Advisory Board

George Svigos is Executive Director of Communications, GM International, a role he assumed in 2020. He leads a team of communications professionals across South America, Europe, Russia, Central Asia, Middle East, North Africa, India, Southeast Asia, Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, which is focused on corporate, consumer and internal communications, as well as corporate social responsibility.  His objective is to develop and implement communications strategies in support of GM’s vision of creating a world of Zero Crashes, Zero Emissions and Zero Congestion. George joined GM in 2013 and has held leadership roles in communications and government relations across a number of markets in the international region. Previous to joining GM, he held senior public affairs roles in the energy and banking sectors. Prior to this, he was a political adviser in state and federal politics in Australia. George has a degree in Journalism from the University of South Australia and in 2021 obtained an Accelerated Management Development Certificate from the University of Michigan Stephen M Ross School of Business.

Ray Kerins is Chief Executive Officer of The Next Solutions Group, a corporate reputation, issues management, business intelligence and cybersecurity organization. Prior to NSG, Ray was Senior Vice President of Corporate Affairs for Bayer Corporation. At Bayer, he managed all communications, government relations and policy for the company’s main businesses – Agricultural, Consumer, Pharmaceuticals and Animal Health. He was a member of the U.S. Country Leadership Team and the Bayer Global Leadership Council. Ray also oversaw the Bayer U.S. Foundation and was chairman of Bayer’s political action committee. He was the executive sponsor for Bayer’s veteran employee resource group BRAVE (Bayer Resources for Armed Forces Veteran & Employees): and the site leader for all of Bayer’s facilities in the Northeast, covering 5,000 employees. Prior to Bayer, Ray was Vice President of external affairs & worldwide communications for Pfizer Inc. Prior to Pfizer, he was Executive Director of public affairs for Merck & Co. He holds a Master of Science degree and Bachelor of Arts degree from Iona College. He has also attended executive leadership trainings at Harvard Business School.

Penny Manis is the Vice President, Editorial & Content Strategy of CNN en Español . She has direct responsibility for the editorial and strategic direction of the network, the development & enhancement of digital services and products, audience growth, and revenue-generating commercial opportunities. Previously, she was the Vice President of Programming at CNN International. She oversaw the network’s programming including New York, Atlanta, London and Abu Dhabi based shows. Manis was instrumental in the network’s coverage of major global stories. She has also served as the Senior Director of Business Programming for CNN International based in New York, shaping the network's financial & economic news agenda and directing reporters and shows. Her experience includes working as a senior producer for “AC360”, a prime time CNN program hosted by Anderson Cooper. Manis played a leading role selecting and launching stories and guest segments. Manis joined CNN 25 years ago as an associate producer for CNN en Español in the Washington bureau where she covered U.S.-Latin American relations. She then transferred to CNN’s Atlanta headquarters to become an editorial producer, booking and preparing news makers and analysts to appear on CNN/U.S., CNN International and CNN en Español. Manis has worked overseas in CNN’s London offices for several years, selecting and producing stories for CNN’s European and Middle Eastern audiences. She brings national, global and business expertise to her current role as a member of CNN International’s Executive Team.

Eileen O’Connor was the senior vice president for Communications, Policy, and Advocacy, a member of the Foundation’s executive team, overseeing all government relations and strategic communications for all program priorities, including the climate strategy. Before joining the foundation, O’Connor spent her career as an attorney, government official, non-profit leader, and award-winning war zone and political journalist. In those capacities, she worked as vice president of Yale University, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Obama administration, for South and Central Asia, Senior Adviser to the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, based in Kabul for 14 months, and White House and foreign correspondent for CNN and ABC news. As an attorney, O’Connor specialized in complex litigation, political investigations, multi-party dispute negotiations, and crisis management in the U.S., Russia, and Ukraine. As a journalist, O’Connor won the DuPont, Peabody, Overseas Press Club, Cable Ace, Emmy nominations, the New York Film Festival Golden Eagle, and National Headliner awards for her investigations at the White House, into the terror attacks on 9/11, Russian organized crime, and her coverage of the fall of Communism in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. O’Connor has a bachelor’s degree in business administration, a Juris Doctor from Georgetown University, and a post-graduate Diploma in World Politics from the London School of Economics and Political Science. O’Connor is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a member of the advisory boards of the Ad Council, the Earth Public Information Collaborative, and on the board of the Institute for War and Peace Reporting. She consults for the Department of Homeland Security on incident response for natural and terrorist threats. She comments on Russia, foreign policy, and misinformation on Fox, CNN, and MSNBC, and Russian TV, as well as contributes commentary to the New York Times and CNN.com.

Jere Van Dyk is a journalist, writer and hostage advocate. In the early 1980s, working as a correspondent for The New York Times, he lived with the mujahideen (holy warriors) in Afghanistan as they fought against the Soviet Red Army, an experience that was recapped in his Pulitzer Prize-nominated articles, and in his first book, “In Afghanistan: An American Odyssey.” From 1987 - 1995, he was an explorer for National Geographic Magazine, traveling the length and finding the source of the Brahmaputra and Amazon rivers, among other assignments. Twenty years later, he returned to Afghanistan to report on the U.S.-led war, only to be captured and held by the Taliban for 45 days in 2008. This harrowing experience is detailed in his book “Captive: My Time as a Prisoner of the Taliban,” which Foreign Affairs selected in 2010 as one of its “Must-Read Books for the World Ahead.” His book, “The Trade, My Journey into the Labyrinth of Political Kidnapping,” is the story of his trip back to Afghanistan and Pakistan to find out who really kidnapped him, and why. It was selected in 2017 by The Sunday New York Times Book Review as an Editors’ Choice. His most recent book, “Without Borders: The Haqqani Network and the Road to Kabul,” published in late 2022, is in part about his relationship to the Haqqani Mujahideen, with whom he lived in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan in the 1980s, when they were U.S. allies, who today the U.S. and its allies call the “Haqqani Network,” the most powerful of all Taliban-related military groups, maybe the most powerful jihadist group in the world.