Deborah Demott is the David F. Cavers Professor of Law at Duke University where she focuses her scholarship and teaching on the law of agency, business organizations, fiduciary obligation, and art law. She has served as sole Reporter for the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Third) of Agency, published in 2006, and has authored numerous articles in addition to a treatise on shareholder derivative actions and a casebook on Fiduciary Obligation, Agency and Partnership. Additionally, DeMott has taught at numerous reputable institutions including LSE, University of Sydney, and others.

Michael Koffler is a partner at Eversheds Sutherland (US), where he guides investment advisers, broker-dealers and investment funds in their compliance with federal and state securities laws and regulations, and SRO rules. Koffler advises clients on the full spectrum of business operations, including advertising, portfolio management, trading, internal controls, compliance programs, mergers and acquisitions and other management issues. He also counsels other financial institutions—banks and insurance companies—on securities issues associated with the management and distribution of investment products.

Robert Sitkoff is the John L. Gray Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, where he was the youngest professor with tenure to receive a chair in the history of the school. Sitkoff previously taught at New York University School of Law and at Northwestern University School of Law. He has won three distinguished teaching awards. Sitkoff serves as an advisory consultant and expert witness in litigation and regulatory matters involving wills, trusts, estates, and fiduciary administration. He has also led training workshops for trust officers and other professional fiduciaries.

Clark M. Blackman II has been recognized by Worth magazine as one of the “Best Financial Advisors in America” from 1996 to 2004. He has contributed to four books on financial and investment planning and fiduciary issues, one of them entitled: The New Fiduciary Standard. Blackman has served as chairman of the Executive Committee of the AICPA^® Personal Financial Planning Division and participates on that organization’s Fiduciary and Professional Standards Task Forces. He is also a founding member and charter steering committee member of The Committee for the Fiduciary Standard, and served on the Best Practices Board of the Institute for the Fiduciary Standard.

Knut A. Rostad, MBA co-founded and chaired the Committee for the Fiduciary Standard and co-founded and is president of the Institute for the Fiduciary Standard, a nonprofit formed in 2011 to advance the fiduciary standard through research, education and advocacy. He served as the regulatory and compliance officer at Rembert Pendleton Jackson, a registered investment adviser in Falls Church, Virginia, for ten years until early in 2015.