Cortney McDermott is the author of Change Starts Within You. As an award-winning writer, she is also speaker, and a strategist to Fortune 500 executives, entrepreneurial leaders and think tanks around the world. Before turning entrepreneur, Cortney served as executive at Vanity Fair Corporation, vice president at Sustainability Partners, professor of graduate studies for several universities, and global associate for the renowned beCause Consortium. (She also moonlighted as a deli waitress, secretary, and everything in-between, as a way to put herself through school and life.) A graduate of the London School of Economics and a certified cultural mediator in multiple languages, Cortney lives with her family, splitting time between the United States and Italy.