Senior Director & Counsel Global Regulatory Risk,
Monitoring, & Remediation
Walmart, Inc.
Bentonville, Ark.
Katisha D. Fortune is the proverbial work in progress. “My focus on continuous improvement is important to me. It allows for me to have a ‘learner’s mindset’ in any situation I encounter,” she explains.
That mindset carried her through law school to an associate attorney position right after graduation, to deputy attorney general for the Delaware Department of Justice, to senior associate counsel at Walmart and lead counsel to its Sam’s Club brand, and to her current position as senior director and counsel in Walmart’s Global Regulatory Risk, Monitoring & Remediation unit. “I’m less committed to prestige or title than I am to what I am learning in any situation. I believe I can learn from anyone, no matter his or her title or position in society,” she says.
She learned from three women in particular. One, a law school classmate and now a partner at a blue chip law firm, “always reminds me that I have a voice and I belong at the table and in the conversation,” Fortune says. Another hired Fortune for her first position at Walmart. “It would not have been possible without her advocacy and determination.” The third, Fortune’s sponsor and leader at Sam’s Club, “used her political and social currency to ensure I had opportunities to shine and be presented for increasing levels of responsibility.”
Fortune took their lessons to heart. “‘Pay it forward’ is a life principle I try to adhere to, even if imperfectly,” she says.
Fortune graduated, cum laude, from The Florida State University, and from University of Pennsylvania Carey School of Law. “I love the power of the law,” she declares. She would like to bring that power to issues she is most passionate about: criminal justice reform, second chances for recently incarcerated individuals, and equity in education “particularly for those forgotten, misunderstood, and underrepresented in high-achievement circles.”
