Nashville entrepreneur and executive leader Stuart McWhorter is rejoining the board of FB Financial Corporation after leaving the Lee administration in May to return to the private sector.

After serving as a director for more than 12 years, McWhorter resigned from the company’s board in January 2018 when he became Gov. Bill Lee’s commissioner of Finance and Administration.

McWhorter is co-founder and chairman of Clayton Associates, a venture capital firm investing in health care, technology and diversified business services. He also volunteers at his alma mater, Clemson University. He formerly served as president and CEO of the Nashville Entrepreneur Center.

Insurance Hall inducts Spann, Wilson, Zander

The Robert E. Musto Tennessee Insurance Hall of Fame at Middle Tennessee State University has selected three longtime insurance professionals for its 2020 class, including two posthumous inductees.

The inductees into the 2020 class are the late John A. “Jack” Spann III of Nashville, Bill Wilson of Nashville and the late Julian “Bud” Zander of Nashville.

The 2020 induction ceremony is planned in conjunction with an Insurors of Tennessee conference in March.

Spann’s posthumous honor recognizes a long and accomplished career in the insurance industry, including his leadership of Spann Insurance Inc., several terms as president of the Insurors of Nashville, a single term as president of the Insurors of Tennessee along with stints on the organization’s board of directors. He was also a founder of Insbank, a local insurance bank.

MTSU’s Risk Management Lab is named in honor of Spann, described in his nomination letter as “an exemplary public servant and consummate professional who worked diligently to improve the quality of life for his fellow Tennesseans.”

Wilson retired from the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America in December 2016 where he served as associate vice president of education and research. He was the founder and director of the Big “I” Virtual University for more than 17 years and is the former director of education and technical affairs for the Insurors of Tennessee.

After his retirement, Wilson founded InsuranceCommentary.com, an industry blog about property and casualty insurance. He is working on a fifth book and delivers keynote presentations as part of his consulting work. He has won several national education awards, including the George M. Gottheimer Memorial Award, which is presented periodically to a CPCU Society member who has made an outstanding contribution to the field of insurance education, risk management or insurance consulting.

Zander’s posthumous honor recognizes a 60-year career as a principal of the well-known family business Zander Insurance, one of the largest independent insurance agencies in the country. His leadership within the company led it to top recognitions from some of country’s largest insurance companies, such as Travelers, Nationwide and Progressive.

Zander served on the Insurors of Tennessee board of directors in the early 1990s and worked five years as an adjunct faculty member at Nashville State Community College.

With this year’s class, the Insurance Hall of Fame has inducted 74 members since its inception.

Executive director chosen for John C. Tune Airport

Aviation industry veteran Jeff Roach has been named executive director of operations and development at John C. Tune Airport.

Roach joined Metro Nashville Airport Authority in 2018 as assistant vice president, strategic planning.

Roach is an American Association of Airport Executives accredited airport executive with more than 40 years of aviation experience, including serving as manager of the Fairbanks International Airport, where he administered all airport functions. That airport is a regional hub airport serving more than 1 million passengers per year, with more than 500 based general aviation aircraft and 100 airport employees.

He also served as the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities Northern Region transportation planning manager in Alaska, where he led a team of transportation planning professionals and supervised the completion of numerous commercial service airport master planning efforts.

Roach served as a military aviator and aircraft mechanic. He is a Federal Aviation Administration commercial-instrument rated pilot with more than 1,000 hours of helicopter flight time. He spent more than 37 years as a member of the Alaska Army National Guard.

He began his career with the Alaska Army National Guard in 1981 as a helicopter mechanic and crew chief. He was commissioned as an aviation second lieutenant and completed helicopter flight school the following year. He served in command and staff positions through the rank of colonel.

Pratt named senior marketing director

HarperCollins Christian Publishing has named Nekasha Pratt as the company’s new senior director of marketing for fiction books under both Thomas Nelson and Zondervan.

Pratt brings more than 18 years of marketing expertise to the organization, across multiple industries including nonprofit, financial services and consumer goods. Throughout her career she has helped lead campaigns that have won over 20 creative awards, including three international Cannes Lions.

