Marisa Murillo

My first board experience was very different. So I'm an art person. I love art and art museums and art collecting, everything related to the arts. My first board was actually a boys and girls club. I had no child at the time. I'm a parent now. I knew nothing about serving on a board and I only knew how to be a lawyer.

So I objected to everything that they put in front of the board, which makes you sort of an unpopular board member. I thought it was my job to be, you know, scrutinizing everything that came before us. And I think I was super annoying. And I also didn't, as Desiree said, I didn't know a lot about what the organization was about or how their services were important.

I would have understood it much better as an adult now. So I think it was a learning experience for sure. I realized over time that it was important to be a lot more moderate in perspective and and take your time with things. And at least it helped me, you know, get on other boards and and mature, I think, as a contributor to the boards that I'm on now.

I love a challenge, Scott. So this year is presenting us with some different metrics, I think, for a lot of the work that I do professionally with interest rates being high, private equity being in a different world right now, tariffs. So I'm excited to help navigate some of this, help clients navigate it. I like it when my phone rings.

And a lot of times that happens because things are challenging and difficult. So professionally, I think it's going to be a really awesome year. And on the art museum front, there's been a lot of opportunity to fundraise because a lot of the corporate sponsorships are not what they used to be.

So there are opportunities there that we haven't had before to really shine a light and help people realize that they can do it even if they don't have a Fortune 50 company behind an exhibition.

Sure. Thanks, Scott. I'm thrilled to be on the podcast with you. I've been practicing law for just shy of 25 years. I'm a debt finance lawyer, and I work a lot with private equity firms and credit funds and financing different transactions.

My work on boards has been a lot in the nonprofit space, especially as it relates to large-scale art institutions and emerging institutions that are trying to fundraise in the seven-figure range. And so it's been really great the way that I've learned about executive functioning and the soft skills of how to make people want to be on a board and achieve things on a board.

And that's been apart from a lot of the work that I've done professionally. So I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Yeah, I'm definitely still seeing that clients of mine that are public companies are interested still in having women on boards, women of color and people of color on boards. Some of that is because even though there were measures put in place, Scott, as you know, to push some diversity initiatives forward, you know, there were the NASDAQ rules and other things. Those were...

those were like put into place, but there were also the realities that some companies really needed the knowledge and expertise that might be coming from women in a way that it's not coming from men or might be coming from women of color, people of color in a way that it's not coming from people representative of other groups.

So for the people that I've spoken to anecdotally, even with the change in administration and even with some of the changes on the legal front, they're still very much interested in having that kind of representation on the board.

Think for example, of an organization that is consumer facing and maybe in a household, the woman or the wife or the mother or the female members of the household are the ones deciding how to spend that income. That kind of knowledge, is not something that they're going to get, a company is going to get from a consultant's report.

They really want someone on the board who sees things that maybe other board members won't see. So I'm still hearing that companies are passionate about it. They're just not vocal about it because they're not sure what it means to be vocal about it right now.

I think there's the idea that you could start on a nonprofit board and then expand what you're doing with those nonprofit boards. It's a great way to learn how to analyze different financial statements that are coming forward, how to handle different issues that might face a large organization with a larger budget. I think it's super important for people to network

obviously when you're on a board, your network grows exponentially, but the idea that you need to get there, it's about, to me, it's about networking. And so it's true that, you know, these policies definitely help things, but nothing has changed about the idea that you've really got to know people and you've really got to get up and get out there to make these different things happen.

And so, you know, that's my advice to people. I think that, like I said earlier, I think when we were talking, the things that you learn when you're on these boards to me are indispensable. For example, in my day-to-day work at Greenberg, I am reading financial statements.

I've probably read a couple of financial statements today, but when I read them and I'm on a board and it's about the, you know, how the organization is going to operate for another year. And I'm like personally invested in the success of the organization. that feels very different to me than I'm reading something and I'm sort of like surgical about it.

But the idea that like, you know, if the HR budget doesn't have enough in it, you can't have people that are working hard for the organization. And so those are things I think that you definitely need to know when you're serving on a board.

Yeah, I think that's so true, Scott.