THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH
The University of Utah is the state's oldest and largest institution of higher education and is a Tier 1 research university. The various departments and colleges within the university are overseen and administered by the following organizations.
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Taylor R. Randall was selected by the Utah Board of Higher Education as the 17th president of the University of Utah in August 2021. An award-winning educator, innovative leader, and champion of higher education, he comes to the position with more than two decades of experience at the U, serving as both dean of and an accounting professor in the David Eccles School of Business. He is the first alumnus since 1973 to serve as president.
Randall began his tenure building on the momentum established by his predecessors, declaring a bold vision to make the U a top-10 public university with unsurpassed societal impact. His strategy outlines three objectives: to inspire a new generation of students by revolutionizing the student experience, innovate and generate discoveries that change the world, and to serve all 3.5 million Utahns. The vision includes goals to increase enrollment to 40,000 students and secure $1 billion in research funding annually. Learn more about his vision and initiatives at president.utah.edu.
In his 20-plus years at the university, Randall has become known as a dynamic leader who drives growth and innovation. During his tenure as dean of the David Eccles School of Business (DESB) from 2009-2021, the school grew five-fold and now holds top 10 entrepreneurship rankings for both undergraduate and graduate programs. Seven of the school’s programs are currently ranked in the top 25 in the nation. Under his leadership, the business school also expanded experiential learning opportunities and its societal impact with the creation of the Goff Strategic Leadership Center, the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute, the Marriner S. Eccles Institute for Economics and Quantitative Analysis, and the Sorenson Impact Center.
Randall began his career at the U as a professor of accounting from 1999-2009. He received awards for the best teacher in the MBA, Executive MBA, and undergraduate programs, as well as the Brady Superior Teaching Award. His professional experience includes consulting positions with major companies such as General Motors, Dupont, and O.C. Tanner. He graduated from the University of Utah in 1990 with honors in accounting and earned an MBA and a doctorate in operations and information management from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.
Randall and his wife, Janet, have four children, one daughter-in-law, and one son-in-law. He loves spending family time playing games, relaxing in the backyard, mountain biking, road biking, golfing, and all things sports-related.
THE PRESIDENT'S CABINET
Executive Vice Presidents
Executive vice presidents reporting to the president with responsibility over the academic and health care missions of the university enterprise.
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Mitzi M. Montoya, Ph.D., was appointed provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs in January, 2023. She joins the University of Utah with a vigor for solving problems, breaking barriers and innovating change for the greater good.
Montoya is a thought leader in higher education. Throughout her career she has supported student and faculty success, enhanced entrepreneurial and innovation ecosystems and led collaborative initiatives to find solutions for social, technical and political challenges.
Before joining the U, Montoya was the dean of the Anderson School of Management at the University of New Mexico. She also served as provost and executive vice president at Washington State University and as the Sara Hart Kimball dean of the College of Business at Oregon State University. At Arizona State University, she was dean of the College of Technology & Innovation, vice provost of the ASU Polytechnic campus, and the inaugural vice president and university dean of entrepreneurship and innovation. Prior to ASU, Dr. Montoya spent 15 years at North Carolina State University where she held the Zelnak Chair in Marketing & Innovation in the Poole College of Management. She received her doctorate in marketing and statistics and a bachelor's in applied engineering science from Michigan State University.
Montoya’s entrepreneurial approach to problem-solving is driven by her research on innovation processes and strategies and influenced by her experiences as a former American Council on Education Fellow. As provost, Montoya seeks to inspire students, faculty and staff; lead innovation efforts; and help the U become a top 10 public university with unsurpassed societal impact.
Photo credit: Beka Price Photography
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Bob S. Carter, MD, PhD, serves as Executive Vice President for Health Sciences and CEO for University of Utah Health. In his roles leading the health system, Carter works to ensure the professional and educational success of more than 27,000 talented faculty, staff, and students who make U of U Health one of the nation’s premier academic health centers. Prior to joining the University of Utah in 2025, he served as the William and Elizabeth Sweet Endowed Professor in Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School and Neurosurgeon-In-Chief at Mass General Brigham, Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital. A neurosurgical oncologist and prolific researcher, Carter was elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2024. Carter received an MD and PhD in epidemiology from Johns Hopkins University and an undergraduate degree in chemistry from Brigham Young University.
Senior Vice Presidents
Senior vice presidents reporting to the president with responsibility across multiple domains of the university enterprise.
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Troy D’Ambrosio is Sr. Vice President of Innovation, executive director of the Lassonde Entrepreneur Institute, assistant dean at the David Eccles School of Business and holds the Troy D’Ambrosio Presidential Chair in Entrepreneurship at the U. The Lassonde Institute assists students and faculty from idea to company launch through programs, competitions, and academic program at DESB. The Lassonde Institute has been consistently ranked as one of the best 10 programs for entrepreneurship in the nation and it has helped the University of Utah become a leader in technology commercialization.
