Industry Profiles and Q&As

Nicole Levin is an artist and environmental organizer living in Los Feliz. Raised in Fairfield, California, Levin studied environmental science at Harvard, and her work reflects contemporary social anxieties in a conscious, poignant voice—with a hearty portion of Jewish humor.

Her writing has appeared in THE NEW YORKER and THE HARVARD CRIMSON, and she has written for THE HARVARD LAMPOON as well as the television series LETHAL WEAPON. Levin previously worked at the Sierra Club, where she helped lead campaigns to phase out urban oil drilling in Los Angeles. Most recently, she has devoted her time to completing an all-white 1,000-piece puzzle. She lives in Southern California with the love of her life, Nina.

Miranda Yousef is an accomplished Emmy-winning documentary director and editor whose work has screened at major outlets including Sundance, Tribeca, PBS, and HBO. Selected editing credits include: Emmy winner BLINK (Telluride 2024, NatGeo); PHOENIX RISING (Sundance 2022, HBO); Emmy winner ART & KRIMES BY KRIMES (MTV Documentary Films); INEQUALITY FOR ALL (Sundance 2013 Special Jury Prize winner); and Academy Award winner Morgan Neville’s Emmy nominee TROUBADOURS (Sundance 2011).

A graduate of Harvard College, Yousef studied documentary filmmaking at UCLA and won the DGA Award for Best Director, Women’s Category, for her graduate thesis film. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Documentary Branch. Her critically acclaimed directorial debut ART FOR EVERYBODY premiered at SXSW 2023, and in 2025 was released theatrically nationwide. The film was nominated for “Best First Documentary Feature” by the Critics Choice Awards, and was named to several best-of lists, including the BBC’s “25 Best Films of 2025” (one of only two documentaries listed), the New York Times’s “Our Favorite Movies from 2025,” and Variety’s “Best Documentaries of 2025.”

Rohit Deshpandé is a Baker Foundation Professor and Sebastian S. Kresge Professor of Marketing, Emeritus at Harvard Business School, where he has been teaching in the Advanced Management Program, the General Management Program, the Program for Leadership Development, the Owner/President Management Program and in other executive education offerings. He is currently teaching ethical leadership in the General Management Program, a module on The Purpose of the Firm in the required curriculum of the MBA program, and a field/project-based course "Business of the Arts" in the MBA elective program. He has also taught global branding, international marketing, and first year marketing in the MBA program as well as a doctoral seminar in marketing management. He is the faculty chair of the Global Colloquium for Participant-Centered Learning and has previously been coordinator for Marketing faculty recruiting, coordinator for Marketing doctoral program admissions, and faculty chair of the Strategic Marketing Management  executive program at Harvard Business School. He is also the faculty chair for Harvard Business School South Asia research. In addition to teaching marketing, he was a part of the design and delivery team that created the Leadership and Corporate Accountability (LCA) MBA required course at HBS focusing on ethics and corporate governance and was faculty chair of the LCA in India executive program. In 2008-2009 Deshpande was recognized as the Henry B. Arthur Fellow for Business Ethics and in 2015 received the Robert F. Greenhill award for outstanding contributions to the HBS community. Most recently his case studies on "Terror at the Taj" and "Street Symphony" have won Silver Telly Awards and his co-authored paper "Consumers avoid buying from firms with higher CEO-to-worker pay ratios" won the 2021 Journal of Consumer Psychology Park Best Paper Award.

Claudia Hinz lives in Bend, Oregon. She was a proud Kirkland House resident  and graduate of the class of 1990. She received her MA in Literature from Southern Methodist University. She worked as a television reporter for network affiliates in Northern California, Seattle, and Dallas. Her work has been published in The Christian Science Monitor, The Boston Globe, Women Writers, Women’s Books, Story Magazine, The Wrath Bearing Tree, and The Manifest-Station. Her debut novel SAFEKEEPING will be released September 30.

Taylor Kay Phillips is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning writer originally from Kansas City, Missouri. She currently writes for LAST WEEK TONIGHT with John Oliver on HBO and is the author of the book A GUIDE TO MIDWESTERN CONVERSATION. Her work has been published in THE NEW YORKER, THE ATLANTIC, and MCSWEENEY'S INTERNET TENDENCY. She lives in Harlem with her husband.

