. In his latest venture, Zambrelli joins his former colleagues from the Fair Fashion Center in the formation of an ESG retail practice within Accenture, the multinational professional services company, shaping strategy, digital technology, and operations through the lens of sustainability and a more responsible future.

A regular face in digital, broadcast, and print media, and on panels discussing responsible business and the acceleration of ESG, his latest work focuses on guiding industries in disruption toward a more data-driven, equitable, and regenerative future. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree from FIT, and a Master of Science degree from Glasgow Caledonian.