Mary-Frances Winters

Mary-Frances Winters is president and founder of The Winters Group, Inc. Prior to founding The Winters Group in 1984, she was affirmative action officer and senior market analyst at Eastman Kodak Company, where she worked for 11 years. Among her many awards and distinctions, she was named a diversity pioneer by Profiles in Diversity Journal in August 2007 and in 2015 a Legacy Leader in Diversity and Inclusion by the Forum on Workplace Inclusion sponsored by The University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis.
A life member of the Board of Trustees of the University of Rochester, Ms. Winters has served on the boards of the Greater Rochester Metro Chamber of Commerce, The United Way of Greater Rochester and the National Board of the Girl Scouts of the USA. She has served as a mentor for the Emerging Leaders Program Sponsored by the Centers for Leadership and Public Affairs at Duke University and the University of Cape Town, South Africa.
Ms. Winters has been a frequent contributor to the editorial page of the local newspaper and USA Today’s Forum column on workplace and diversity related issues. She has been published in the International Personnel Management Association Newsletter, Profiles in Diversity Journal, DiversityInc Magazine, Executive Excellence Magazine, Society of Human Resource Management’s Mosaics Newsletter, The EMA Reporter and has written monographs on "Philanthropy Among People of Color" for the Council on Foundations in Washington, DC. She is the author of three books, Only Wet Babies Like Change: Workplace Wisdom for Baby Boomers, Inclusion Starts With “I” and CEO’s Who Get It: Diversity Leadership from the Heart and Soul. She most recently authored a chapter in the book Diversity at Work: The Practice of Inclusion (2013).
A qualified Intercultural Development Inventory® (IDI®) administrator, Winters also serves as senior facilitator for IDI® qualifying seminars.
She is a graduate of the University of Rochester with undergraduate degrees in English and Psychology, and a master’s degree in business administration from the William E. Simon Executive Development Program. She received an honorary doctorate from Roberts Wesleyan College in 1997.