Good Day Farm

How and when was your business founded?

Our business was founded in Little Rock in December 2020 with the mission of bringing high-quality cannabis to the South. What attracted you to your career? The idea of making people’s lives incrementally better.

What’s your secret to success? Hiring people smarter than me and having a relentless passion for learning. What motto/quote/etc. does your business live by?

Establish trust through openness, authenticity, transparency and decency. What is your leadership style? Collaborative and inspiring.

What is your proudest achievement?

Helping build our amazing team at Good Day Farm while creating massive opportunities in a very unpredictable cannabis marketplace environment.

Where do you see your business in the next few years?

Our goal is to be a $3 billion business based in Arkansas.

What sets you apart from your competitors?

Our relentless focus on our customers, our brands and our product innovation and quality.

What’s something others would be surprised to know about you?

I am a British citizen as well as a United States citizen, and I have the largest sweet tooth.

Marilyn Strickland Arkansas Foundation for Medical Care

Marilyn Strickland is the chief operating officer for Arkansas Foundation for Medical Care and is the senior executive responsible for AFMC’s overall operations. These operational areas and services include Arkansas Medicaid and Medicare health care provider outreach and education, multidisciplinary contact centers, health utilization management, information technology, marketing, communications, business intelligence, program evaluation and data mining services.

She came to AFMC with more than 40 years of experience in public-sector health care. Before joining the AFMC team, she gained extensive experience with the Arkansas Department of Human Services including serving in the COO role at Arkansas Medicaid. Today, Strickland champions AFMC’s mission to promote excellence in health and health care through education and evaluation. She supports AFMC’s more than 300 health care professionals and works throughout the organization to ensure that AFMC remains at the forefront of health care reform, all the while improving health care for her fellow Arkansans.

Don Swartz

Edafio

As Edafio’s chief operating officer, Don Swartz is responsible for internal operations, processes and systems supporting staff associates and customer services.

As the newest member of the executive team, he leads quality and productivity initiatives, spearheads the ongoing development of Edafio’s capacity and scale and oversees and manages the integration of future acquisitions. His background speaks to the versatility of his leadership skills and comprises an impressive track record of building world-class customer service organizations and operationalizing and delivering complex technology capabilities. Swartz brings more than 30 years of technology and operational leadership experience with regional, national and international businesses including Fortune 100 and 500 companies. He has held executive positions at CompassMSP, Flexential, QTS, Tradeweb Direct, Freddie Mac and Capital One, among other software, services and platform businesses. Swartz earned his BSEE in electrical engineering from DeVry Institute and resides in northern Virginia.

Quinten Whiteside

Wright

Lindsey Jennings

Quinten Whiteside is the chief operating officer of Wright Lindsey Jennings (WLJ), one of Arkansas’s largest and oldest law firms. With nearly 80 attorneys, WLJ offers comprehensive legal guidance across more than 50 practice areas and 20 industries. An experienced litigator, Whiteside’s practice focuses on administrative law, government relations, transportation, land- lord/tenant concerns and health care. Mid-South Super Lawyers named him a “Rising Star” in 2021 and 2022, and he was featured in “Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch” in 2021, 2022 and 2023 for insurance and transportation law.

Whiteside spent six years on the KUAR/KLRE board, including as chair of the recruitment and governance committee, and graduated from Leadership Greater Little Rock Class XXXVII. He currently serves on the boards of the First Tee of Central Arkansas and the ACCESS Cup Golf Tournament.

Jamie Wiggins, Ph.D., MBA, RN, NEAA-BC, FACHE Arkansas Children’s Hospital

Jamie Wiggins serves as the executive vice president and chief operating officer for Arkansas Children’s. An actionoriented health care leader, Wiggins is steadfast in his commitment to improving quality of care and delivering excellence. He oversees the patient care services and operations team and is ultimately responsible for developing, implementing and improving the systems that deliver the best outcomes for the children of Arkansas. As a registered nurse, Wiggins has clinical experience and operational expertise that informs a unique perspective focused on enhancing patient experience, growing programs and promoting diversity, equity and inclusion.

Wiggins has a Ph.D. in Nursing, is a fellow of the American College of Healthcare Executives and is a certified “Nurse Executive-Advanced” by the American Nurses Credentialing Center. He has a bachelor’s degree in nursing and a master’s degree in nursing and health systems leadership as well as an MBA.

Lindsay Wilmott Generations Bank

Lindsay Wilmott was appointed to serve as chief operations officer of Generations Bank in August 2019. Before that, she spent time working within the bank’s compliance department. During this time, she obtained her “Certified Regulatory Compliance Manager” certification.

Wilmott began her banking career as a part-time teller in 2006 while pursuing her bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the University of Arkansas. Upon graduation, she accepted a full-time role within the Rogers branch, working as head teller and later assistant branch manager. Shortly thereafter, the Rogers branch was acquired by what would later become Generations Bank. This would be the first of three acquisitions in which Wilmott assisted the bank. In 2016, she played an integral part in establishing the bank’s loan operations department, serving simultaneously as a supervisor for the department and as a lending compliance officer. She moved to work fully within the compliance department in 2018.