Meet the Mastercard CEO Force for Good winners for the first half of 2024

Commitment first. That might be the watchword of the exceptional group of volunteers selected for Mastercard’s premier volunteering recognition, the CEO Force for Good Awards, for the first half of 2024.

In a competition cycle that had the most nominees ever in the history of the awards, the 22 selected individual and team winners demonstrate a critical component of being a force for good, including three volunteers who have dedicated a decade each to their causes.

Asia Pacific

Sonya Gertler, St. Leonards, Australia

You know you’ve made an impact as a volunteer when you receive an email message like this one, from a student: “You were welcoming, kind and understanding throughout the whole program. I will never forget this “priceless’ experience,” and I hope to be back at Mastercard in the future.” This young woman was describing a project that Gertler organized for students to spend a week in the St. Leonards office gaining industry exposure and learning about STEM careers. It’s one aspect of Gertler’s service commitment to a cause close to her heart: education and the advancement of talented girls from disadvantaged backgrounds, helping them achieve their full potential. As the Mastercard representative for the Harding Miller Education Foundation in Australia, Gertler leads the coordination of scholarship funding for up to 20 girls between the ages of 15 and 18 years, ensuring they have access to technology, tutoring and enrichment programs to succeed in high school and beyond. She also mentors four HMEF scholarship students in northern Australia, guiding and empowering them through their final years of high school.

Roshani Kudlingar, Pune, India

Kudlingar spearheads various volunteering projects in the Pune Tech Hub, including leading the Mastercard Run for over three years. She has also helped drive momentum for Mastercard's signature STEM education program Girls4Tech, over the last six years, including during the pandemic when she conducted sessions virtually. Over the past 10 years, Kudlingar has been affiliated with Swa-Roopwardhiniee, an NGO dedicated to the upliftment of underprivileged children in Pune, where she actively is involved in teaching academics to students. She has also led a laptop donation drive for these students to aid their education, in addition to one for the  Narmadalaya NGO for students in need in Madhya Pradesh.

Carrie Lu, Guangzhou, China

It may be a record for one CEO Force for Good honoree to be named in four separate nominations by colleagues. Clearly, Lu is valued for her volunteer leadership in this small office of 20-plus associates, as both an organizer and a booster of team spirit. That includes career coaching for secondary students, conservation projects such as cleaning up trash at nearby Baiyun Mountain, and promoting public transportation to encourage sustainable living. “Our volunteer initiatives show that even small groups can achieve great things when united by a common purpose,” Lu says.  

Ann Chang, Aron Lin, YiTing Chen, James Jan, Jenny Pan, Kelly Chao, Chava Chou, Alice Huang, Blake Smedley, Mary Hsiao, Abbie Lin, Casey Huang, Christine Wang, Ivan Liu, Renelle Hou, Sharon Chang, Sherry Liu, Ting-Feng Chang, Tracy Tsai, Wendy Huang, Wesley Luo, Alan Hwang and Jenny Hsu, Taipei, Taiwan

Kaohsiung Animal Protection Association, one of Taiwan's largest but most resource-deprived legal animal shelters, finds new homes for stray cats and dogs. It shelters thousands of animals but donations cover only 20% of monthly expenses, putting the KSAPA goal of constructing a new shelter building out of reach. The association also struggled to find an effective way to train volunteers given limited staff time. Over the course of two years, these 24 Taipei colleagues volunteered their time and expertise to benefit KSAPA in all areas, including crafting a new fundraising approach with content creation, social media marketing and improving the donation process, leading to a 96% year over year increase in donations. To address the training need, they created an interactive online course that prepares knowledgeable and motivated volunteers. In addition, 15 team members traveled 400 kilometers — nearly 250 miles — to assist with on-the-ground dog walking and cleaning.

Sekhar Palli and Vijay Singh, Vadodara, India

Plastic pollution is a major crisis for our ecosystem. Knowing the environmental consequences on people and nature, this duo devised and implemented a three-pronged strategy to reduce plastic waste in the nearby village of Sindhrot and the local Mahisagar River. The pair’s efforts include promoting habits among the village’s 4,000-plus people to reduce plastic waste, such as using cloth bags and avoid throwing plastic bags and bottles in the river. They’ve organized community cleanups, a major focus of their initiative. They’ve also arranged for proper garbage bins and transportation to recycle collected waste. The cleanup drives in particular have amassed impressive stats, with more than 40 river cleanups since 2022 that removed more than 1,500 pounds of plastic waste. They are not spearheading planting trees on the riverbank to reduce soil erosion and flooding and provide an even cleaner and greener village.  

Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa

Hajar El Mouttaqui, Haneen Nasir, Eric Laqueche, Sowmya Srinivasan, Gheeda Alnoubani, Fatema Buhusayen, Ishita Sabarwal, Deema Ahmed, Jack Tomkinson, Amir Al Lawati, Mariam Elmaghraby, Mona Magdy, Rada Ali, Sarah Sherif, Reham Mohy, Raoul Fernandes and Mithun Mithran, Dubai, Cairo and other offices worldwide

Tarahum means compassion in Arabic. This multi-office team has been supporting Tarahum for Gaza charity campaigns, donating to help Gazans through a range of employee-led volunteering initiatives. Team members came together to pitch in on food, medical supplies and clothing drives and to inspire colleagues worldwide to give. Food donations in coordination with the UAE Food Bank and Emirates Red Crescent — and with the entire Dubai office contributing — collected 2,600 kilograms (almost three tons) through March. Team Cairo held a winter campaign in partnership with the Egyptian Clothing Bank, donating a truckload of garments and blankets, including for critically ill patients in El Maydani Hospital Rafah. The Cairo office also collected food and medical aid in collaboration with the Egyptian Red Crescent. As word of this initiative spread, donations from our other offices in Morocco, Ireland, the U.K., U.S. and others flowed in, filling another truckload of essential supplies dispatched to Gaza. Employee campaigns raised $33,000 in donations for responding disaster relief organizations.

Imelda Ngunzu, Lucy Juma, Christine Anari, Anne Ndiiri and Mithun Mithran, Nairobi, Kenya

Bridging the digital divide is an urgent need that only gets more crucial as so much of learning, employment and everyday life are centered online. For underserved schools in rural Makueni County, Kenya, Mastercard’s Alice Ngunzu Digital Labs for Schools Project is that bridge. Named for a passionate educator and community advocate Alice Ngunzu, the project is led by her daughter, Imelda Ngunzu. Ngunzu had previously established a lab and library in her mother’s village, and now she and her colleagues have established four more digital labs with over 200 new computers for some 1,000 students, a 1:5 ratio that offers genuine opportunity for hands-on learning. In addition, the project will be adding two more labs this year and is working to expand students’ educational and career prospects through access to our employee-mentors and digital literacy training.

Lara Dinc and Yunus Efe Yüksel, Istanbul, Turkey

Make a Wish Türkiye grants one wish of children aged 3 to 18 who are battling life-threatening diseases, transforming the lives of both the children and their families forever with unforgettable experiences. Dinc and Yüksel have represented the Community Support Team for Mastercard’s Istanbul office for the past two years in collaboration with Make a Wish Türkiye. During this time, they also have raised $20,000 worth of donations for many different projects and in-kind contributions for the Earthquake Zone pro bono project following the 7.8 magnitude earthquake in February 2023. That included optimizing travel routes in six regions, drawing up road maps and visiting 32 families in their homes and hospitals in Adıyaman, Kahramanmaraş, Gaziantep, Şanlıurfa, Diyarbakır, and Mardin. Additionally, they participated in sports marathons to support and collect donations, and recently coordinated an auction of artwork by emerging artists, raising $10,000 to fund 10 more children’s wishes.

Ogonna Moronu, Vincent Attah, Morenike Oluwatosin, Adekunle Yusuf, Lara Randle, Nneka Umeh, Munachi Duru, Oladipupo Adetayo, Olakanmi Olusola, Kari Tukur, Abubakar Kassim, Ina Arome, Mayowa Adewumi, Akintunde Ajayi, Adebola Adepeju, Sunday Oladejo, Temitope Fafiyebi, Emmanuel Adeleke, Tolu Adeyinka, Khalid Mosuro, Iheoma Nnodi, Udo Ogbonnaya, Opeyemi Ekundayo, Temitope Ladejola-Oginni, Gbolahan Majekodunmi, Anthony Udiminue, Morenike Oluwatosin, Eno Hanson, Akinola Akinrin, Chuka Nwene, Nnamdi Azodo, Ekele Kanu, Olusoji Ayeni, Sandra Enwezoh, Olayinka Oluleye, Peter Ehizogie, Opeyemi Ogunnoki and  Alabi Olatunji, Lagos, Nigeria