For the past three and a-half years, Pratt served as director of marketing for the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development, where she developed and maintained close working relationships with tourism boards, legislators, government officials and state partners across 95 counties to help create multichannel campaigns to generate revenue for the state, through tourism. Before her tourism marketing position, Pratt held leadership positions in global organizations, marketing agencies and Fortune 500 companies.

HarperCollins selects Hill as director of audio sales

Brad Hill’s has been promoted to director of audio sales for HarperCollins Christian Publishing and HarperCollins Focus.

Hill began his career at Zondervan, a publishing group within HCCP, in 2006 on the audio production team where he helped bring front list titles to the audio format. Before returning to HCCP and HCF in 2019, he spent six years managing teams at Brilliance Audio where he gained experience in the broader audio publishing industry.

Hill will lead the strategy for the HCCP and HCF audiobooks program, overseeing the audio editorial and marketing process and helping pursue innovative ways to utilize the audio format.

Centerstone Research taps chief psychology officer

Centerstone, a provider of behavioral health and addiction services, has named Dr. Shane Kuhlman as chief psychology officer for Centerstone’s Research Institute.

Before arriving at Centerstone, Kuhlman served as a research and clinical fellow with the Center of Excellence for Suicide Prevention at the Canandaigua VA Medical Center in Canandaigua, New York. He has also served in project director roles for research and implementation programs through the University of Rochester Medical Center, the University of South Alabama and the University of West Florida.

Kuhlman holds a Ph.D. in combined integrated clinical and counseling psychology and a master’s degree in applied psychology from the University of South Alabama. His research efforts have primarily focused on suicide prevention and have been published in many academic publications, including Journal of Interpersonal Violence, Journal of American College Health and The Journal of Crisis Intervention and Suicide Prevention.

Farris first woman to lead Stites & Harbison

Marjorie A. Farris will become the chair Stites & Harbison, PLLC, in January, the first woman to lead the firm since its founding in 1832. Farris will succeed Robert M. Connolly, who served as the firm’s chair for the past six years.

Farris, based in Louisville, says she plans to be actively engaged across all of Stites & Harbison’s 10 offices in Kentucky, Georgia, Indiana, Tennessee and Virginia.

Farris is Stites & Harbison’s co-chair of the Class Action and Multi-District Litigation Group and a member of the Torts & Insurance Practice Service Group. She has actively defended more than 75 class actions nationwide and is the long-standing author of the Kentucky section of the ABA’s Survey of State Class Action Law included in Newberg on Class Actions.

Farris earned her J.D. from the University of Louisville Louis D. Brandeis School of Law. She also is a graduate of the University of Kentucky.

Tanner returns for VP role with Big Loud

Legal and business executive Jeff Tanner is returning to Nashville to assume the newly created role of vice president of business affairs at Big Loud Records and Publishing.

Tanner will oversee business and legal affairs for Big Loud. Relocating from Dallas, Tanner’s previous Nashville tenure includes a decadelong career in the music business with stops at Narada/EMI and Sony Music Nashville as associate director, L&BA.

Genesco appoints Lambros to board

Genesco Inc. has appointed John F. Lambros to its board of directors.

Lambros is president of GCA-U.S., a global investment bank. He serves as the head of GCA’s digital media banking practice, is a member of its board of directors and executive committee, and serves as head of the firm’s New York office.

For more than 22 years, Lambros has been an active adviser to or operator in the digital media and emerging technology markets, including leading more than 250 public and private market financings, mergers & acquisitions, recapitalizations, joint ventures and debt financings. Before GCA, from 2000 to 2003, he was senior vice president of business development for Into Networks, a broadband technology company and pioneer in content streaming.

From 1993 to 2000, Lambros was a banker at Morgan Stanley & Co. where he served as a vice president and a member of the global communications group focused on advising emerging telecommunications, media and technology clients.

Also at Genesco, Melvin G. Tucker, senior vice president and chief financial officer of Genesco, has resigned his position, effective Nov. 27, in order to pursue an opportunity outside of the company.

During the search for a new chief financial officer, Mimi E. Vaughn, board chair, president and chief executive officer, who previously served as chief financial officer, will assume the responsibilities.

In addition, she will oversee a newly established office of the CFO to provide additional leadership, which will be co-led by Brently G. Baxter, vice president and chief accounting officer, Matthew N. Johnson, vice president and treasurer, and Dave Slater, vice president of financial planning & analysis and investor relations.