D’Ambrosio is co-founder, officer, and director of multiple startup companies that have attracted over $700 million in capital. Those companies include Transworld Telecommunications, which was sold to Sprint in 1998; Convergence Communications, which was sold to Lockheed Martin in 2005; and EPM Mining Ventures, which is listed on the Toronto Venture Exchange. He has served as the VP of investor relations and corporate communication for American Stores Company, a NYSE listed company, the director of mutual fund operations for Wasatch Advisors and deputy chief of staff to the Mayor of Salt Lake City. He graduated from the University of Utah in 1982 and was named the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year in 2000, a v100 Technology Leader in 2008, Best in State Educational Administrator in 2009 and received the 2014 Governor’s Medal for Excellence in Science and Technology. LinkedIn
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Jeff Labrum, CPA, is the Chief Operations Officer for the University of Utah, a role he assumed on November 1, 2023. As COO and member of the executive team, he works closely with the president, CFO, and two senior vice presidents to oversee the execution of achieving the overall goals and vision for the university.
Jeff directly oversees Auxiliary Services, Facilities, Operational Excellence, Project Design and Construction, Real Estate Administration, UIT, and Department of Public Safety. He also serves as the president’s liaison for Athletics and the University of Utah Growth Capital Partners Foundation.
Jeff brings more than 25 years of private sector industry experience as a finance and operations executive. He began his career at the accounting firm KPMG and spent years at Magnesium Corporation in a variety of roles and responsibilities including driving spin off’s of business units and the recapitalization of the business. Most recently, he founded his second startup company, Lingotek, Inc., a SaaS enterprise translation software platform and sold the company in January 2021 subsequently joining the acquirer Straker Group (ASX:STG) as its U.S. general manager. He joined the University of Utah in 2023 as a special advisor to the president before assuming his current role.
Jeff is a certified public accountant and a two-time University of Utah graduate, with a BA in accounting and an MBA.
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Jason Perry is the Sr. Vice President for Government Relations and the Director of the Hinckley Institute of Politics at the University of Utah. Jason brings more than 25 years of experience working in the public sector, where he has worked extensively with policy makers at the local, state, and federal level.
Jason is a graduate of the S.J. Quinney College of Law at The University of Utah and began his career working for Attorney General Jan Graham. A passionate advocate for protecting children, Jason helped launch the Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce and received the FBI Director’s Award for distinguished service to the law enforcement community. He also served as a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney.
Following his service in the Attorney General’s office, Jason became an Administrative Judge in Utah’s Department of Commerce where he quickly rose to the level of deputy director. While serving in this capacity, former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman, Jr. appointed Jason to serve as the Executive Director of the Governor’s Office of Economic Development. During his time leading GOED, he was instrumental in the recruitment and expansion of companies that bolstered Utah’s economy and helped the state receive numerous national accolades including one of the Most Business Friendly States, Most Dynamic Economy, and Best Managed State. Most recently, Jason served as the Chief of Staff for Governor Gary Herbert. Jason became Vice President for Government Relations at the University of Utah in 2011 and Director of the Hinckley Institute in 2016.
Jason makes his home in Salt Lake City with his wife Mary Catherine and their four children.
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Dr. Erin Rothwell is the Sr. Vice President for Research (VPR) and Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the University of Utah. Since joining the VPR Office in 2018, Dr. Rothwell currently oversees 18 research administrative units that support research compliance, regulation policies, and safety procedures across campus. In addition, Dr. Rothwell serves as the President of the University of Utah Research Foundation that cultivates research innovation and technology transfer for university real estate prospects and industry partnerships.
Dr. Rothwell’s research is currently funded through the National Institutes of Health and is focused on ethical, social, and legal implications of genetic and technological advancements on individuals and families specifically within newborn screening, prenatal testing, and bio banking.
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Heidi Woodbury has led University Advancement since February 2019. During her tenure, she has spearheaded several fundraising campaigns and led the university to exceed its $2 billion Imagine New Heights campaign goal. Since her appointment as vice president, University Advancement has developed campus-wide partnerships with a renewed focus on donor-centric fundraising and a One U approach to customer service and teamwork.
Prior to Heidi’s current position, she served in various leadership roles in the David Eccles School of Business from 1996 – 2019, most recently as assistant dean for external relations. Under her direction, financial support from private, foundation, and industry donors significantly increased; new academic centers and facilities were built to meet the needs of students, faculty, and our community’s business professionals; and alumni connections across the nation and world have flourished. Prior to joining the Eccles School, Heidi was the director of public relations for KUER-FM, the university’s public radio station. During her storied career, Heidi has been the recipient of many awards for her outstanding achievements, most recently the Patti N. Choate Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Fundraising Profession from the Utah Society of Fundraisers.
