KATE ALLEN

In four seasons at the University of Nebraska, Kate Benson and her Cornhusker basketball teammates went 2–7 against the University of Kansas. Two decades later, she’s Kate Allen, and she’s got scoreboard where it matters most: She’s the executive director of the foundation at the largest college in Kansas—Johnson County Community College—with undergraduate enrollment exceeding even that of the program in Lawrence.

A Kansas City native and graduate of Shawnee Mission South High—she was an honorable mention All-America pick of Street & Smith’s, the basketball bible—Allen demonstrated early on that she was deadly serious about education. She earned her bachelor’s degree in political science in just 2½ years, and less than four years after arriving in Lincoln, she had her MBA, as well. All while playing through the rigors of Big XII basketball. And the whole NU–KU thing was clearly confined to the basketball court; Allen earned her law degree from KU in 2002.

She’s been just as serious with her work at the foundation. “In my first year, we doubled the sponsorship income from our scholarship gala to $600,000, and we awarded the most scholarship funds in the 40-year history of the foundation, passing through nearly $1 million in student support,” she says. But she deflects the credit for that to the roughly 130 community leaders she’s worked with through the foundation’s board.

Allen and her husband, Josh, have two boys, Luke 5, and Ben, 4.

JEFFERY ANDERSON

He had a good thing going with Capital One Bank: vice president and director of sales and operations, leading a team of more than 350, responsible for a platform of $1 billion in residential lending. Then came The Lunch. The concepts Jeffery Anderson and his dining companions sketched out around that table became the framework for Spring Venture Group, where Ander-son served as chief operating officer before SVG begat United Medicare Advisors, where he now is the chief executive. “Leaving a Fortune 500 company and taking the lead into entrepreneurship has been the most exhilarating experience I’ve been a part of,” says Anderson, 36.

Eighteen months after it was formed, United was already generating multimillion-dollar insurance premiums, helping consumers shop to find the best prices for Medicare supplemental insurance. Rapid growth and an ambitious goal of increasing revenues by 400 percent can’t be achieved, Anderson says, without creating a platform that allows employees to succeed. “It is important to me that our company culture creates an atmosphere with the freedom to share all ideas, has minimal hierarchy, and fosters the desire to continually improve,” he says.

As important as his own success and the company’s has been on a professional level, Anderson relishes what it’s done for him in personal terms. “Proving to my children that one must take risks in life in order to truly accomplish their dreams drive me every day to ensure that what we’ve created stands the test of time,” he says. He and his wife, Anne, have three children: Fletcher, 6; Morley, 4; and 3-month-old Ivy.

JESSE BARNES

History. The arts. Drawn to both even as a child, it might have been entirely predictable that Jesse Barnes would end up where he is now: As executive director of the Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Heritage Center. There, the 38-year-old Barnes is fulfilling a passion for telling the stories of African Americans who played key roles in the development of Kansas City. “The cultural center was built to celebrate the history, arts and culture of African Americans in Missouri and beyond,” says Barnes, and was named for the former Kansas City councilman who, earlier in his career, had followed the path of Martin Luther King Jr. to help change public-accommodation laws. Some of Barnes’ most memorable contributions to the center’s programming involved exhibitions from iconic figures like the Tuskegee Airmen and the gowns worn by Motown’s Supremes. Dialing into such popular cultural lines has helped raise the profile of the center while on his watch—and tripled the revenues. “I feel that each exhibition should provide ‘edutainment’ for a diverse audience of youth and adults,” says Barnes. In addition to his day job, Barnes is a board member for Awesome Ambitions, a youth advisory group, is a member of the Mayor’s Task Force for the Arts, and is a board member for Kappa Alpha Psi, the fraternity. He’s also a member of 100 Black Men of Kansas City, a civic group with a focus on mentoring youth. A graduate of Morehouse College in Atlanta, he holds a master’s degree from UMKC. He and his wife, Mary, have been married for seven years.

ANNIE BROCK

“Have a Purpose.” It’s the family motto, says Annie Brock. “When I was growing up, my father was sick, which ultimately led to a heart transplant,” says the 39-year-old vice president of sales and business development for Arsalon Technologies. “I realized early that hard work and preparation for the future were important, because life is precious and at the snap of your fingers, circumstances can change.” Circumstances have certainly been changing at Arsalon, a Lenexa-based Web-hosting company that has enjoyed growth of nearly 600 percent since Brock joined the company. Arsalon became eligible for consideration in Ingram’s Corporate Report 100 list of fastest-growing area companies in 2005 and has since logged eight straight appearances, including three Top 10 finishes. “It has been extremely fulfilling to be a part of a small growing business where everything you do, every day, contributes to the bottom line,” she says. Outside of work, a favorite cause is the Kansas City Autism Training Center, where she’s been involved as board member and volunteer since 2009. “People always ask me if I have an autistic child” because of those efforts, she says, “and I respond, ‘No, but the parents that do have their hands full.’ I’m fortunate that my husband (Dwayne) and my children are healthy and I can volunteer,” she says. Perhaps that’s why she says she doesn’t believe the world owes you any favors. “You have to work hard to achieve success,” says Brock, and that all goes back to having that purpose. “With all the distractions created by advancements in technology today,” she says, “it is important to have a purpose and stay focused.”