Kathy DiBenedetto is a seasoned business and Human Resources executive, talent strategist, and management consultant with more than 25 years of experience helping organizations and people navigate growth, change, and transformation. She has held senior leadership roles across a wide range of industries and organizations, from entrepreneurial start-ups to global Fortune 100 companies, including serving as a Chief Human Resources Officer and Chief People Officer.

Throughout her career, Kathy has focused on the intersection of people, culture, and business strategy—building high-performing teams, developing talent, strengthening leadership, and creating workplace cultures that engage and retain people through every stage of their careers.

At ROAR forward, Kathy brings that experience to ROAR forward’s corporate offering, Your Personal Longevity Journey, helping organizations understand and respond to the opportunities created by longer lives, longer careers, and increasingly multigenerational workplaces. Her work spans product strategy, program development, and business development, with a particular focus on translating longevity insights into practical solutions that help people and organizations thrive.

Curious by nature, Kathy is a passionate believer in reinvention and continuous learning.  She sees longer lives as an invitation to keep evolving—to remain curious, build new skills, explore new possibilities, and continue adding meaningful new chapters to both our careers and our lives.

Kathy began her consulting career at Accenture and is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin.

Erick Neher is a senior marketing and brand strategy executive who specializes in insight-based content, research, sponsorship, and cultural storytelling. With extensive experience across global media, he helps organizations unlock their full economic value. Most recently, as Vice President of Industry Marketing and Advertising Communications at Hearst Magazines, he led enterprise-level marketing and brand strategy across a portfolio of more than 30 iconic titles, designing integrated programs that connected advertisers with audiences through editorial authority, live cultural experiences, original research, and multi-platform storytelling. He worked across categories to pair iconic corporate brands with authentic cultural narratives through custom content, events, and thought leadership. Across his tenure at Hearst, Erick played a central role in shaping enterprise positioning, proposal strategy, and executive communications.

In parallel with his corporate leadership, Erick serves as Cultural Editor at Large for The Hudson Review, contributing authoritative writing on film, theater, and music. He holds a BA from Harvard University and an MA from New York University.

Chris Tosti is a seasoned finance executive with over 30 years of experience driving financial strategy, budget optimization, and operational efficiency in the media and publishing industry. Most recently serving as Finance Director at Hearst Magazines, he has overseen expense budgets and played a pivotal role in aligning financial operations across multiple departments including Editorial, Technology, Public Relations, and Central Video.

He excels in partnering with C-level executives, department heads, and cross-functional teams to ensure financial objectives are met without compromising operational effectiveness.  His approach combines technical financial acumen with a strong sense of organizational strategy. His expertise spans budget building, financial reporting, contract negotiation, and team development. Throughout his career at Hearst—rising from Financial Analyst to General Manager and eventually Finance Director—he was instrumental in supporting some of the industry’s most recognizable brands, including Elle Decor, House Beautiful, and Food Network Magazine.

Chris is a graduate of St. John’s University with a Bachelor of Science in Finance.

Giulio Capua is a C-Level sales and marketing executive with over 30 years experience in building and monetizing world class media brands. His reputation as a transformational leader who can navigate periods of disruption, while delivering on stakeholder needs, led to a long leadership career in media and gave him the opportunity to start a brand consultancy in 2022.

Prior to joining ROAR forward, Giulio was the SVP, Group Publisher, Departures, Travel+Leisure, Food&Wine at Meredith Corp. Prior to Meredith, Capua spent 28 years at Condé Nast, a majority of them leading some of their most reknowned brands. He served as Chief Business Officer of AD and Condé Nast Traveler, publisher and CRO of AD, VP and publisher of Gourmet, and Associate Publisher of GQ, (where he joined as a sales representation and advanced to associate publisher).

Under his leadership, AD was named to Advertising Age’s “A-List” and Adweek’s “Hot List” twice. Additionally, while leading Gourmet, that magazine achieved its best ad page performance in history and was named to Advertising Age’s “A-List”, as well as an Emmy Award nomination for “Diary of a Foodie.”

Giulio graduated from Ithaca College with a B.S. in finance and marketing.

Bill Gibbons, a former journalist, editor, and media marketer, has applied his wide media experience to a new ROAR career of advising marketers, PR agencies, and new media companies on content development, monetization, client outreach, and audience engagement.

At ROAR forward, Bill oversees content – producing the ROAR Report, the ROAR Bulletins, and custom content for clients.

Over the course of his career, Bill has held senior positions in newspapers, magazines, digital media, and streaming video. He was a journalist and editor in the first half of his corporate media career, where he honed his content development skills. In the second half, he focused on media marketing and developed his brand, ad sales, social, event, data, and content marketing skills.

As a senior marketer, Bill held positions at CBS News Digital, CBS All Access (Paramount+), Hearst Magazines Digital Media and magazine brands such Town&Country, Travel+Leisure, Forbes and GQ. At those companies he focused on developing strategies and programs that drove advertising/sponsorship revenue and consumer engagement on behalf of clients.

He is a graduate of Syracuse University where he studied Journalism and English Literature.

A creative publicity executive and media strategist, Beth has over 20 years of experience at the intersection of media, thought leadership, and corporate communications. She has worked with a range of clients including musicians, actors, authors, corporate executives, and cultural creatives from television, publishing, music, and the culinary world. Beth designs, devises and delivers bespoke strategies to elevate awareness about ROAR forward.