Growing up in rural Utah, Heidi’s post-high school vision was not to attend college. Fortunately, her academic counselor urged her to apply for the prestigious University of Utah leadership scholarship. The scholarship offered life changing opportunities, enabling her to graduate from the U with a degree in Social and Behavioral Science in 1989. Heidi has since dedicated her life’s work to paying it forward and facilitating more University of Utah chances for those who want to achieve higher education goals.
Institutional Officers
Institutional officers reporting to the president with responsibility for specific domains of the university enterprise.
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Natalie Gochnour serves as senior advisor to President Taylor Randall and is director of the Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute at the University of Utah. She also serves as the chief economist for the Salt Lake Chamber. Natalie’s experience includes a diverse mix of public service and business experience.
From 2006 to 2013 she guided the public policy work of the Salt Lake Chamber, Utah’s largest business association. During her state service, she advised Utah governors Bangerter, Leavitt, and Walker, and served as the media spokesperson for the governor’s office during the 2002 Olympic Winter Games. She also served as a political appointee in the George W. Bush administration, serving as an associate administrator at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and a deputy to the secretary at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
In 2022, Natalie was the recipient of the internationally-acclaimed Athena award, a recognition given to a professional female leader who has demonstrated significant achievement in business and community service. She serves as a Utah Department of Transportation Commissioner and on the boards of the Utah Olympic Legacy Foundation, Envision Utah, World Trade Center Utah, and Primary Children’s Hospital. She also is a regional director for Altabank, Utah’s largest community bank, and a trustee of the O.C. Tanner Company.
Natalie has both an undergraduate and master’s degree in economics from the University of Utah.
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In June 2021, Mark Harlan began his fourth year as director of athletics at the University of Utah. A veteran administrator with a deep history in the Pac-12 Conference, Harlan brought more than 20 years of intercollegiate athletics experience at five universities to Salt Lake City, including four years as director of athletics at the University of South Florida.
In his first three years at Utah, Harlan has overseen significant success in competition, in the classroom, in the community, and in fundraising, with marked improvements to the student-athlete experience. The skiing program has won two national championships (2019, 2021) and was the leader through two days of the 2020 NCAA Championships when the meet was canceled; the football program won back-to-back Pac-12 South championships in 2018 and ’19, and played in the Holiday Bowl and Alamo Bowl; gymnastics finished third at the 2021 NCAA Championships, advanced to the 2019 NCAA semifinals and claimed both the 2021 Pac-12 Championship and the 2020 regular season Pac-12 title; and the volleyball program has competed in three consecutive NCAA tournaments with a Sweet 16 appearance in 2019.
In addition, the men’s tennis, women’s cross-country and men’s golf programs have advanced to NCAA Championships competition as teams, and the Utes achieved their highest final fall ranking in the 2019 Learfield/IMG Director’s Cup, ranking 18th, third among Pac-12 schools. That 2019 fall sports season saw all four of Utah’s fall sports programs reach postseason play.
Academic achievement has risen to new heights under Harlan’s leadership, with Utah’s student-athletes posting the top three semester GPAs, including a program-record 3.57 in Spring 2020. In each of his three years at Utah, the Utes’ student-athletes have broken the previous record for full-year GPA, including a GPA of 3.407 in 2020-21. That topped the previous record of 3.387 set in 2019-20, which had eclipsed the previous best of 3.25 in 2018-19, Harlan’s first year at the U.
In addition, Utah’s 95-percent graduation rate, according to the NCAA’s November 2018 Graduation Success Rate report, was the highest in school history, and has been followed by back-to-back 94-percent rates in the 2019 and 2020 reports.
Harlan has spearheaded the development of the Ken Garff Red Zone at Rice-Eccles Stadium, which opened in 2021 and expands the stadium’s capacity to 51,444, while adding new team locker room facilities, club spaces and premium seating. Groundbreaking took place in November 2019, and construction on the $80 million expansion began in early 2020 on the project that will also fully enclose the stadium’s south end zone area. Harlan and University of Utah President Ruth V. Watkins unveiled plans for the project in November 2018, and in April 2019 announced the Ken Garff family’s $17.5 donation, the largest gift in Utah Athletics history.
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Jeff Herring has served as the Chief People & Culture Officer at the University of Utah since 2013. Prior to the U, Jeff served on the Governor’s Cabinet as the Executive Director of the Utah Department of Human Resource Management for 12 years. In HR, Jeff has consistently focused on developing the organizations strategic efforts using principles of increasing customer service, efficiency and effectiveness, and leadership capacity.
Prior to his public service, Jeff worked as an attorney focusing in the area of labor and employment law.
Jeff earned his BA in History from the University of Utah. He then went on to earn his MBA with an emphasis on HR and completed his law degree from California Western School of Law in San Diego, California.
