• Daria NovakNeighbor

  • Madison, CT

Ms. Novak is an Executive Consultant and former President of ERUdyne, LLC international cross-cultural, business management and homeland security training and consulting firm she founded in March 2001. She specializes in helping organizations to leverage culture and turn it into a competitive advantage. Ms. Novak travels extensively across the United States and throughout the world teaching, consulting, and lecturing on global business management, security issues and cross-cultural issues. Since 2003 she also has taught seminars in National Security Studies, Chinese Politics, International Relations and American Politics at Eastern CT State University, the University of Connecticut and at University of New Haven. From 1979 to 1989, Ms. Novak served in career positions and as a presidential appointee under Ronald Reagan at the U.S. Department of State in Washington, DC and overseas. In 1989, she served as Senior Coordinator for the Secretary of State’s 300-member China Task Force handling the crisis in Tiananmen Square and as a U.S. government spokesperson. She received a Meritorious Honor Award from the Undersecretary of State for her “core leadership role in managing the crisis” in China. Ms. Novak has traveled extensively in Asia and was a member of then-Vice President Bush’s White House Advance Team. Ms. Novak received a Superior Honor Award, the highest given by the State Department, from the Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs, for her involvement in saving American lives in Haiti during the fall of Haitian President Duvalier. Secretary of State George Shultz also awarded her a Meritorious Honor Award for her substantive contributions to the August 1982 U.S.-China Joint Communiqué, one of the main documents governing U.S. relations with China. Ms. Novak received an MA in Political Science from the University of Southern California and is a graduate of the U.S. Foreign Service Institute and Georgetown University’s Institute of Comparative Economic and Political Systems. She received a certification in advanced Chinese language studies at Taiwan National Normal University in Taipei. Ms. Novak began her PhD work at the University of Southern California and later transferred to the University of Connecticut. She also has conducted presidential election research under Harvard University’s Joan Shorenstein Center on Press and Politics. Prior to founding ERUdyne, Ms. Novak was a manager in the Technology Practice at META Group when she specialized in knowledge management, risk/vulnerability assessments, IT-business performance standards and contracting. With a background in dual-use (military-civilian) nuclear technology she led vulnerability studies conducted at nuclear power plants in the Northeast United States. Ms. Novak has served on the Board of Directors of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers, Women in World Trade, the California-Taiwan Trade and Investment Council, the California-USSR Trade Association, the Shoreline Youth Symphony Orchestra, and the Great Falls, Va. Volunteer Fire Dept. where she was a volunteer firefighter and EMT. In recent years she has been involved in MusicAid USA (a group dedicated to helping wounded vets obtain musical instruments), the American Society of Training and Development, the Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association, and InfraGard (a public-private partnership protecting critical infrastructure). She was a contributing writer to The Encyclopedia on World Terrorism, 2002 Edition and has written many other articles on foreign affairs and international business. Ms. Novak has a lifelong involvement with the Republican Party and is a member of the Connecticut Federation of Republican Women. Among other positions she has served as a Delegate to the 1976 Republican National Convention, various District and State Republican Conventions, Vice Chairman of Virginia College Republicans, and President of Mary Washington College Republicans, prior to joining the Reagan Administration. She was born and raised in Connecticut and has lived with her family in Madison since 2001.

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