Previously, Beth served as head of talent relations at AMC Networks, where she was the primary liaison between its on-air talent and the network’s internal business initiatives. Prior to AMC, Beth spent seven years as VP, Communications for Entertainment Weekly (EW) making EW and its editors the go-to source for entertainment news and commentary.

Earlier, Beth was Director, Communications at Conde Nast and began her magazine media career at Rolling Stone. Before working in magazine media, Beth spent over a decade in the music business handling artist development and publicity at Atlantic, Capitol, Tommy Boy and Elektra Records.

Jennifer has an extensive background in experiential marketing and event production, primarily in the media and entertainment space, as well as on the agency side.  She has worked with some of the most culturally influential brands and companies, crafting unique and compelling experiences that make meaningful connections with consumers through inspired storytelling.

She is an experienced thought leader with exceptional communication skills who looks to create strategic partnerships that drive engagement and collaborates with both internal and external stakeholders on sales and marketing initiatives to deliver on ROI.

Following long tenures at both Hearst and Conde Nast, Jennifer joined the ROAR team in September 2023 and continues to consult for other leading brands.

Jennifer lives in Connecticut and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Marketing and Communications from Boston College.

Veteran publisher, trend spotter, and marketing strategist, Linda Mason transitioned her magazine media career into a consultancy business helping magazine brands develop successful positioning platforms.

Prior to that, she was executive vice president, marketing for MPA – The Association of Magazine Media. At MPA she developed magazine industry wide marketing strategies and was a key player in conceptualizing and communicating the medium’s unique strengths to the association’s membership as well as advertising agencies and clients.

Mason also held various positions with Conde Nast, including vice president, integrated marketing where she built and governed a business that integrated all elements of cross-platform, multi-brand, multi-media custom marketing and advertising for large corporate accounts. She was also a key contributor to Condé Nast’s positioning platforms.

Her magazine brand experience includes the launch of Elle Girl as Vice President/Publisher, publisher of Details and associate publisher at GQ where she started as fashion director.

Mason is a native New Yorker and holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from New York University.

Ellen leverages her wide and varied experience to bring a unique perspective to her consultancy that includes clients in the marketing, media, advertising, and non-profit worlds. She applies her expertise in business development, marketing (digital and traditional), and advertising to improve her clients’ bottom lines and operations.

Ellen has held senior roles as a marketer, ad agency strategist, ad buyer, advertising seller, account manager, content creator, editor, consultant, qualitative researcher, and adjunct professor. She has been a key leader at FCB New York, Time Magazine, Magazine Publishers of America, The Advertising Research Foundation, Prohaska Consulting, Mediavillage.com and more. She and her teams have won numerous industry awards for their innovations and results.

A native Mississippian, she makes New York City her home and enjoys time in North Carolina, where she graduated with Honors from UNC Chapel Hill’s Journalism School. She serves on boards and contributes her skills to benefit multiple non-profit organizations.

Cara built her long and successful career by developing ground-breaking approaches to storytelling for the world’s most iconic brands. She has produced custom content for many of the world’s greatest companies by marrying that brand’s identity with the editorial DNA of each media platform she has worked for.

She launched her career at Condé Nast, where she developed the company’s first Special Advertising section during her tenure at GQ. She went on to lead all of Condé Nast’s custom content creative. She later joined Time Inc. as VP, Creative Director at The Foundry, and then SVP, Head of Creative Strategy for The Foundry at Dotdash Meredith.

Among the hundreds of companies that Cara has produced custom content for, she includes Audi, Donna Karan New York, Walmart, Levi’s, L’Oreal, Microsoft, American Express, Nike, and P&G, as former clients. For each of them she created a unique visual experience that not only pushed the boundaries of design and voice, but drove engagement and conversion for those clients across every media platform.

At ROAR forward, Cara is the founding Head of Creative of ROAR Studios, where she consults and creates content for clients to connect them with Re-Imagineers and The New Longevity demographic.

With more than 30 years as a C-Suite sales executive, Kelly Peterson has worked with global brands to develop and deliver powerful marketing initiatives resulting in significant lifts in sales volume and ROI for her clients.

Kelly’s experience as a Group Advertising director with the Hearst Corporation, and as a consultant to national and global brands, has given her the ability to identify and implement marketing programs that maximize her clients’ investments.  Her expertise in print, digital, social, and broadcast media gives her unique cross platform insight into the needs of marketing and sales organizations.

Beyond media, Kelly works with two artificial intelligence start-ups and has launched a voiceover practice. She is a past President and Board Chair of Women in the Home Furnishings Industry (WITHIT) and a mentor at the College of Charleston Business Program.  Kelly is a graduate of Iowa State University where she studied Advertising and Mass Communication and has an Executive MBA from the University of California, Berkeley.

Sean is a senior creative leader experienced in developing award-winning brand campaigns and strategies across digital, print, and experiential platforms. He led multidiscipline teams with a focus on branding and promotion, storytelling, ideation, activation, multimedia design, motion graphics, and video production. Sean has grown in his career in positions at accomplished titles such as The New Yorker, Travel + Leisure, Food & Wine, Departures, and GQ, among others. A self-starter who takes pride in bringing big ideas to life with a proven track record of driving new business, mentoring young talent, and cultivating client relationships. Sean lives in Brooklyn with his wife and spends his free time creating fine art, illustration, and animation.