CEO, WLJ Advisors; Award-Winning Author; Keynote Speaker; Lecturer, Harvard Business School's Corporate Learning; Executive Coach and Advisor to CEOs

Whitney Johnson

Whitney Johnson is the CEO of WLJ Advisors and one of the 50 leading business thinkers in the world as named by Thinkers50. She is an expert on helping high-growth organizations develop high-growth individuals. Whitney is an award-winning author, world-class keynote speaker, frequent lecturer for Harvard Business School’s Corporate Learning and an executive coach and advisor to CEOs. She is a popular contributor to the Harvard Business Review, has 1.7 million followers on LinkedIn, where she was selected as a Top Voice in 2018, and her course on Fundamentals of Entrepreneurship has been viewed more than 1 million times. In 2019, she was ranked #3 on the Global Gurus’ Top 30 Organizational Culture Professionals. In 2017, she was selected from more than 16,000 candidates as a “Top 15 Coach” by Dr. Marshall Goldsmith.

An innovation and disruption theorist, she is the author of the bestselling Build an “A” Team: Play To Their Strengths and Lead Them Up the Learning Curve, and the critically-acclaimed Disrupt Yourself: Putting the Power of Disruptive Innovation to Work.  In these books, she codifies her frameworks for developing high-growth individuals and organizations – the Personal Disruption and the S Curve of Learning frameworks. Whitney was the cofounder of the Disruptive Innovation
Fund with Harvard Business School’s Clayton Christensen, through which they invested in and led the $8 million seed round for South Korea’s Coupang, currently valued at more than $9 billion. She was involved in fund formation, capital raising, and the development of the fund’s strategy.

As a former award-winning Wall Street stock analyst, Whitney understands momentum and growth. She was an Institutional Investor–ranked equity research analyst for eight consecutive years and was rated by StarMine as a superior stock picker. Whitney hosts the weekly Disrupt Yourself podcast, publishes a popular weekly newsletter, and she is married with two children.

Division President, Americas, WD-40 Company

Patricia Olsem

As the division president of WD-40 Company’s Americas segment, Patricia is responsible for overseeing all operations throughout the United States, Canada and Latin America.

Patricia has been with WD-40 Company since 2005 and has held various management positions including, senior vice president and general manager of United States, senior vice president marketing and innovation of the Americas, and vice president Americas innovation development group.

Prior to joining WD-40 Company, Patricia worked in brand management at ConAgra Foods from 2000 to 2005, International Home Foods from 1997 to 2000 and Diageo from 1995 to 1998.  She currently serves on the board of advisors for the Cremo Company.

Patricia received her Bachelor of Science degree in marketing from King’s College and her Master of Science in Executive Leadership from the University of San Diego.

When she is not working, she can be found spending time with her husband and son, at sporting events (Go Yankees!), traveling, working on home improvements and taking time to lounge on various California beaches.