Karen Hernandez

Karen Hernandez is a results-driven executive with experience in Fortune 500 and start-up organizations, specializing in Financial Services and Manufacturing.

She is a divergent thinker who thrives on identifying opportunities in obstacles, transforming data into strategic intelligence, and emphasizing actions over words. Karen values integrity, teamwork, creativity, and humor.

Her expertise lies in financial strategy and planning, business intelligence, mergers and acquisitions, risk management, compliance, cost management, and accounting.

In strategy, Karen excels in resource allocation, competitive analysis, business planning, and creating dashboards. She is skilled in branding, competitive positioning, and establishing policies and procedures.

Operations-wise, she has a knack for performance metrics, process improvements, internal controls, project management, and mergers/acquisitions integration. Karen is also experienced in certifications like ISO/TS 16949 and uses tools like the Balanced Scorecard.

Karen holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA in Philosophy, Politics, Economics, and Economics/Accounting from Claremont McKenna College, with additional studies at the University of Nottingham.

She has held roles at notable organizations, including serving on the Board of Directors at the Harvard Business School Association of Orange County, holding officer-level positions at TransAmerica Corp., Ford Credit Corp., and First Interstate Bancorp, and being a member of various advisory boards and boards of directors.

Karen's past roles include being a co-founder at Sanargy, LLC, a partner and turnaround specialist at Lakefront Capital Holdings, Inc./Core Strategies, and a CFO at Irvine Ventures/ConnectCom Microsystems.

Her journey includes a summer internship in the Marketing Leadership Program at Ford Motor Company and a role as a senior auditor at Deloitte & Touche.

She lives by quotes from Albert Einstein, Edmund Burke, and Rudyard Kipling, reflecting her values in challenging the status quo, taking action against evil, and embodying the virtues outlined in 'If'.