Regina M. Connell
Steven D. Davies
Robert Browning Hessler
Madeleine Homan
John Kennedy
Bud McFarlane
Malinda McFarlane
Scott McFarlane
Sean S. McVity

Regina M. Connell
Regina is the founding partner of San Francisco-based Saltcellar Group, a brand strategy and experience consultancy specializing in work for professional and financial services firms, academia, non-profits, and social enterprises. Prior to founding Saltcellar, she was at Proxicom, an e-business services company. She founded and was the Managing Director of the Customer Insight & Experience group, advising Fortune 500 clients on branding, new product strategy, and the creation of meaningful customer experiences. She was also a senior strategist at Landor Associates, a brand strategy and design firm. Regina’s management consulting career began at Booz Allen & Hamilton and continued at Fantus Consulting/Deloitte & Touche. Previously, Regina also worked as a manager at Apple. Regina holds a JD from Hastings and a BA in International Relations from Stanford University.

Steven D. Davies
Mr. Davies has been building businesses for the last 20 years. His primary focus is to take struggling small businesses or lines of business and refocus their operations and sales for successful growth. Mr. Davies has extensive experience consulting with companies in the healthcare, consumer goods, retail, energy and technology industries.

Mr. Davies is currently a Principal with Energy and Communications Solutions (E&CS), aiding their transformation from a small development company to sustained profitable growth. Prior to E&CS, Mr. Davies founded and ran the Consumer Goods and Retail practice for Proxicom, an Internet development company. From foundation, Mr. Davies recruited the team and grew business revenue to $30mm before the company was sold. Mr. Davies also co-founded the Chicago office, one of Proxicom's most profitable, and was one of the principal rainmakers for that office.

Mr. Davies has a Masters of Management with Distinction from the J. L. Kellogg School of Management, a BA in Physics from Wesleyan University, and has had a successful career that included time at Booz·Allen & Hamilton, an international strategy consulting company, Welcome America, a start-up services company for the grocery and retail industries, as well as Medicus Systems, a small healthcare consulting and technology company.

Robert Browning Hessler
Originally founding The Browning Group in 1980, Bob has over 30 years of business management and consulting experience, helping companies to master their core competencies and aggressively develop their marketplaces.

He has held management positions with two of the nation's leading advertising agencies with responsibilities for Proctor and Gamble, American Express and Hertz International. He subsequently joined Hertz International as Vice President-Marketing, establishing worldwide marketing and advertising capabilities.

Prior to his consulting career Bob was President of Dymo Products Company where he successfully led the company through a challenging transition from a product-based manufacturer to a solutions-focused visual communications company. His consulting background provides particular expertise in the food service and hospitality industries by virtue of his work with Saga and Marriott Corporations.

In recent years, Browning Group clients have included Aramark, Friendly Ice Cream Corporation, Owens-Corning HOMExperts, Frontier Natural Brands, Robertson-Stephens, State of Florida Business Enterprises, TeleSensory Corporation, University of Washington, Kimco Hotel Group, LSG/SkyChefs, St. Helena Health Center.

He holds a Master's Degree in Business Administration from the Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Science Degree from Syracuse University.

Madeleine Homan
Madeleine Homan is a Master Certified Coach, author and speaker and is VP of Coaching Services for The Ken Blanchard Companies. She is a founder of Coaching.com, which was acquired by the Ken Blanchard Companies in 2002 and co-author of the Internet platform (the Coaching Management System) used to support large coaching initiatives.

With over than 16 years of experience Ms. Homan was instrumental in developing the core curriculum for Coach University where she was a founding advisory board member and Sr. Trainer. She is the designer and facilitator of The Manager as Coach, which is the core-coaching curriculum for several companies worldwide (Boston Consulting Group and Capital One). She is also an author of The Ken Blanchard Companies coaching skills course: Coaching Essentials for Leaders. Ms Homan has been a pioneer in the coaching profession; in 1994 she founded Straightline Coaching, a coaching service firm devoted to work satisfaction for creative geniuses.

Ms. Homan was a founding board member of the International Coach Federation where she served on the board for six years, founded the Organizational Coach Committee and was the VP of Professional Development. In 1998 Ms. Homan spent two years as the Program Director for a coaching program that rolled out to 2100 individuals internationally for the IT division of Goldman Sachs.

Ms. Homan’s expertise in coaching has been highlighted on ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox News Channel. Her presence in the marketplace extends into press articles in The New York Times, London Times, Training & Development Magazine, ASTD Publications and Women’s Media.