Doing well by doing good is perhaps never more important than when many are not doing well. The question is also how to do good in the most effective way. That was the situation for this Lagos team last year, when double-digit inflation approaching 30% had a dire impact on many Nigerians. In December, the Lagos office began a partnership with Aunt Landa Bethel Foundation, which provides services and relief to abused individuals, widows and others in deep need. The team raised $2,256 to provide three months of food — rice, beans, salt, cooking oil and other staples — for over 120 families in Ikotun-Egbe, a rural community in Lagos State. In addition, the team purchased generators, industrial hair dryers and clippers, a popcorn machine and a locally manufactured pepper grinder to help set up small businesses. Spending time with families revealed how the team’s service was making a difference. One widow, for example, could now send her three children to school.

Europe

Terry Downing, London, England 

By any measure, Downing had a noteworthy spring as a volunteer. In April, Downing and colleague Jennifer Michael helped host Cyber Girls First, welcoming 50 girls from underserved schools for interactive lessons on cyber, AI and STEM concepts and careers, with presenters from the CGF organization, which targets girls 11 -14, Mastercard, the British Computer Museum and others. Downing plans more CGF sessions to complement  Girls4Tech. On June 7, he participated in the Lord Mayor’s Appeal Abseil Challenge, rappelling about 700 feet from the 47th floor of a London building via rope, and raising $642 for Challenge charities. A passionate advocate for veterans and families of fallen soldiers, he has also cycled from London to Paris three times to raise funds and awareness. Says Downing: “I’m a hands-on supporter of many good causes.”

Panagiotis Vlachos, Dublin, Ireland

Mastercard is a founding partner of the CyberPeace Institute, and a key element of its work to safeguard NGOs worldwide is the role of CyberPeace Builders—employees who volunteer their cybersecurity expertise. Vlachos lends his knowledge as a senior information security engineer to educate NGOs through security assessments, awareness training and more. He has completed over 10 missions, making him the lead volunteer for our company and among the top 10 volunteers among Institute member companies. He stays motivated by his commitment “to ensure a more secure internet for all and to promote Mastercard as a strong player in the Information Security sector actively giving back to the community.”  

Danika Doonan, Louisa Ryan, Zoe Baggot, Roger Butler, Tara Pollard, James O'Connell,  Vanessa Hill, Laura Daniel and Gareth Grehan, Dublin, Ireland

Last year, now-retired Dublin colleague Claire Byrne was honored for creating a  centralized employee volunteer group called Dublin MC Cares. This successful volunteer effort keeps going and continues growing through the shared ambition of these inspirational people. “They’re making a positive difference, committing personal time day after day, week after week, to the group’s responsibilities,” Grehan says. The service model pairs Dublin Tech Hub employees with volunteer opportunities benefiting local and national charities, planning and organizing at least one volunteer event each week. They maintain strong relationships with partner nonprofits and reach out to new organizations, with the goal of offering meaningful service to everyone. Participating charities include My Lovely Horse Rescue, Irish Cancer Society, LauraLynn Children’s Hospice, Feed Our Homeless, Alzheimer Society of Ireland and Team Hope.

Margherita Gaudenzi, Claudio Ferri, Giulia Luciano, Giulia Lollobrigida, Alessandra Andreozzi, Fabio Saraconi, Alberto Marangio, Alessia Munzone, Tiziana Iencinella, Lilia Toosi Maraghi, Marzia Pecce and Silvia Brugnara, Rome, Italy

High school students in Italy typically have few occasions to learn skills outside of school programs and explore potential career paths. These 12 colleagues are a dynamic example of how Mastercard volunteers upskill students’ practical knowledge of the world of work, helping them make career choices. For the program “Future Paths: Building Skills Today for Tomorrow’s Careers,” now in the eighth edition, team members mentored local students on the Internet of Things, data science, AI, marketing and brand power, sustainability and the importance of emotional intelligence in business and working with others. Feedback from students and this volunteer team is a resounding sì to offering more Future Paths editions.

Latin America and the Caribbean

Newton Prates, São Paulo, Brazil

Prates does double duty to the goal of financial inclusion for all. Not only does he work toward that effort alongside his colleagues, he devotes personal volunteer time to delivering lessons in financial literacy. For more than five years, he has been mentoring local young people from disadvantaged communities who lack access to practical knowledge of finance, reaching more than 150 students in 2023 and 2024. He is an active supporter of education that meets other specific needs, including the work of Fundação Dorina Nowill Para Cegos in Brazil, a foundation that emphasizes social inclusion of the blind. He is that colleague who is the first to engage in volunteer initiatives and with enthusiasm, inspiring others to give back by his example.

