Rebecca McPhail, '96
2019 Alumni of the Year recipient for the College of Business, Humanities and Social Sciences
Rebecca McPhail is president of the West Virginia Manufacturers Association, the largest business and trade organization representing the manufacturing industry in the Mountain State. As president, McPhail is the voice for manufacturers with state and federal regulators and elected leaders, advocating for policies and partnerships that encourage economic investment and manufacturing growth in West Virginia.
Before joining the WVMA in 2013, McPhail was president and CEO of Vision Shared Inc., a statewide community and economic development organization. Prior to her work at Vision Shared, McPhail was assistant vice president of development at Marshall University.
A West Virginia native, McPhail spent time working as a grant development and research manager and interim director of development for the YMCA of Greater Cleveland in Cleveland, Ohio, before returning home in 2004 to join the Marshall University as Associate Vice President of Development.
At an early age, McPhail’s family taught her by example the importance of industry and public service in West Virginia. Her father, grandfather and great-grandfather all worked as coal miners, and she watched her grandmother represent her eastern Kanawha County community at the state capitol on water and sanitation issues as a private citizen. Industry and public service are the cornerstones on which McPhail’s life began, and these are two elements that contribute to her drive to improve the health and well-being of West Virginians through economic and job growth.
McPhail is a proud graduate of West Virginia Institute of Technology with a bachelor’s degree in history and government. McPhail is a graduate of Leadership West Virginia and was named a 2017 Young Gun by The West Virginia Executive magazine.
What keeps McPhail motivated in her job day after day is her children and her desire to make sure they have the option to make a living and raise their families in West Virginia. This is also what moves her to play an active role in her community. She is chairman of the Charleston March for Babies through the March of Dimes; a member of the West Virginia University Stadler College of Engineering and Mineral Sciences Advisory Board; and serves on the boards of the YMCA of the Kanawha Valley and University of Charleston.
She resides in Charleston, West Virginia with her husband David Yaussy and two sons, Garrett and Owen.