2009 Keynote Speakers

  • Diego Sanchez

    Diego Sanchez

    Legislative Assistant to Congressman Barney Frank, U.S. House of Representatives

    Diego Miguel Sanchez, APR, is Legislative Assistant to Congressman Barney Frank (MA-4) and is the first openly transgender person to work on Capitol Hill. His portfolio of issues includes Health and Human Services, LGBT Civil Rights, Labor, Veterans, Social Security, Federal Employees, The Postal Service and The Census.

    With decades of social justice and civil rights advocacy, including marriage equality and pharmacy access to clean needles in Massachusetts and gender identity and expression anti-discrimination in Boston, Diego has nearly 30 years of award-winning experience in global public relations, marketing and diversity management at the world headquarters of Starwood Hotels, ITT Sheraton, The Coca-Cola Company, Holiday Inn Worldwide and Burson-Marsteller/NY. At ITT Corporation, he earned the Harold S. Geneen Award, the company’s highest honor for Unique Team Achievement.

    Named among the Top 100 Most Powerful Latinos in Corporate America by Hispanic Business magazine and one of the 100 most powerful Latinos in Massachusetts (Poderometro/Power Meter) by El Planeta newspaper in 2007 and 2008, Diego introduced more than 50 global programs and 20 global brands including Diet Coke® and The St. Regis®.

    He is the first openly transgender person appointed to a DNC standing committee, named to Platform by Party Chair Gov. Howard Dean and appointed a Party Leader (PLEO) and At-Large Delegate to the 2008 Convention. Diego successfully gained historic inclusion in the Platform of his three designated priorities: calling for a National AIDS Strategy by name, adding gender identity to non-discrimination in employment alongside sexual orientation and including same-sex couples as families.

    He testified before Congress last summer as one of three individual transgender witnesses on the issue of employment non-discrimination for transgender Americans. Reps. Barney Frank and Tammy Baldwin also testified at the historic hearing.

    Diego served on President Barack Obama’s LGBT Policy Advisory Committee and Transgender Policy Sub-Committee and after being a national LGBT Advisor for Sen. Hillary Clinton’s Presidential Candidacy. Diego is a Senior Fellow of The Emerging Leaders Program of the Center for Collaborative Leadership in the College of Management at UMass/Boston.

    Diego is a former Business Council and Boston Diversity Co-Chair of The Human Rights Campaign, a Founding Board member of The National Center for Transgender Equality, Past Co-Chair of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition and member of G Club, reserved for University of Georgia Lettermen, which he earned in women’s tennis. He was graduated from UGA with a BA in Journalism and major in Public Relations in 1980, where he was named to Mortar Board recognizing scholarship, leadership and service and to Omicron Delta Kappa (ODK), the National Leadership Honor Society.

  • Speaker photo

    Blythe Masters

    Head of Global Commodities, J.P. Morgan

    Blythe Masters is a graduate of Trinity College, Cambridge, with a BA in economics.She is currently the Head of Global Commodities at JP Morgan and a member of J.P. Morgan's firmwide Executive Committee.From 2004-2006, Blythe was the CFO of JP Morgan’s Investment Bank.

    She was previously the Head of Global Credit Portfolio and Credit Policy and Strategy at JP Morgan, responsible for the management of credit and market risks of the bank’s retained credit positions arising from lending and derivatives activities, the development of credit strategy, policies, infrastructure and limits to measure and control credit risk, and coordinating the financial and risk reporting of the firm’s credit activities.

    Prior to that, she was Head of North American Structured Credit Products and Co-Head of Asset Backed Securitization at JP Morgan, managing businesses including ABS, Conduit Financing, CLOs, Synthetic Securitization, Credit Hybrids, Insurance and Pension Derivatives, Latin American Structured Finance, Repackaging and Structured Products Risk Management.

    Prior to this, Blythe was responsible for Global Credit Derivatives Marketing at JP Morgan Securities, Inc. Her responsibilities included structuring and distribution of credit derivative products and related credit risk management strategies, both for JP Morgan and its clients. In 1998-99, Ms. Masters was also Co-Head of North American Credit Portfolio.

    Blythe joined JP Morgan in 1991 having completed a number of internships in the bank’s Derivatives businesses dating back to 1987. She has experience in derivatives marketing and trading (spanning fixed income, commodities and credit markets), credit portfolio management, structured finance, securitization and finance.

    She is Board Chair of the NY Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure.

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