Get to Know Joanne Pasternack
Joanne Pasternack is a dynamic and visionary philanthropic leader who, over the past two decades, has galvanized community impact with internationally recognized brands including the Golden State Warriors, San Francisco 49ers, City of Mountain View, and Special Olympics. In September 2018, she joined ServiceNow as their Head of Global Impact – a newly created role where she will be developing a global corporate social responsibility portfolio for the cloud computing company based in Santa Clara, California.
ServiceNow - ranked number one on Forbes Magazine’s annual list of the world’s most innovative companies in 2017 - achieved over $2.6 billion in revenue in 2018. With the introduction of their Global Impact strategy, ServiceNow is poised to become an industry leader and innovator in the realm of philanthropy-driven global impact.
Launched under Joanne’s leadership in Q4 of 2018, the multifaceted charitable programming platform is enabling ServiceNow to not only “make the world of work, work better for people” but also ensuring that “the world works better for people” Through the ideation and deployment of global giving and employee engagement activations around the world, ServiceNow seeks to open the doors of opportunity for all people through innovative and enduring programs supporting food security and digital literacy. In 2019, ServiceNow created a corporate advised fund, donated nearly $3M to global initiatives aligned with their core mission and developed the “Giving at Now” platform to support employee engagement through volunteerism, matching grants, team building activities, and diversity, inclusion and belonging programming.
Before joining ServiceNow, Joanne spent twelve seasons leading philanthropic efforts for professional sports franchises in the NBA and NFL, most recently serving as the Vice President of Community Relations for the Golden State Warriors and the Executive Director of the Warriors Community Foundation. She oversaw all corporate social responsibility, philanthropic programming, and charitable fundraising for the Golden State Warriors as a member of the Senior Executive Management Team in support of key club objectives. During her tenure with the Warriors, Joanne increased the Foundation’s charitable fundraising by over 110%, bringing the total grants awarded to $9.2M; developed the framework for the largest corporate sponsorship/professional sports team charitable partnership to date; oversaw over 300 community events; opened seven basketball courts in San Francisco and Oakland; and deepened corporate partnership collaboration around philanthropy.
Under her leadership, the back-to-back NBA Champion Warriors completed two NBA Finals Legacy Projects and were honored with the San Francisco Business Times 2018 Beyond the Check Award for Youth Development. In September 2018, she was honored as one of 35 women named to SportsBusiness Journal/Daily’s “Game Changers: Class of 2018.” She also provided support for NBA All-Star Kevin Durant for his successful bids to be named the 2018 Muhammad Ali Sports Humanitarian Award from ESPN and the 2018 NBA Community Assist Award.
Previously, Joanne was the Vice President and Executive Director of Community Relations and 49ers Foundation for the San Francisco 49ers, creating and managing high visibility philanthropic investments to create paths for all children to reach their full potential. Under Joanne’s leadership, the 49ers were named ESPN’s 2017 Humanitarian Team of the Year, Beyond Sport’s 2015 Sport Team of the Year and the 2013 winners of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Award for Sports Philanthropy. In October 2016, Joanne was one of 200 delegates at the “Sport in the Service of Humanity” convening hosted by Pope Francis at The Vatican.
Early in her career, Joanne worked for the City of Mountain View – launching and overseeing the Mountain View Police Activities League in addition to her role as a Senior Analyst – and for Special Olympics, Inc. in International Corporate Partnerships at their headquarters in Washington, DC.
Joanne holds a BA from the University of Pennsylvania, a law degree from Santa Clara University, and completed the Executives in Non-Profit Leadership program at Stanford Graduate School of Business. She is an Adjunct Professor in the Graduate Sports Management programs at Georgetown University, the University of San Francisco, and George Washington University.
Joanne currently resides in the South Bay with her husband Robert Bardin, who works for the San Jose Earthquakes, and their two children, Kira (12) and Reid (10). A strong advocate for inclusion and access, Joanne is on the boards of directors for Special Olympics Northern California/Nevada, the Bay Area Women’s Sports Initiative (BAWSI), Figure Skating in Harlem, #PlayForAll (an LA84 Foundation subsidiary), Wender Weis Foundation for Children, and Beyond Sport International. She also serves as an advisor to Ubuntu Football Academy (South Africa) and Applied Silver - an emerging biotechnology firm harnessing the power of silver to create a cleaner environment for sports, healthcare, and hospitality. An engaging storyteller, Joanne speaks regularly on a variety of topics around inclusion – including bringing awareness to early-onset Alzheimer’s disease in honor of her hero - her father, Bruce Pasternack.
Always up for an adventure, Joanne loves exploring far-flung locations, cheering loudly (and sometimes inappropriately) from the sidelines at her kids’ sporting events, reading books recommended by her Kindle and anything related to figure skating.
Click here for a one-minute video of Joanne. Click HERE for her LinkedIn profile.
