Jennifer Reingold received her B.A. in political science from the University of Pennsylvania and her M.A. in international affairs and economics from the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins. She has been a news assistant at The Wall Street Journal, a reporter, staff writer, and associate editor at Financial World, an associate editor at BusinessWeek, a senior writer at Fast Company, and joined FORTUNE in 2007, where she is a senior editor. She has co-written “Confessions of a Wall Street Analyst,” “Final Accounting: Ambition, Greed, and the Fall of Arthur Andersen,” and numerous pieces. Reingold has been honored with numerous awards, and has recently written a series of pieces on JCPenney and former CEO Ron Johnson.

On Innovation Navigation, Reingold shared new insights behind her analysis of Ron Johnson’s failed tenure at CEO of J.C. Penney for Fortune Magazine. She highlighted Johnson’s fundamental failure to understand the company’s existing customer base’s behaviors and preferences in favor of radical change and a “we know better” attitude without a product to back it up (retail manufacturing and buying cycles are long enough that Johnson couldn’t introduce new product until after he introduced a new brand). Reingold described this as a lesson to other would-be creators of an Apple-like retail experience for other brands – Johnson’s revolution threw the valuable parts of J.C. Penney’s culture and strategy out with the proverbial brand bathwater – and suggested that leaders pursuing transformative innovation be sure they have mentors and a team willing to point out mistakes close by.