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Hugging It Out
with Teresa Wynn Roseborough
The self-described Brown v. Board of Education baby
embraces The Home Depot
BY CANDICE DYER
PHOTOGRAPHY BY STAN KAADY
LONG BEFORE WOMEN IN POWERSUITS DEBATED THE
“Lean In” approach, Teresa Wynn Roseborough was taking
that posture a degree or two further. “I’m a hugger,” she says,
before enthusiastically embracing every new acquaintance
like long-lost family in her office at The Home Depot Inc.
headquarters in Atlanta.
“She’s nothing if not consistent,” says Bruce Yannett of
Debevoise & Plimpton in New York. “She hugs guys as well as
women, in almost every setting and context. The first time she
hugged me, it was a little startling in that sort of buttoned-
down business environment, but then you quickly realize how
completely genuine she is. Her personal warmth is not some
act; it’s simply who she is.”
Some encounters, though, call for stricter social boundaries—
such as meetings with U.S. presidents and first families. “I go
with the friendly handshake with them,” Roseborough says. “I
don’t think the Secret Service likes huggers.”