Nia Christoforakis

Nia Christoforakis is the Vice President, Environmental Health & Safety North America at EssilorLuxottica, the global leader in the design, manufacture and distribution of ophthalmic lenses, frames and sunglasses. EssilorLuxottica is the parent company of well-known eyewear brands such as Oakley, Ray-Ban, Oliver Peoples, Costa and Persol, among many others.

Nia has more than 30 years of experience leading Environmental Health & Safety (EH&S) culture and performance improvement initiatives in the manufacturing and Retail industries. She began her career with EssilorLuxottica more than eight years ago as the EH&S Director for EssilorLuxottica’s Oakley sunglasses manufacturing site in Foothill Ranch, CA, and has progressively advanced within the company to her current position.

Nia is passionate about integrating EH&S systems and processes into EssilorLuxottica’s overall business strategic initiatives to create a best-in-class organization, including being the safest and most socially responsible company to work for globally. She enjoys building EH&S Systems and processes from the ground up and promoting safety culture and continuous performance improvement.

Nia’s favorite aspect of her job is working with people from all over North America and the globe at all levels of the organization. She is passionate about creating high performing and resilient teams and is intentional about mentoring and developing her team members. Nia’s achievements include the successful implementation of environmental and safety management systems, year over year reduction of OSHA recordable injuries/illnesses and the implementation of auditing systems.

In her spare time, Nia enjoys spending time with her family, hiking, biking and traveling. The beach is her happy place.

If Nia were to write a book to inspire future leaders, it would be titled Fail Fast, Learn from Your Mistakes and Don’t Give Up!