Cooper Biersach

Cooper Biersach is co-founder of the Family Enterprise Center at UNC Kenan-Flagler and the faculty lead for the Center’s educational programming.

She teaches family business courses to undergraduate and MBA students to prepare them for the challenges of leadership and ownership within their family’s enterprise. She also designs curriculum for multi-generational families to be delivered both in-person and in online formats.

Professor Biersach served as the senior VP, worldwide human resources and a member of the executive committee of a family-owned company, Jack Morton Worldwide, a global brand experience and communications agency. In that role, she faced firsthand many of the challenges and opportunities of a family-run business: exponential growth, succession planning, leadership development, acquisitions, global pressures and the transition of the business by sale to the publicly traded holding company, Interpublic Group.

Drawing on her experience as a non-family executive, Professor Biersach provides leadership coaching, succession planning, governance and communication consulting to privately held businesses and family enterprises.

Professor Biersach is the founding director of the Carolinas Family Office Forum, a networking and educational peer group for top executives of family offices in North and South Carolina.

She holds an executive certificate in leadership coaching from Georgetown University’s Institute for Transformational Leadership. She is a Professional Certified Coach with the International Coaching Federation.

She received her MBA and JD with honors from UNC-Chapel Hill, where she also earned her BA in English.