Faces of Lehigh

Felicia La Forgia ’90 was promoted to head of Corporate Banking at U.S. Bank, the nation’s fifth largest commercial bank. She leads client activity in all industry, geographic and government sectors, spearheads community engagement and champions cross-enterprise initiatives in the greater New York City area. La Forgia received her bachelor’s degree in finance from Lehigh and an MBA from New York University, Stern School of Business.

Joe Solly ’14 ’20 MBA

Joe Solly '14 '20 MBA accepted a position at Mulesoft as a principal customer success manager. Solly graduated from Lehigh in 2014 with a degree in earth and environmental science. He worked primarily in software sales before returning to Lehigh to earn his master’s of business administration through the 1-MBA program to gain business acumen, round out his undergraduate degree and move into a managerial role.

Herbert ‘Bert’ Trucksess ’71

Bert Trucksess ’71 retired in April as chairman of Saia Inc. (NASDAQ), one of the nation’s leading trucking carriers with more than 9,500 employees. He was chairman and CEO of Saia and its predecessor, SCS Transportation, from 2000-2006, and then chairman to 2019. While starting his career in the energy business for 13 years with Sun Company, his last name destined Trucksess for the next 36 years in the trucking industry. At Lehigh, Trucksess received his bachelor’s degree in business and economics with highest honors and Phi Beta Kappa recognition. He is an advisory board member of Lehigh’s Center for Supply Chain Research.

Katherine Hodsdon ’11

Katherine Hodsdon ’11 was named the chair of the newly formed Undergraduate Dean’s Advisory Council in August. This new group of alumni, two to 10 years post-graduation, was created by Katrina Zalatan, associate dean of undergraduate programs, to provide a line of communication between young alumni and the College of Business, to advise ways to keep offerings relevant and to link students to the business community to promote career success.

Hodsdon, née Glass-Hardenbergh, is a vice president, portfolio manager at Acadian Asset Management in Boston. Acadian is a quantitative asset manager with US $92 billion assets under management as of June 30, 2020. She has been with the firm for 4 years and works as a member of the equity research team to continually enhance their forecasting models.

Hodsdon is coming off a six-year term on the Lehigh Young Alumni Council. She has been a presenter at the Lehigh Wall Street Council’s financial services forum almost every year since she graduated.

She has two Bachelor of Science degrees from Lehigh—integrated business and engineering, finance; and information and systems engineering. Hodsdon earned a master’s degree at NYU
in mathematics in finance.