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After two decades of leading in a series of University of Utah IT roles, Jake Johansen has been named interim chief information officer for the institution and the Utah System of Higher Education. Johansen will serve while the university launches a search to replace longtime CIO Steve Hess, who is retiring after five decades at the university, effective July 1, 2026.
For the past 23 years, Johansen has worked in a broad range of IT security-related jobs, most recently as chief information security officer, reporting to Chief Information Officers Steve Hess (campus) and Donna Roach (U of U Health).
Johansen steps into this temporary role during a time of great change at the university, as the institution thoughtfully plans for emerging technologies, including implementing artificial intelligence (AI) tools and boosting cybersecurity efforts. Prior to taking on the CISO role, Johansen worked as director for Enterprise Security in the U’s Information Security Office (ISO), for which he managed Information Assurance, Security Engineering, and Security Operations Center teams. His work entailed promoting, implementing, and supporting the university’s Cybersecurity Program; overseeing the process of gathering, analyzing, and assessing current and future information security threat landscapes; hiring, training, and managing staff; and actively participating in the IT security governance process.
Johansen is a certified information systems security professional (CISSP), certified HIPAA professional (CHP), and certified security administrator. In addition to leading the university’s IT professionals, Johansen will take on Hess’ role leading the Utah Education Network (UEN), which brings together 40 school districts and state libraries and government in a network of online resources.
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Lori McDonald, PhD, is the Vice President for Student Affairs at the University of Utah.
Credited with the capacity to build vibrant partnerships with major offices and academic units across campus, McDonald provides innovative leadership to a comprehensive Student Affairs Division that includes Housing & Residential Education, Student Development & Inclusion, Student Health & Wellness and the Office of the Dean of Students. As Dean, she served as the Student Affairs Administrator for Campus Emergency Management and as the Senior Deputy Title IX coordinator and now sits on the President's Cabinet and the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs' Academic Leadership Team.
McDonald earned her doctorate from the University of Utah’s Department of Educational Leadership & Policy. She has a master’s degree in higher education and student affairs from The Ohio State University and a bachelor’s degree in biology, also from the U. Her tenure as Vice President comprises over twenty-five years of dedicated service within the University of Utah's Division of Student Affairs.
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Chris Nelson is the chief university relations / communications officer for the University of Utah. Prior to assuming this role in August 2022, Nelson served as interim chief marketing and communication officer and the university’s communications director and chief spokesperson. Over the course of his three-decade career at the university, Nelson has held senior roles in strategic communications, marketing and fundraising, including: assistant vice president for public affairs at University of Utah Health and executive director of the University of Utah Hospital Foundation. He holds a master’s degree in public administration, bachelor’s degrees in mass communication and political science, and a graduate certificate in integrated marketing communications—all from the University of Utah.
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As Chief Safety Officer of the University of Utah, Keith Squires is responsible for the oversight and coordination of all campus safety initiatives, as well as supervising the university's public safety divisions.
He served in Governor Gary Herbert’s cabinet as the Utah Commissioner of Public Safety, retiring in September 2018 after 31 years of service as a law enforcement officer. He served as the homeland security advisor for Governors Huntsman and Herbert. Keith has served the state in many other capacities, including as director of the State Bureau of Investigation, assistant superintendent of the Utah Highway Patrol, and director of Emergency Management and Homeland Security. Keith served as a state and local law enforcement advisor to U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.
He holds a master’s degree in homeland defense and security from the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School and a bachelor’s degree in administration of criminal justice. He is a graduate of the FBI National Academy and FBI National Executive Institute.
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Andrea Thomas has spent most of her 23-year career in brand management, retail marketing, innovation, and sustainability. Most recently, she was assistant dean of undergraduate studies at the David Eccles School of Business. Before that, she spent nearly nine years at Walmart Inc. in a variety of roles including senior vice president of marketing for the U.S. business; senior vice president of sustainability; and senior vice president of private brands. Previous to Walmart, she was vice president of global chocolate for Hershey Co. and spent 13 years at PepsiCo Inc. working in brand management, innovation, and retail marketing. She received a B.S. in mass communication and public relations from the U, an MBA from BYU, and an EdD in higher education management from the University of Pennsylvania. LinkedIn
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Educational Experience:
- University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law, J.D., 1987 Order of the Coif (Top 2%) Utah Law Review, Articles Editor
Professional Experience:
- Van Cott, Bagley, Cornwall & McCarthy, Shareholder
- Utah Supreme Court, Clerkship with the Honorable Michael D. Zimmerman
Professional Associations and Community Activities:
- National Association of College and University Attorneys (NACUA)
- Past President Legal Aid Society of Salt Lake Board of Trustees
- Past President University of Utah Honors College National Advisory Board
- Utah State Bar, Ethics and Discipline Committee Member