Built to Matter: Joan Carter on Business, Leadership and a Life of Impact
Presented By: Smart Business Dealmakers
What does more than 50 years of entrepreneurship teach you about building businesses, leading through change and making a difference? In this opening fireside chat, 2026 Philadelphia Dealmakers Hall of Fame inductee Joan Carter reflects on the journey she and her husband, John, began with $150,000 and grew into UM Holdings, starting, acquiring, developing and selling more than 40 businesses. She’ll share the decisions and lessons that shaped that journey, her leadership of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia and Union League of Philadelphia, and how those experiences shaped her approach to leadership, service and philanthropy.
Moderator:
Chief Content Officer
Smart Business
Dustin is an award-winning business journalist, bestselling author, and the chief content officer of Smart Business. Over the past 30 years, he has interviewed thousands of business and civic leaders, and helped more than 50 CEOs and entrepreneurs transform their ideas into books. A trained investigative politics reporter and former digital media entrepreneur, Dustin joined Smart Business in 1997 after serving as an editor at several daily newspapers.
Panelists:
Co-Founder
UM Holdings Ltd
Joan Carter is co-founder of UM Holdings Ltd., a private company that has owned and operated a wide variety of businesses, both public and private. Companies have ranged from providers of health care services to manufacturer of commercial fitness equipment to a contract research organization.
Retired from the active buying and selling of businesses, Ms. Carter is active in organizations promoting free markets and limited government. She is Founding Chair Emeritus of the Legacy Foundation (now Founding Forward) and co-chairs the Foundation for Individual liberty which she endowed with her husband and business partner, John Aglialoro.
She is a former Trustee of Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company, former Director of CarrAmerica (NYSE:CRE) and is former Chairman of the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. She is active in the Philadelphia community and is past President of the Union League of Philadelphia, the first woman President in the League’s 150 year history.