Our Authors

Paul Volponi is the award-winning author of 20 books including Phyllis George: Shattering the Ceiling (a nonfiction biography), and the novels The Final Four (on the NYC Chancellor’s reading list NYC Reads 365), Top Prospect (part of Scholastic’s nationwide book club), and Black and White (winner of the international Reading Association’s Children’s Book Award). Paul is the recipient of a dozen American Library Association honors.

Kyle Vowinkel spent three decades mastering chaos at the pinnacle of US government operations, when lives were on the line. A West Point graduate and retired FBI executive, he is one of only five agents in Bureau history to serve on both the elite Hostage Rescue Team and the Crisis Negotiation Unit—a rare dual perspective forged through leading high-risk missions in Afghanistan as well as negotiating the peaceful surrender of the Boston Marathon bomber. Kyle has demonstrated that clarity, calm, and connection can prevail even under the most extreme pressure. Today, as founder of Elite Mindsets, he helps leaders prime, predict, and prevail when the stakes are highest. Fortune 500 executives, government agencies, and top universities turn to him to transform volatility into strategic advantage—applying the same frameworks that led to success in the most complex and high-consequence environments.

Steph Wagner is the National Director of Women and Wealth at Northern Trust, one of the largest and most respected financial institutions in the world. She is responsible for leading the firm’s wealth advisory practice for women and oversees all creation of content, curriculum, and programming through its Elevating Women platform, which she founded. Prior to joining Northern Trust, Steph served as managing director and cofounder of Sendero Women & Wealth, a division of a registered investment advisory firm. Ahead of that, she built a national consulting practice as a divorce financial strategist. She also founded Women Wealthy Wise, an education company that created content, curriculum, and inspiring programming for women about money, and partnered with wealth management firms nationwide to strengthen their women’s initiatives. Before becoming a stay-at-home mom, she worked in private equity as a Vice President at Gemini Investors, a Boston-based private investment firm focused on providing capital to established, smaller middle market businesses.

Kate Eberle Walker is the CEO of Presence Learning, the leading provider of online special education services for K-12 schools. In this role, she leads a majority female employee population, whose mission is not only to serve students with learning needs, but to provide a flexible career path for nearly 1,000 special education clinicians, many of whom are working mothers. Kate worked her way up to become CEO of The Princeton Review at age 39. While CEO, she not only made the business profitable; she did so while building a 50% female executive team, making her C-suite fully aligned with the gender balance of the organization as a whole. Before becoming a CEO, Kate navigated the male-dominated world of Wall Street as a Goldman Sachs investment banker for five years and worked her way up through management roles. She offers straight, tells-it-like-it-is advice to her fellow managers, and is an approachable and relatable mentor to younger women, whom she regularly supports and advises on career decisions.

Currently a Brooklynite, she lives in Carroll Gardens with her husband Chris, whom she met 15 years ago when they were both students at Harvard Business School. They have two daughters, ages eleven and eight. As her children can attest, she loves telling people what she thinks they should do, and most of the time people find it worth listening.

Joel Walkowski is a writer, nationally touring comedian, and New York City basketball legend. He runs a SMART Recovery meeting at the Phoenix House in Brooklyn, NY. Joel is a nationally touring comedian, award-winning roast battler, and second funniest cast member on the popular NFL Fan Therapy web series. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Comedy Central, and got him banned from Major League Baseball. His nonprofit “Big Walkowski” raises money for organ donation with a basketball tournament (that he usually wins). He lives in Brooklyn, NY and has a sauna in his living room.