Econa Team

Michael A. Freeman, M.D.

Founder

Fourth-gen entrepreneur, Psychiatrist, former Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCSF. Founding CMO of United Behavioral Health, a UHC subsidiary. Past president of the Institute for Behavioral Healthcare. Provides psychiatric care and executive coaching to entrepreneurs. 12 years of previous CEO experience.

Wellbeing Solutions Specialist

Mobile App R&D Psychologist, National Center for PTSD. Stanford School of Med, Dept of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sci. Fellow: Stanford School of Med Center for Innovation Implementation.  > 60 scientific papers; six Fed & private grants. Psychologist, entrepreneur mental health researcher, therapist for entrepreneurs.

Wellbeing Solutions Lead

Mental health UX specialist, was Mobile UX Research Lead for the VA National Center for PTSD. > 20 end-to-end mobile app development credits, >5MM downloads, > 25 scientific papers. Expert in innovation, data analytics, health program implementation and evaluation, interventions, & knowledge dissemination.

Leila Rosenberg, B.A.

Project Manager

BA in psychology, with honors, UC Berkeley. Research coordinator for the Neurobehavioral Affective Control Training Study, Cal Mania program. Contributed to research in developmental, social, and clinical psychology. Skills: study design, data analysis, assessment, coding, scientific writing and editing, and project management.

Principal Investigator

Distinguished Professor of Psychology, and a Chancellor’s Professor at UC Berkeley. Grants from NARSAD, NIMH, NSF, and NCI. > 275 scientific papers, >22k citations. Co-author/co-editor of six books. Fellow of AAAS, ABMR, ACBT, APS, CASB. Past president of Society for Research in Psychopathology.

Johan Wiklund, Ph.D.

Advisor

Johan Wiklund is the Al Berg Chair and Professor of Entrepreneurship at Whitman School of Management, Syracuse University, USA, and Professor Two at Nord University, Norway. His research interests include entrepreneurship and mental health as well as the entry, performance, and exit of entrepreneurial firms. He is considered a leading authority in entrepreneurship research with 100 articles appearing in leading entrepreneurship and management journals and over 30,000 citations. He is Editor-in-Chief for Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, a premier entrepreneurship journal. A prolific advisor of Ph.D. students, he received the Academy of Management Entrepreneurship Division Mentor Award in 2011.

Advisor

Dustin D. McMahon is a serial entrepreneur and founder wellbeing advocate. He has served as a founding executive at several startups and venture funds where he developed deep experience scaling artificial intelligence, predictive analytics and digital health platforms. A Fast Company contributor and Techstars alum-turned-mentor, Dustin was featured in Peacock’s Founding in Color documentary series. He holds degrees from Dartmouth and Harvard.

Advisor

Brad Feld is a venture capitalist, entrepreneur, innovation ecosystem author, an blogger. He is a Partner and co-founder of Foundry Venture Capital, and the co-founder of Techstars (an early-stage accelerator and venture fund). Brad is a highly-recognized entrepreneur, mental health and wellbeing advocate, a non-profit board member, and a philanthropist. He graduated from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Operations Lead

Cristina Poindexter, B.A.

Developmental Director

Cristina directs Econa’s development and partnerships program, leading sponsorship and philanthropic grant development for Econa’s FounderScreen Initiative by engaging ecosystem stakeholders in co-creating scalable mental health and wellbeing solutions for entrepreneurs. Cristina is a serial entrepreneur and entrepreneur wellbeing advocate with extensive leadership experience including at Google and Headspace. She has founded four companies solving for brain and mental health opportunities, two of them venture-backed. Her consulting practice, Dolce Vita Ventures, partners with investors, founders, and mission-driven organizations on projects that accelerate the transition to a future that centers human flourishing. She holds a B.A. in Sociology from Yale University. FounderScreen will screen 5,000+ entrepreneurs for mental health and wellbeing concerns at no cost to participating founders, and provide immediate free access to personalized evidence-based supports. The initiative will produce the first-of-its-kind ecosystem-wide entrepreneur wellbeing reports, launching with Los Angeles in 2027.