Marianne Ruggiero

Founder and CEO, Optima Careers, LLC

Marianne Ruggiero is the President of Optima Careers which she founded as a boutique career consulting service after a 25-year career in Human Resources. As a career consultant and executive coach, she offers a highly customized, proprietary approach to addressing career management, leadership development and work-life issues. Working one-on-one, she helps clients see their strengths, understand their work style, clarify their goals, align with the marketplace, and create actionable plans that enable them to move forward with confidence. In executive coaching, clients succeed in driving strategies, establishing more effective organizational structures, and achieving challenging goals. She is sought out as an advisor for her ability to balance strategy and execution, values and action, insight and practicality, collaboration and accountability.

Marianne’s human resources experience included senior positions with prominent companies such as American Express, Citigroup, and J. Crew. Her executive clients also span a broad spectrum from Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to iconic brands such as Amazon, Apple, Coca Cola, and Tiffany’s, successful start-ups including Parachute and Kaleidescope, and educational institutions including The City University of New York, Duke University, MIT and Yale.

Marianne has contributed to the Harvard Business Review, appeared on CNN Money with Christine Romans and regularly addresses business and education groups. She has an MBA in Organizational Development from Pace University where she was awarded an Andrew Mellon Foundation fellowship.