Her book, Leverage Your Best: Ditch the Rest; The Coaching Secrets Executives Depend On with co-author Scott Blanchard was published in June 2004 from William Morrow a Division of Harper Business.

Ms. Homan splits her time between Dobbs Ferry, NY where she lives with her two children Hannah 15 & Atticus 13 and Escondido, CA.

Clients Past and Present: Carlson Marketing; Abbott Immunology; Altel, Doncaster, WL Gore, Adobe Systems, Lucent, Oracle, KPMG, Anthem BlueCross Blue Shield, Siemens, Credit Suisse, PictureTel, Goldman Sachs, Boston Consulting Group, Forrester Research, American Standard

John Kennedy
John Kennedy is an independent consultant providing strategic guidance and fund-raising assistance to start-up and troubled companies in the Media, Telecommunications, and Information Technology spaces. Previously, John was the CEO & Chairman of Load Media, a content delivery management company located in Los Angeles, California. John was brought in by Load Media's investor group in a turn-around situation and was responsible for the company's strategic direction, team building, business development, partner relationships and developing Load Media's technology roadmap.

Prior to joining Load Media Network, John was the Strategic Advisor to Teledesic LLC, a satellite venture founded by telecommunications and software pioneers Craig McCaw and Bill Gates. John reported directly to the CEO, and was responsible for developing and evaluating business plans and models for Teledesic's proposed products, services and acquisitions. Prior to Teledesic, he was a Venture Capital Associate with Idanta Partners, a venture capital firm founded in 1971 and solely funded by the Bass Brothers of Texas. John has served on the boards of several technology related start-ups, and was also a founding member of GeoPath.net, a wireless ISP serving Nairobi Kenya.

John was a LEGIS Fellow of the Brookings Institution, where he served as a Legislative Assistant to Senator John McCain of Arizona. During this time, John handled legislative issues relating to defense, information systems, and telecommunications technologies. John was also the Aide-de-Camp to the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and is a decorated Naval Flight Officer, having served in several theaters of operation during his military career.

He holds a B.S. in Economics from the U.S. Naval Academy, and a Masters in Business Administration from the Harvard Business School.

Bud McFarlane
After a distinguished career in public service that culminated with his service as President Reagan's National Security Advisor, Mr. McFarlane founded his own energy development company, Energy and Communications Solutions, LLC where he leads a team of professionals in the development of energy projects in Russia and Ukraine. He has also served as a consultant to foreign governments and media on terrorism, energy infrastructure, emissions reductions, and privatization policies.

Malinda McFarlane
Malinda McFarlane began her career in London with Revlon, specializing in marketing and brand management, after which she moved to Moscow, Russia to lead Revlon's entry into the former Soviet Union. She has worked in the Management Consulting field with Bain & Company and has held senior management positions in the energy and information technology industries.

She is currently the Director of Market Management at TXU Corp, one of the nation's largest diversified energy companies. She earned a dual B.A. in International Business and Russian from the University of Texas and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Scott McFarlane
Scott McFarlane began his career as a naval officer flying attack aircraft, logging over 200 aircraft carrier landings and 40 combat missions. He has since held senior management positions in the the manufacturing, aerospace, and information technology industries, and has worked in Business Development with Perot Systems Corporation since 2001.

He earned a B.S. in Economics (with distinction) from the U.S. Naval Academy and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Sean S. McVity
Sean McVity is the Managing Partner of Garnet Capital Advisors, LLC, a New York City-based investment bank specializing in bank asset sales and a range of private equity and other investment activities in the distressed-debt industry. A veteran of several start-ups himself, Sean has also devoted a considerable portion of his career to assisting start-up companies develop growth plans and secure expansion financing.

Sean started his Wall Street career at First Boston in 1986, eventually moving to Citicorp in 1990 to work in bank-loan trading. He was a founding member of Meenan, McDevitt & Company, a New York-based bank-loan purchasing and brokerage firm, which was acquired by French bank Société Générale in 1998.

In 1999, he left Société Générale to found the Heart Center Online, an online cardiovascular-medicine information and health-services company, which currently boasts over 700,000 visitors per month.

In 2001, Sean returned to Wall Street to found the Loan Portfolio Sales Group at New York-based Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, Inc.   As head of the KBW Loan Portfolio Sales Group, Sean directed the group's practice managing M&A transactions and assisting companies in the distressed-debt industry to raise both equity and debt capital. 

At Garnet Capital, Sean manages the firm’s corporate development advisory group and directs Garnet’s Eastern European subsidiary, Garnet Polska, in addition to his work on client loan-portfolio sales.

Sean received his A.B. cum laude in French from Princeton University and an M.B.A. from Columbia University.

< back to top