The NIU College of Business held its Alumni Awards Dinner which was hosted by Dean Balaji Rajagopalan, attendees included NIU President Freeman, 2020 and 2021 award winners, NIU College of Business alumni and friends, and NIU faculty and staff, all of whom gathered together in celebration of the college’s award winners for the years 2020 and 2021, respectively.

2021 Distinguished Alumna

Jocelyn Moore, 1999 B.S. Management, 2009 MBA, General Manager of Global Diversity and Inclusion at Microsoft Customer & Partner Solutions + Geographies

Moore is a globally astute human resource executive. Moore is the general manager of Global Diversity & Inclusion at Microsoft. In this capacity she is responsible for leading Global Diversity & Inclusion for the Microsoft Customer & Partner Solutions group and for all geographies.

Moore brings 20 years of progressive human resources experience from global companies like Aon Hewitt, Medline Industries, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, and DXC Technology. Moore has held many transformative Human Resources roles. She started her career as a HR Coordinator and worked her way through the ranks to more progressive complex human resources positions.

Prior to joining Microsoft, she was with a North American based company, responsible for transforming the entire HR department. Moore also spent time as the VP of Global Talent Acquisition with DXC Technology, responsible for recruiting 30,000 new employees each year across the company’s global footprint. In this capacity, Moore was directly responsible for leading all Global Talent Acquisition strategies, including relationship management, workforce planning, talent channels, and overall governance.

Moore recognizes she was helped along her career journey and wants to pay it forward. Over the years, she has done résumé and interviewing workshops, served on many nonprofit boards all focused on helping students with diverse backgrounds, and has had several mentees.

She holds a Bachelor of Science in HR Management and MBA from Northern Illinois University and was the 2018 Distinguished Alumna for the Management Department.

Alan Handley, 1992 B.S. Accountancy, CEO of Lakeshore Recycling Systems

Handley is a transformational waste and environmental services industry leader and president and chief executive officer of Rosemont, Illinois- based LRS (formerly known as Lakeshore Recycling Systems) since the company’s founding in 2013.

Under Handley’s leadership, LRS has experienced exponential growth, disrupting the waste industry status quo through a sustainability-focused circular operating model designed to generate more revenue by diverting and repurposing more material from the waste stream. Today, LRS ranks as the largest independent waste, recycling and portable services provider in the Midwest United States, and the fifth largest waste and recycling provider in North America.

During his tenure, Handley has scaled LRS revenues from $60 million with 220 employees in 2013, to more than $430 million in revenue with more than 1,800 employees in 2021, successfully executing 15 acquisitions in 2021. Handley sets the vision, pace and passion at LRS, introducing new technologies and innovations in waste and recycling, including in 2018, when LRS was the first in the nation to deploy the Machinex SamurAITM robotic sorting machine. LRS today operates 56 facilities across eight Midwestern states: Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa, Michigan, Indiana, Minnesota, Arkansas and Kansas, bringing needed competition to waste, recycling and portable services markets.

Prior to LRS, Handley served as Executive Vice President and CFO at Aldridge Electric, a leading electrical contractor focused on complex critical infrastructure projects. Before Aldridge, Handley served as Managing Director at Mesirow Financial/KPMG, where he led a team of 140 consultants; other leadership positions included Heller Financial, PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, and the United States Marine Corps.

Handley holds an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, where he later served as an adjunct professor, and a bachelor’s degree in accountancy from Northern Illinois University. Handley is a Certified Public Accountant, a Certified Insolvency and Restructuring Advisor, and a Chartered Global Management Accountant. His board commitments include the Lupus Society of Illinois, the Pediatric Lupus Clinic at the University of Chicago’s Comer Children’s Hospital, and the Board of Executive Advisors at the NIU College of Business.

An avid scuba diver, mountaineer and traveler, Handley is passionate about conserving and protecting the environment, and keeping plastic out of the world’s oceans.

Korrey Anderson, 2012 B.S. Operations Management and Information Systems, 2018 MBA, Cyber Security Service Manager at McDonald’s U.S.A.

Anderson has spent the last 10 years working for McDonald’s U.S.A. in various roles including performance testing, risk management, and currently as the cyber security service manager over Endpoint Protection.

In this role she provides support and services to over 100 countries in the McDonald’s system – supplying the solutions necessary to protect corporate and restaurant devices against malware and security threats. Recently she led a large-scale initiative to drive adoption of a globally managed endpoint protection offering across all McDonald’s markets enhancing the security and protection of the organization.

