The Minority Corporate Counsel Association (MCCA) announces the election of two new members and a new chairman to its Board of Directors. Simone Wu of XO Holdings and Diane C. Yu of New York University have become new board members and Thomas L. Sager of the DuPont Company, a long time MCCA Board member, has been named chairman.
Ms. Wu is senior vice president and general counsel of XO Holdings. She oversees all of the telecommunications company's legal affairs, including commercial, corporate, employment, intellectual property and litigation matters.Before joining XO in 2001, Ms. Wu held business and legal positions at MCI and AOL, and practiced transactional and communications law at the firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP.
Diane C. Yu is the chief of staff and deputy to the president of New York University. Prior to her role at NYU, she served as Associate General Counsel at Monsanto, a subsidiary of Pharmacia Corporation, where she was the highest-ranking Asian American executive. Ms. Yu also served as the General Counsel for the State Bar of California and from 1986-1987, she was a White House Fellow appointed by the President. Her volunteer roles have included numerous board and committee positions with the ABA, Association of Corporate Counsel, National Asian Pacific American Bar Association and the National Association of Law Placement (NALP).
Mr. Sager, vice president and assistant general counsel of DuPont, also serves as the company's chief litigation counsel. Mr. Sager helped pioneer DuPont's Convergence and Law Firm Partnering Program, which has become a benchmark in the legal industry. He has championed efforts to promote diversity in the legal profession and has been recognized with the ABA's 2001 Spirit of Excellence Award and the Recognition of Excellence Award from the Association of Corporate Counsel. MCCA established its Thomas L. Sager Award in his name to recognize law firms that demonstrate a sustained commitment to improving the hiring, retention and promotion of minority attorneys. Mr. Sager also serves on the CPRTask Force on Diversity, which promotes diversity among neutrals.