Mr. Pierno has extensive experience in Corporate and Business Matters gained from many years of law practice on a national and local level while based in California and from his service at the senior management level in a Fortune 500 conglomerate. Mr. Pierno's unusual multidimensional experience has been enriched by his continuous commitment to public service exemplified by his tenure as the senior official in two statewide governmental departments in California, by having served as chairman of the boards of two separate institutions of higher learning and by his day to day involvement with numerous charitable and educational endeavors. He brings to the issues he deals with sound judgment and a breadth of knowledge.

Among active California practitioners, he has the unique distinction of having been involved in the drafting and process of enactment of most of the major laws in the California Corporations Code. He has chaired the Committee on Corporations as well as two special committees of the California State Bar, and served as President of the nonprofit coalition that was formed to help bring about solutions to the legal profession's malpractice insurance crisis in the late 1980's.

He served as a public sector arbitrator, essentially as a pro bono service, for the NASD for almost twenty years, often presiding over the decisional process on major financial transactions in dispute. He has managed significant litigation, playing an instrumental role in coordinating and strategizing high-profile environmental, real property, pension, savings and loan, insurance and securities litigation matters. While outside California for a period in connection with his corporate responsibilities, he served on a select industry committee that served as a catalyst to bring about important judicial reforms in Texas.

A graduate of Stanford Law School and Whittier College, he presently serves as board chair of the latter.