Melissa Harris is a business columnist at The Chicago Tribune. Her twice-weekly column, Chicago Confidential, chronicles the city’s corporate elite – from their boardroom deals to who’s hanging out with the powerful, to who's just hanging on.

Prior to joining the Chicago Tribune, Melissa Harris covered crime for The Baltimore Sun and local government for The Orlando Sentinel, both Tribune Co. newspapers. She has worked for the company since the summer of 2001 when she interned in the Sentinel's Washington bureau. A graduate of Northwestern and Johns Hopkins universities, she landed her first “job” at age 15, covering prep sports for the Mason Pulse-Journal. By her senior year of high school, she felt she had made it when the paper paid her $25 per story.

Old movies, reading, working out, traveling, playing the piano, good food and sports. (College: Northwestern and Indiana; NFL: Ravens; MLB: Reds, Cubs, Orioles)

Warren Buffett's son works on immigration reform 4/28/2012
Howard Buffett, a Decatur farmer, says current laws hamper U.S. food production — Wearing a black fleece pullover and blue cargo pants, Howard Buffett loaded his jumpy Slovakian-born German shepherd Bolek into his Ford F-250 Super Duty and radioed his crew that he was on his way.

Visiting NATO summit journalists to get home-cooked meal 4/27/2012
Host committee lures reporters out of McCormick Place and into Chicago neighborhoods Mayor Rahm Emanuel has touted the upcoming NATO summit as an opportunity to show off Chicago to thousands of visiting journalists.

Groupon chairman talks tech, rocky IPO 4/15/2012
Venture capitalist Eric Lefkofsky on going public: 'The window was right' Nearly a month ago, I asked Eric Lefkofsky , the Chicago venture capitalist who helped launch Groupon, to sit for an interview.

Sheila O'Grady steps down as Illinois Restaurant Association chief 4/10/2012
Leaves strengthened group for executive search firm Spencer Stuart When Sheila O'Grady began her tenure as president of the Illinois Restaurant Association, the mandate was clear: Assert the association's clout by overturning the city's foie gras ban and defeating a proposed 3 percent state payroll tax.

Scholarship program offers more than money 3/25/2012
Illinois Education Foundation also provides community college students with academic support, networking opportunities The first time an interviewer asked bubbly 23-year-old Noor Shaba why she wanted to be a pharmacist, her answer lasted nearly a minute.