Since her graduation Anderson has remained involved with NIU, participating on the OM&IS Executive Advisory Committee and the ELC Executive Advisory Board. She values the education and experiences she has had at NIU and has embraced opportunities to stay involved and provide guidance and support to other students.

Anderson is a two-time NIU alumna, receiving her undergraduate degree in operations management and information systems in 2012 and her master’s in business administration in 2018.

Suzanne El-Moursi, 2000 B.S. Operations Management and Information Systems, COO of Brighthive

El-Moursi is an accomplished business leader with 20 years’ experience specializing in digital transformations, brand strategy, growth marketing, entrepreneurship and startup operations.

Following 13 very successful years leading innovation and growth strategies at several global brands (IBM, HSBC, GE Healthcare, and (Sa pient Nitro) El-Moursi’s passion for entrepreneurship led to her career shift to building startup businesses.

Beginning in 2012, El-Moursi joined Power2Switch as chief marketing officer, a deregulated energy shopping platform, which was acquired in 2013 by Choose Energy, a portfolio company of Kleiner Perkins Caufield Byers. After the acquisition El-Moursi continued with Choose Energy as vice president of marketing leading brand development and growth marketing taking the energy marketplace across all deregulated energy states. In 2015 she joined another startup, Mira Fitness, as creative director leading product design, growth strategy and marketing.

In 2016 El-Moursi became CEO & President of Uplift Data Partners, a drone technology SaaS and service platform for the construction industry, funded by Clayco Construction’s private equity fund Treehouse Ventures, where she led it from inception to acquisition. Uplift Data Partners was acquired by Precision Hawk, the largest privately held drone technology company, adding the construction vertical to their existing offerings in energy, agriculture and telecommunications.

El-Moursi is currently the chief operations officer at venture backed metadata collaboration platform, Brighthive. Brighthive enables private and public organizations to share and collaborate on different datasets while ensuring the business, legal and technological limitations are solved for. Today El-Moursi is an active Venture Capital Investor with the W Fund and sits on the board of directors for technology startups in data governance and health remote monitoring startups.

El-Moursi is a founding member of Chief, sits on the board of directors for the Chicago Children’s Choir and Northern Illinois University’s College of Business board of advisors to the Dean.

Carlos Andres-Madrigal Restrepo, 2015 MBA, COO of Danec

Madrigal is responsible for the strategic direction, vision and yield growth of Danec, the largest palm oil group in Latin American (Colombia and Ecuador), with more than 5,000 employees and more than 112,000 acres under his responsibility.

As a seasoned professional with more than 20 years of agro- industrial experience, and with a great professional career in executive positions in large companies in the United States, Colombia and Ecuador, Madrigal is known for driving companies to growth, maximizing operational excellence, and delivering financial and productivity performance.

He has mentored managers and presidents throughout his career and is an active member of several boards of directors.

Madrigal holds an Executive MBA from the Northern Illinois University and a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Sergio Arboleda University. He graduated summa cum laude.

Matt Thompson (posthumous), 1980 B.S. Marketing, retired Executive Vice President of Worldwide Field Operations at Adobe

Thompson led Adobe’s efforts to enhance long-term growth opportunities internationally. He persistently focused on understanding Adobe’s customers and maximized sales through their behavior. He was adept at determining what’s hot and new in the industry and pivoting Adobe to keep ahead of the competition. His reputation and impact at Adobe were preeminent.

He was a caring and even boss, but held people accountable for promised deliverables. He was devoted to making sure everyone had a seat at the table, especially women. As a huge supporter of women’s initiatives, he worked tirelessly to support them within the high-tech industry by providing seminars to encourage them to stay current alongside their male counterparts and to inspire them to reach their potential.

Thompson regularly traveled back to NIU’s campus to mentor students and speak in classes. He did so to share his knowledge with future business leaders on sales concepts and the computer software industry. He hosted sales students at Adobe headquarters yearly and regularly invited them to his home for networking.

He also provided NIU’s MBA students access to Adobe offices worldwide. These visits helped connect students to real world insight at international business locations. And Thompson’s impact inspired future business leaders while helping them grasp international commerce.

Outside of Adobe, Thompson sat on the Board of Directors of Appirio, an information technology consulting company headquartered in Indiana. He offered his professional services to assist the company in strategic partnerships with cloud applications, like Salesforce. Additionally, he served on the Board of Directors of the Special Olympics of Northern California.

In light of Thompson’s untimely passing earlier this fall, we are honored to celebrate his accomplishments. We are deeply honored and proud to call Matt Thompson an alumnus, a mentor, and a friend.

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