Dr. L. Michelle Bennett is currently Senior Vice President with Roger Schwarz and Associates having departed her position as Director of the Center for Research Strategy at the National Cancer Institute in 2021. She trained as a molecular oncologist with a focus on genetic susceptibility to cancer, earning a Ph.D. in oncology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research studies were focused at the intersection of cancer and the environment.

Dr. Bennett has extensive practical experience in promoting collaboration and team-based approaches by bringing together research scientists with diverse backgrounds and expertise, across many dimensions of difference, to solve complex scientific problems. She co-authored the Collaboration and Team Science: A Field Guide that serves as a primer for investigators who are building or participating on research teams.

She is a Certified Executive Coach having done her training at the Hudson Institute in Santa Barbara. It was through her coaching training that she dared pursue helping scientific teams increase their effectiveness. She has now integrated Mutual Learning into her coaching, consulting, and training practices as she works with individuals, teams and organizations.