AWBC STAFF

Corinne Goble
CEO
Goble joined the Association of Women's Business Centers as CEO in January 2019 and is charged with bringing about enhanced sustainability and increased capacity to the association and its members. When AWBC and the national network of Women's Business Centers were confronted with effects of a global pandemic in early 2020, Goble and the advocacy team sprung into action. While Women's Business Centers responded tirelessly to small business concerns in their communities, Goble and the team championed their efforts to secure resources.
Thankfully, members of Congress foresaw the important role that Women's Business Centers would play in an economic disaster and appropriated record-level emergency funding (CARES Act) to be administered by the United States Small Business Administration (SBA). In addition to $150,000 awarded annually to each Women's Business Center, centers could access up to $420,000 of CARES Act funds giving them access to $570,000 in a single fiscal year. In addition to their own annual fundraising efforts, this unprecedented combination of funding is the highest level of funding than at any other point in history. Women's Business Centers leveraged this infusion of funds into tremendous impact.
Goble and the full AWBC team will remain steadfast in their commitment to the growth and strength of the Women's Business Center network. Her immediate priority is the modernization and re-authorization of the Women's Business Center program while building capacity throughout the growing network of 145 Women's Business Centers.
Adjacent to and in support to this work, Goble serves in a variety of collaborative efforts that directly support small businesses in their efforts to get started and grow, whether in procurement, digital skills, access to capital or international trade. She's a Founding Member of the USMCA Small and Medium Enterprise Counselor Network consisting of counselors in Mexico, Canada, and the United States that collaborate to help small businesses find success through exports.
She was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, attended high school there and studied abroad in Spain where she received a dual Spain-U.S. high school diploma. Having graduated with honors, she earned her BA International Studies from the University of Evansville in Indiana. She attended graduate school in Washington, DC at The George Washington University and has never stopped learning, even completing her Business Spanish Certificate from the University of Wisconsin. She enjoys the outdoor adventures like hiking the Badlands of North Dakota, long runs along the C&O Canal in D.C. and Maryland, and sunny afternoons on her stand-up paddle board. And, she loves raising her two children, Reid (16) and Adaliz (11) in Louisville, Kentucky to be entrepreneurs one day, too.

Jessie Yankee
Vice President of Programs
Jessie Yankee is the Vice President of Programs for the Association of Women's Business Centers, focused on program development, advocacy, and capacity building for Women's Business Centers nationwide. Previously she was the Director of the Missouri Women's Business Center, focused on economic inclusion and access to capital for the historically underserved. Jessie holds a lifelong passion for equitable small business development and entrepreneurship for women, and previously owned and operated an award-winning commercial IT business. Jessie is also a mother of two, Benny (11), and Ella (9).
Jessie grew up in Bethalto, Illinois, and later attended the University of Missouri, majoring in Business Administration. She then completed her MBA at William Woods University.

Jeremy Mertz
Director of Operations
Jeremy joined the AWBC in July of 2022 as the Executive Assistant to the CEO and has since been promoted to Director of Operations. His earlier career was spent in broadcasting, working at WAVE3 News, the local NBC affiliate in Louisville KY. He held various positions during his 16 year tenure at WAVE, to include roles as broadcast news director and assignment editor. Since joining AWBC he has produced the 2022 hybrid annual leadership conference, led the effort to migrate membership data to a new database powered by Salesforce and established various reporting and HR systems.
Jeremy was born and raised in Louisville, KY and now lives in New Albany, IN with his husband Brendan and his 15 year old son Miles, who is a rising sophomore at Jeremy's alma mater Holy Cross High School. Jeremy enjoys spending time at the family beach house in Outer Banks NC, reading whatever he can get his hands on and is learning to garden.