ABOUT US
The Foundation facilitates individual contributions and corporate sponsorships that enable SCORE to expand the reach and enhance the success rate of our small business community through free mentors, tools, resources, workshops and educational programs.
SCORE held
300,740
mentoring sessions in 2024
Leadership
Ron Cates
President, SCORE Foundation
Ron Cates has led diverse organizations to stellar results in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors. Renowned for his marketing and leadership skills, Ron is a world class speaker/presenter who has delivered keynote presentations at hundreds of high-profile national and international events. A small business advocate for decades, he now works as president of the SCORE Foundation, the philanthropic arm of SCORE, America’s premier source of free small business advice.
Adam Robbins
VP of Corporate Sponsorship
Adam is a business development and revenue generation expert who has spent over 20 years as a leader in sports business, corporate partnership marketing and media strategy. He has founded multiple successful organizations during his career including a groundbreaking influencer marketing company that leveraged the power of AI-driven campaign building. As an NFL agent, he founded a sports management and marketing firm specializing in professional athlete representation and has held front office and C-Suite roles at professional sports leagues and national media organizations. Adam holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a master’s degree from Northwestern University.
Our Board Members believe deeply in SCORE’s mission and are active ambassadors within their diverse nationwide business networks and local communities to advance the Foundation’s purposeful philanthropic work.
Small businesses drive the economy.
There were 32.5 million small businesses in the U.S. in 2021, employing 46.8 percent of all employees.
– SBA
Board of Directors
John McCloskey
Board Chair
Former Pres. & CEO,
The Aerospace Group
John McCloskey has volunteered with SCORE for 10 years serving as Chapter Chair and District Director for North Carolina. For 17 years, McCloskey was a member of the management Boards of publicly traded German Corporations FAG Bearings and Schaeffler AG. He was also President and CEO of the Aerospace Group, the largest manufacturer of jet engine bearings and structures in the world.
Prior to that, he was Executive Vice President of North American Operations for GKN Automotive. He has a B.S. Engineering, an MBA and completed post graduate work at Harvard, London Business School and IMI Geneva.
Julie Christiansen
Board Vice Chair
Julie Christiansen, chief commercial officer at Cosway Company in Los Angeles, has extensive experience in the contract manufacturing industry. Her passion for entrepreneurs involves mentoring them in their journey to bring their brand vision to life. She further supports small businesses through participation in her local Main Street Association and through her role on a variety of boards that are focused on private business ownership, including the Independent Beauty Association.
Beth Wood
Board Secretary
CMO, Principal Financial
With two decades as a staunch consumer advocate, I have enjoyed great success as a brand, marketing and customer experience professional, team leader and agent of change. I’ve worked in both B2B and B2C models across consumer packaged goods, health and beauty, retail and financial services. The most inspiring work I’ve led includes building humanity into brands, leveraging voice of customer insights and connecting to and through consumer and market tensions. My passions are best served through transformations, leveraging the superpowers of the brand and reimagining its value to its stakeholders and the world. This requires deep human insight, a strong data, analytics and technology foundation, and a team motivated to deliver impact. Through my connected and direct leadership style, my teams have re-imagined storied processes and redrawn experiences to eliminate friction and reduce customer effort. We’ve refreshed windows of collaboration across teams to deliver superior execution and connect customer outcomes to financial outcomes. I am intensely dedicated to bringing out the best a team has to offer by establishing clear purpose, a grounded strategy and embracing the autonomy necessary to deliver exceptional execution.
Judy Trevino
Board Treasurer
Judy Trevino has extensive management and board experience in nonprofit, governmental and foundation institutions. She currently oversees multiple nonprofit organizations sponsored by the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, an international nonprofit organization. Her passion for service has allowed her the opportunity to lead strategic and board succession planning, board governance training, executive and board recruitment, and financial board oversight.
Megan Malone
Board Director
Sr. Director, VISA
Megan Malone serves as senior director with the U.S. Government Engagement team at VISA. In this capacity, she leads and shapes the company’s small business policy priorities to support small and medium-size enterprises. She has extensive experience working with Congress and the Administration on small business issues and in developing coalitions that support common policy objectives.
She previously served as senior legislative advisor at Venable LLP for 10 years. Among her many personal support activities for small businesses is serving as board vice chair for Black Girl Ventures.
Scott Stearsman
Board Director
SVP Small Business Banking, Truist
Scott Stearsman serves as Head of Small Business Banking for Truist Financial Corporation. In this role he is responsible for overseeing the small business banking segment and delivering financial solutions and expertise to small business owners and entrepreneurs. He has over 20 years of banking experience serving consumer and small business clients.
Steve Strauss
Board Director
Steve Strauss is an in-demand content creator, Inc.’s small business columnist, and the author of 18 books, inclusding The Small Business Bible. An attorney and entrepreneur as well, Steve’s latest venture is the popular newsletter, notes to an entrepreneur.
Steve is often tapped to be a brand ambassador for companies such as Visa, Yahoo, PayPal, Bank of America, and Microsoft. His combined social media following is in the six-figures.
Whether it’s blogs, videos, podcasts, live streaming, e-books, webinars, or other digital media, his company, The Strauss Group, creates cutting-edge content for everyone from Fortune 500 companies to small non-profits.
The “friendraising” and financial support provided by the Foundation Board expands the depth and delivery of the programs that SCORE so effectively delivers to small business owners nationwide.
94%of companies in business remained
in business at the end of 2024
48%SCORE clients with
increased revenue in 2024