DeVona Wright Cottrell

DeVona Wright Cottrell is Director and Associate General Counsel at Baird and supports the firm’s Fixed Income business unit. Joining Baird in 2007, she partners with the Fixed Income Capital Markets Business Unit by providing Fixed Income Sales & Trading and the Public Finance team with legal advice and support regarding municipal finance transactions and best practices. DeVona also provides legal support to several of the firm’s internal departments, including Marketing & Communications, Facilities, and Compliance. In addition, she is the primary in-house attorney overseeing Baird’s IP Portfolio and advising the businesses with regard to IP related matters. DeVona also provides support to Facilities with the negotiation and drafting of commercial real estate leasing transactions and other real estate related matters.Prior to joining Baird, DeVona was a partner at Gonzalez, Saggio & Harlan LLP, where she represented corporate clients on public finance, real estate, intellectual property, general transactional matters. She is a past co-chair of PRISM, Baird’s Multicultural Associate Resource Group and is President of SWSIC, a Baird-sponsored women’s investment club focused on increasing financial literacy in the African-American community. DeVona also participates as a Mentor in Baird’s Mentoring Circles Program between the Lubar School of Business at UW – Milwaukee and Baird.DeVona is a diligent volunteer and mentor in the greater Milwaukee-area community as well. She is pro bono corporate legal counsel to her church and serves on numerous boards and committees throughout the city, including the Wisconsin Women’s Business Initiative Corporation’s (WWBIC) loan committee, Milwaukee Collegiate Academy, UW–Milwaukee Foundation, Girl Scouts of Wisconsin Southeast and Milwaukee County Research Park Corporation. DeVona earned her J.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, M.B.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and B.A. in political science from Jackson State University, summa cum laude.DeVona is a Wisconsin native and a proud wife and mother. She was selected as one of The Milwaukee Business Journal’s Forty Under 40 winners for 2014 and was for 2 consecutive years recognized as R3-100: Poised For Prominence as published in Inside Counsel, August 2014 and R3-100: Ready to Rise as published in Inside Counsel, August 2015 and in October of 2015 received the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee Alumni Gold Award (Graduate of the Last Decade). Other honors and awards include the 2006 Milwaukee Times – Black Excellence Award, 2007 Wisconsin Law Journal – Leader in the Law Award and 2009 Super Lawyers Magazine – Wisconsin Rising Star.