Manuela Salazar, Bogotá, Colombia

Homelessness is not only the condition of lacking permanent housing. It creates social isolation as those without homes are “the most marginalized and feel neglected by society,” says Salazar, a member of the founding team behind Sueños de la Calle, which supports homeless people as they reintegrate into the community. She creates content for the foundation and helps individuals through the rehabilitation process, which begins with addressing basic needs. “Every 15 days, we distribute food, drinks and clothing to the homeless, engaging with them and using these donations as tools to start a conversation” she explains. “We act as a bridge and intermediary for those who wish to change their lives.” To start that transition, the foundation connects homeless individuals with other organizations and services. It also helps individuals discover and develop talents that can create stable lives and futures.

Thiago Días, Felipe Ibaceta, Nicolas Costa, Mario Felipe de Barbieri, Cristobal Vicuña, Luis Muñoz, Mathias Claps, Josefa Lucas, Jose Ignacio Oyarzun, Jose Valdivieso, Gian D ́Amico, Catalina Leiter, Dalia Wood, Camila Meiser, Ignacio Reygadas, Christian Gaedechens, Catalina Blanco, Nelly Meza, Jorge Escobar,  Patricio Zavala, Jean Philippe Cazenave, Ignacio Hojas, Claudia Flores, Tomas Zurita, Laura Andrighetti, Matias Haussmann, Juan Pablo Coddou, Josefina Quiroga, Javier Guerraty, Patricio Mena, Fernanda Beckdorf, Felipe Gonzalez, Alejandra Pino, Erica Cartes, Juan Jose Fernandez and Alexandra González, Santiago, Chile

In February, deadly wildfires devastated an area of about 129,000 acres in Chile’s Valparaíso region. At least 131 people lost their lives, 38,000 lost their homes and another nearly 15,000 homes were damaged. Mastercard Chile and colleagues across the world responded immediately, including a $100,000 donation to Un Techo para Chile, an NGO that specializes in home building and social inclusion programs to help people in poverty. The company donation was part of an event on February 15 that featured Chilean celebrities and raised funds to build 135 homes. Two months later, this group of 36 colleagues spent a day together hefting tools and materials to construct four houses in eight hours. “We connected with families who will live in the houses and learned about their struggles and how they’re moving forward,” González says.

Tomás Ceballos, Camilo Zarate, Orlando Montalvo, Valentina Angulo, Estefanía Martínez, Mariana Linares, Laura Soto Cristiano, Marina Acosta, Maria Paula Lozano and Laura Dominguez, Bogotá, Colombia; Maria Vejarano, Alicia Davalos, Gabriella Befeler and Sandra Gonzalez, Miami; and Emily Ao Ieong, Helen Zhang and Olivia Pugh, New York City

 This multi-office team is part of an ongoing volunteer commitment to support the Indigenous Wayuu community, a highly vulnerable population in La Guajira, Colombia. Many members of this team won a Force for Good Award last year for  the Water for Life project, an initiative that granted access to drinkable water at Muurai School, benefitting more than 500 families. This 2024 award recognizes a successful collaboration to raise $41,000 to build a module of classrooms on that same school, unlocking further access to education for more children. The team  engaged colleagues in their respective offices to obtain both corporate and employee donations, the latter through trivia contests, a Run4Good event, bazaars and a virtual bingo tournament, with more than 150 employees participating across North America and Latin America. “This fundraising initiative demonstrates the ‘one team’ spirit,” Soto says. “It also exemplifies our principles of inclusion, doing the right thing with decency and as a force for good.”

North America

Ignacio Puig de la Bellacasa, Purchase, New York

Puig de la Bellacasa is a volunteer coordinator who ensures a men’s shelter in the Bronx has a pair of managers each Monday and Tuesday night. The shelter is run by the Sisters of Charity, founded by Mother Teresa in India, but whose sisters depend on volunteers to staff the facility from 5 p.m. to 7 a.m. daily. He leads 32 volunteers who take their turns as night managers, with duties that include check-in, serving dinner and clean-up, preparing and serving breakfast, and checking the men out in the morning. In addition to coordinating volunteer staffing, Ignacio takes a volunteer shift once a month. ”Most of the men seeking shelter are immigrants from Latin America, speaking only Spanish, starting from scratch after traveling thousands of miles on extremely dangerous journeys,” Puig de la Bellacasa explains. “Beyond the basic needs, what they appreciate most is being seen and listened to, receiving support and encouragement.”

