As Executive Vice President and General Counsel for Kelly, Vanessa oversees the legal, corporate secretary, investor relations, procurement, enterprise risk management, external communications, insurance and corporate security teams. She joined Kelly in 2020 with 24 years of senior legal experience at companies in the data science and information industries.  She manages regulatory and legal compliance for Kelly, directs strategic legal initiatives, and provides senior management with actionable counsel relationships. With extensive experience in commercial transactions, litigation management, data privacy, international law and contract management, Vanessa offers counsel grounded in the rule of law and nurtured with practicality and innovation. She leads her teams with integrity, respect and honesty, and is passionate about giving back to others and within her community.

Prior to joining Kelly, Vanessa served as Senior Vice President in legal, risk and compliance for IHS Markit. She started her career at Plunkett & Cooney, PC, in Detroit, where she litigated employment law, and insurance contract and defense liability actions. In 2001 Ms. Williams began serving as staff counsel to the Michigan Basic Property Insurance Association, where she practiced until 2006. She is a former Editor-in-Chief of the American Bar Association journal, The Brief, has authored articles for the Michigan Bar Journal, and is a contributing author to Michigan Insurance Law and Practice.  She is a fellow of the American Bar Foundation and the State Bar of Michigan Foundation, a former chair of the State Bar of Michigan Representative Assembly and past president of the Association of Defense Trial Counsel. She currently serves as an independent director on the boards of Horizon Bank and Horizon Bancorp, Inc. where she is also the current compensation committee chair. Vanessa is a recipient of Crain’s General & In-house Counsel Award for large private companies. In 2021, she was named to the EMpower Ethnic Minority Executives list, initiated by the diversity and inclusion membership organization, Involve and in 2024 named to SIA’s Staffing 100.