Liz Walker ’11 is a classically trained ballet dancer and choreographer based in Cambridge. She manages Harvard’s Signet Society, an intergenerational, multidisciplinary arts organization on campus. Prior to her retirement from full-time dancing, Liz performed as a soloist with Los Angeles Ballet, dancing a variety of roles in the classical, Balanchine, modern, and contemporary repertory. Liz’s work as a choreographer explores personal lived experience through movement, and she has worked on commissions for Mount Auburn Cemetery, Harvard Ballet Company and Metropolitan Area Planning Council. She lives in Cambridge with her husband, daughter and son.

Michelle Chen is Senior Producer, Kids’ Media and Education at The WNET Group, where she has been creating content for public media broadcast and digital platforms since 2004. She has received Emmy Awards for her work on the PBS KIDS series CYBERCHASE and the multiplatform project, GET THE MATH. Other projects include the groundbreaking educational gaming series MISSION US, which has received the Japan Prize for Educational Media and the Games for Change Award for Most Significant Impact; the Emmy-nominated PBS KIDS preschool math series COUNT ON JUNE BUG!;  the Youth Collective Gen Z engagement initiative; the PBS KIDS video and gaming OH NOAH!; and professional development video series for educators. She received her bachelor’s degree in biology from Harvard University.

Prior to L.A. Material, Sarah Wick spent six years as C.O.O. at Crooked Media, an audio and subscription based media company, and General Manager of a digital gaming vertical at Disney Interactive. An L.A. native, Sarah is happiest working in her garden and foisting her citrus on people.

Madeline Dorroh is a Los Angeles-based voice actor known for their work across video games, anime, and more. You can hear them as Norma in Zenless Zone Zero, Caramel Choux Cookie in Cookie Run: Kingdom, Inori in Medalist, Ratatoskr in Fire Emblem Heroes, Jorda in Trails Through Daybreak I and II, Prez in Project Wingman, and various others. For inquiries, demos and a full list of credits, please see their website at: https://www.madelinedorroh.com

Robert Carlock is the co-creator of the new NBC comedy THE FALL AND RISE OF REGGIE DINKINS, starring Tracy Morgan, Daniel Radcliffe, and Erika Alexander. He was an executive producer of the Emmy-nominated Netflix shows GIRLS5EVA and co-created UNBREAKABLE KIMMY SCHMIDT.  He was also the co-creator of NBC's MR. MAYOR as well as the Netflix animated series MULLIGAN. Carlock was an executive producer and co-showrunner of NBC’s 30 ROCK, earning three Emmy Awards for Outstanding Comedy Series and four nominations in the writing category (losing each time to one of his co-workers, usually Tina Fey).

Carlock started his career at THE DANA CARVEY SHOW before joining SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE for five seasons, including a two-year stint as the producer and head writer of Weekend Update.  Following SNL, he joined the writing staff at FRIENDS, for its final three seasons, before the show won the Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series and ended its 10-year run.

Kelly Yang JD '05 is the #1 NEW YORK TIMES bestselling author of the FRONT DESK series, NEW FROM HERE, FINALLY SEEN, FINALLY HEARD, young adult novels PARACHUTES and PRIVATE LABEL, and picture books  YES WE WILL and LITTLE BIRD LAILA. Her books have earned multiple awards, including the 2019 APALA Award for Children’s Literature and the Strega Prize, and have featured on multiple best of the year lists. FRONT DESK was named one of the Best Books of the 21st Century by Kirkus Reviews. In addition, Kelly has written screenplays and television pilots for Netflix, CBS Studios, and the CW. Kelly immigrated to the United States when she was six years old and grew up in Southern California. She went to college early and is a graduate of UC Berkeley and Harvard Law School. THE TAKE is her first adult novel.

David Frankel is the director of THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA 2, which will be released by Disney in May.  His previous work as a director includes THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA, MARLEY & ME, THE BIG YEAR, COLLATERAL BEAUTY, JERRY AND MARGE GO LARGE, ONE CHANCE, MIAMI RHAPSODY, and HOPE STREEPS. He won an Academy Award for Best Short for his film, DEAR DIARY, and an Emmy for his direction of HBO’s BAND OF BROTHERS.  His other work for HBO includes the pilot for ENTOURAGE, several episodes of SEX AND THE CITY, and FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON.  His other television work includes episodes of THE MORNING SHOW for AppleTV+; the pilots for MANIFEST (on NBC & Netflix), THE BAKER AND THE BEAUTY (on ABC) and THE IRRATIONAL (on NBC); and the Netflix pilot for INVENTING ANNA, starring Julia Garner.  He lives in Miami with his wife, Jennifer Beber.