 | Assistant Dean of Career Services lyhughes@syr.edu |
Lily Yan Hughes is an executive expert in M&A, governance, corporate finance, and securities with experience working for highly regulated financial services companies and banks, real estate operating and development companies, and global technology companies. Hughes brings to the Office of Career Services fresh and timely leadership and global perspectives.
Most recently, Hughes was Senior Vice President, Chief Legal Officer, and Corporate Secretary for Arrow Electronics, Inc., a $29 billion, Fortune 150 company. At Arrow, she was a member of the Executive Committee and led the company’s global legal, trade risk, and compliance teams.
From 2015 to 2019, Hughes was Senior Vice President, Chief Legal Officer, and Corporate Secretary of Public Storage, an S&P 500 and FT Global 500 company. From 1997 to 2015, she served in roles of increasing responsibility, including her last role as Vice President and Associate General Counsel, Corporate, M&A, and Finance of Ingram Micro Inc., the world’s largest wholesale information technology and mobile devices distributor (and a former Fortune 100 company). Prior to that, Hughes was an Associate Director in the Property Management Department of the nationwide leader in cancer treatment and research City of Hope, and a partner at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips. She began her legal career as an associate at McKenna, Conner & Cuneo in Los Angeles.
Hughes received the National Diversity Council Power 50 (Women in the C-Suite) award in both 2021 and 2020. She also received American Law Media’s National Women in the Law award as General Counsel of the Year for 2018. Most recently, Agenda—The Financial Times publication focused on board and governance—named Hughes to its Diversity 100 list, a directory of 100 board-ready director candidates from groups historically underrepresented in the boardroom. Hughes was recently named to the DirectWomen Board Institute Board of Directors. She received her J.D. from the UC Berkeley School of Law and holds a B.A. in Political Science from UC Berkeley.