Meet The Team
Sherry Deutschmann
Founder and CEO
Sherry Deutschmann is a serial entrepreneur, author, and passionate advocate for entrepreneurship. In 2019, Sherry founded BrainTrust, a company dedicated to helping women entrepreneurs grow their businesses.
Prior to founding BrainTrust, Sherry was founder and CEO of LetterLogic, Inc., a company she grew to $40 Million and sold in 2016. LetterLogic was named an INC 5000 company (one of the fastest-growing privately held businesses in the US) for ten consecutive years.
Sherry attributes the success of LetterLogic to its unique culture in which the needs of the employees came before those of the customer or shareholder. That culture led Sherry and LetterLogic to be featured in the New York Times, Forbes Magazine, Business Leaders, INC, and Fast Company. Sherry was honored by President Barack Obama as a White House Champion of Change in 2016. Sherry’s book, Lunch with Lucy – Maximize Profits by Investing in your People, was released in March 2020 and received national honors, winning both the 2021 Gold Foreword Indies Business Book Award and the 2021 Bronze Axiom Business Book Award.
Morgan Stanley
Co-Founder & President
Morgan Stanley is an angel investor and business leader committed to helping women business owners build financial independence, wealth, and influence. As Co-Founder and President of BrainTrust, she leads the organization’s national expansion and oversees member experience, ensuring women have access to the tools, community, and accountability they need to thrive.
Before BrainTrust, Morgan spent over three years helping scaling organizations implement systems, improve communication, and drive alignment. She is also a DiSC Certified trainer and has coached hundreds of professionals on communication and team dynamics.
Morgan was named a 30 Under 30 honoree in Nashville and serves on the board of the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the University of Mississippi, where she earned her degree. She was the 2024 keynote speaker for the Ole Miss REDe Entrepreneurship Summit, a member of the Nashville Emerging Leader cohort, and serves on the Making Strides for the American Cancer Society committee.
Josh Bowling
Chief Operating Officer
Josh Bowling is a CXO with hands-on leadership experience in early-stage growth companies (Series A – Series C) across SaaS, software & hardware, fin-tech, media, hospitality, insurance, and healthcare industry settings. Reputation for identifying and fixing root cause bottlenecks across people, processes, and tools to transform and deliver holistic team and company functioning within 12 to 18 months. Leader of highly motivated teams to conquer challenging objectives.
With roots in banking and public accounting, Josh has spent his career as a founder and executive in finance and operations positively impacting for-profit enterprises at all levels by embodying approachability, honesty, and integrity. He is an operator known for creating an empowering environment where individuals work to their unique abilities, free to execute without fear of reprisal. He focuses on collaborative problem-solving and fostering a solution-oriented mindset. Embracing diverse perspectives, Josh consistently surrounds himself with opposing opinions for innovative decision-making.
As evidence of the impact he makes, he has received invitations from top leaders and board members to advise, invest in, return to, or join their ventures and his career’s essence lies in the trust and positive feedback from his teams and fellow leaders. Their genuine endorsement reflects the impact and value he brings to organizations.
Holland Nix
VP of Member Experience
Holland Nix is an entrepreneur at heart. Prior to joining BrainTrust, she spent over 25 years forging a successful path in the male-dominated music industry. As former CEO and Founder of her own artist management agency “Anger management”, she understands the unique nuances, challenges, and rewards that come with owning a business.
It was Holland’s passion for supporting local artists that inspired her to leave a stable management position to start her own company. Not only could she create the work/life balance she craved, but she was able to give local rock bands a platform for creativity and growth that took them from Nashville to a global market performing from Japan to Moscow’s Red Square. And her influence hasn’t stopped there.
She’s used her experience and insights to coach women in business through peer-to-peer sharing, moderated forums, strategic planning and consulting. Holland’s impact continues here at BrainTrust. She’s responsible for executing and directing operations while ensuring the team and members are able to wholeheartedly execute the BrainTrust core values.
Jess Johnson
VP of Marketing
Jess Johnson brings 15+ years of dynamic experience growing brands and building communities in female-forward industries including wellness, fitness, and real estate. Working alongside bold, creative women throughout her career has helped shape a marketing philosophy centered on clarity, authenticity, and connection, with a strong belief that growth happens when strategy, trust, and committed action align.
As a Bay Area–based working mom of two, Jess understands the realities of building an ambitious career alongside a full life, and she brings that perspective into how she helps organizations scale with intention and integrity.
As VP of Marketing, Jess brings a holistic perspective to growing the Braintrust brand, and is focused on creating clear pathways for the right women to discover the community, feel aligned with its mission and method, and take the next step toward meaningful growth.
Carter Koontz
Operations Coordinator
Carter Koontz comes to BrainTrust with years of experience problem solving, fostering business growth, and creating vibrant cultures. After captaining her college lacrosse team, Carter took her leadership skills and competitive nature to the professional sports industry, where she excelled in marketing, sales, and event planning.
Carter moved to Nashville and quickly fell in love with the city. Now, she keeps a keen finger on the pulse, studying the intersection of development and culture. Committed to the growth of her communities, she strives to give back–mentoring and coaching young women on and off the field and organizing trash clean-ups in her neighborhood.
She brings drive, enthusiasm, and creativity to BrainTrust to inspire members and promote a welcoming environment for women business owners to grow their businesses and achieve their personal and professional goals.
Megan Mastin
Director of Events & Programming
Megan is an accomplished event strategist, program architect, and operations leader. For nearly a decade, she has carved out a dynamic career in the events and programming world, an industry that demands equal parts strategy and creativity. From high-profile conferences to intimate gatherings with purpose, Megan has dedicated her work to creating experiences that connect people, spark ideas, and drive communities forward. Her ability to see both the big picture and the most nuanced details has earned her a reputation as someone who not only executes flawlessly but reimagines what an event can achieve.
Entrepreneurship is woven throughout Megan’s story. As the co-owner of a family business, she built operational systems from the ground up, strengthened partnerships, and negotiated contracts that helped the business grow. That experience deepened her understanding of what it takes to run a company: the challenges, momentum, and courage behind every decision.
Today, her impact continues at BrainTrust, where she leads events and programming that shape member experiences and support long-term community and organizational goals. Megan is driven by the belief that events are more than gatherings; they’re catalysts for connection, growth, and lasting impressions.
Em Wilder
Nashville Growth Manager
Em is an experienced program leader with a strong background in people leadership, program design, and community engagement. Before moving to Nashville with her family in 2023, she spent over a decade developing and managing innovative educational experiences to help close opportunity gaps for K–12 students in the Chicagoland area, including launching an entrepreneurship-focused high school program and a summer accelerator for young founders.
Over the past two years, Em led the Twendé Program at the Nashville Entrepreneur Center (NEC), working closely with more than 150 founders and growing Twendé into the NEC’s largest accelerator community with impact across Middle Tennessee and the state.
Em is a partner, parent, and connector who is passionate about welcoming more women business owners into BrainTrust’s community and supporting them as they grow.
