Dean's Advisory Board

Debra Perry                                        

Managing Member
Perry Consulting

Debra Perry is a senior financial services professional with broad executive and board level experience in credit analysis, risk oversight and financial institution restructuring.  Presently, Ms. Perry is a director of three public and private companies in the financial and business services markets. Over her 25 year career, she was a senior executive at Moody’s, the bond rating agency, and held a variety of fixed income research and capital market positions in New York, Paris and London with First Boston and Chemical Bank.

During her career at Moody’s, Ms. Perry served as Chief Administrative Officer with responsibility for Human Resources, Technology & Operations, Communications and Facilities. In addition to her corporate roles at Moody’s Ms. Perry managed numerous rating groups covering financial institutions, industrial companies, and US municipal issuers and she served as Chief Credit Officer.

In 2004, Ms. Perry joined the board of Conseco, Inc., a life and health insurer that emerged from bankruptcy in late 2003 with a new management team and board selected to rebuild the company. In 2008, Ms. Perry joined the board of Korn/Ferry International, a premier global provider of talent management solutions.  In addition, Ms. Perry is a member of the advisory board of Bridge Associates LLC, a national turnaround and crisis management firm.

Ms. Perry served on the board of MBIA, the largest financial guaranty insurance company from 2004 until March 2008.  Following the early impact of the credit crisis on the company and its recapitalization, she was asked by the board to serve as a consultant to its Credit Risk Committee. In that capacity, she worked with management and the board to develop recommendations to strengthen the company’s credit risk platform, processes and core underwriting principles.

Since becoming a corporate director, Ms. Perry has been a frequent speaker on Audit Committee oversight in the new governance environment and on crisis management on boards at meetings sponsored by corporate board and business organizations.   She is a member of the National Association of Corporate Directors, the International Corporate Governance Network, Women Corporate Directors and the Economic Club of New York. She recently was elected a trustee of the Committee for Economic Development, the non-partisan business led public policy organization dedicated to policy research on the major social and economic issues of our time. 

Ms. Perry holds a BA (Phi Beta Kappa) from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a graduate degree from Yale University where she completed all course work for a PhD in European history. A fluent French speaker who lived for six years in France and the UK, she retains a deep interest in European culture and public affairs.  She resides in New Jersey with her two children.