Audrey Decker, Alexandria, Va.

U.S. Department of Justice figures show that in 2023, judges granted asylum in only 14% of cases nationwide. Among the fortunate few is a young woman who fled multiple death threats from local gang members, arriving in the U.S. alone at age 16 and waiting over seven years for her request to be heard. When that time came, Decker, her pro bono attorney, was solidly prepared, with some 100 hours on the case. As a volunteer with Kids in Need of Defense, a nonprofit that supports unaccompanied children forcibly displaced from their home countries, Decker has won asylum for five children since 2015. “Although required to appear in immigration court, they are not provided with attorneys,” Audrey explains, making her volunteer role vital. Her former clients are now adults, all working and each with, or soon to have, permanent resident status. So far in 2024, both KIND and the Virginia Access to Justice Commission Pro Bono Honor Roll have recognized Audrey with repeat awards for her dedication.

Dawn Oram, Purchase, N.Y.

Military veterans deserve every kind of help in making the transition from their professional service to private sector careers. For 10 years, Oram has been building that bridge as a volunteer mentor with American Corporate Partners, which pairs service members with employee mentors from major U.S. companies. She is currently mentoring her 12th veteran — known as “protégés” in the program — through monthly sessions on networking in business, resume review, interview preparation as well as “civilian” concepts such as work-life balance after the all-in expectation of military life. She also participates in ACP webinars, with attention to corporate success strategies for women. And her ACP commitment is not her only outstanding volunteerism. She is a volunteer dog walker at the Ramapo-Bergen Animal Refuge and partners with VolunteerNY and local nonprofits on service projects that bring teams together to meet community needs. “Dawn is a Force for Good powerhouse,” says her colleague Liz Devlin. “She helps others be great, inside and outside of our organization.”

MaryKate Morani, Yvette Abadi, Sydney Modeas, Vishal Sundaram, Ronnie Daveiga, Ronaldo Garcia-Hernandez, Erika Woloschuk and Colby Keistler, Boston

This volunteer team launched in early 2023, driving a significant increase in volunteer days used last year, with some 60% of the office involved, totaling 127.5 days among 74 employees. Team projects are typically organized in partnership with nonprofits that serve the greater Boston community. Examples include a Thanksgiving 2023 in-office joint effort to prepare 800 hygiene and snack kits for the Pine Street Inn Homeless Shelter. At an event with the Greater Boston Food Bank, volunteers packed 324 30-pound cases of food, the equivalent of 8,100 meals. There are also team-sponsored projects to clean up a local beach, collect some 40 pounds of gently used clothing, make cards for hospitalized kids and host multiple blood drives. “Thanks to their creativity and hard work, volunteerism and community impact are now integrated into the fiber of our Boston office,” Keistler says.

Antione Tobias, Charmaine Washington, Chenita Rollins, Darrieal Price, Kenyatta Holmes, Kiayouna Oats, Kirk Williams, Lavell Dean, Marc Mitchell, Tiffany Pierre, Tonya Williams and Tracee White, O’Fallon, Mo.

 There are many ways for teams to collaborate on service initiatives. These 13 members of St. Louis’s volunteer committee of the Leading Employees of African Descent business resource group understand the fundamentals of making an impact on a community — by showing up, by contributing hours to each commitment, and by showcasing nonprofits’ good works and ongoing needs while giving back. In 2023, the volunteer team put a spotlight on five organizations that together represent a roll call of essential services in the St. Louis area, including participating in annual fundraisers for the Foundation for Strengthening Families and for Achievements Unlimited. The team volunteered at the St. Louis Food Bank and conducted mock interviews and contributed to a career fair sponsored by NPower, which promotes technology education and career development to empower students. They also showed their best philanthropy moves in the Sista Strut event for breast cancer awareness. So far this year, the team members are emphasizing health and education through volunteering at the Ronald McDonald House and partnering with the Annie Malone organization.

Banner photo: The Chile team built houses for families who lost their homes in the wildfires in the country's Valparaíso region in February.