CARINA FERREL - Principal
Ms. Ferrel is a dynamic and resourceful Information Technology Executive with extensive leadership experience and the vision to create the necessary business and technical architecture to be successful at each stage of growth and expansion. She created a world-class IT organization that scaled to support rapid growth from numerous acquisitions. Her instinctive and natural entrepreneur characteristics have put her at the forefront of exploring and extracting value from emerging technologies and trends.  Her strategic approach is focused on consistently offering compelling and palatable technology solutions, as well as implementing organizational structures that create increased value to the business
 
In addition to the various leadership roles she has held in operations, facilities and information technologies functions, her most recent role was as VP of Information Technology at Serena Software, Inc. At Serena, Ms. Ferrel successfully directed the growth of Serena's IT organization as its revenues grew from $4M to $275M, created an enterprise wide vision and directed a global team of 65 staff through 12 acquisitions and an IPO.

Ms. Ferrel holds a Diploma in Corporate Business & Economics, Linnè Skolan College, Uppsala, Sweden

DAVID FINNIS - Principal
David Finnis is an information security subject matter expert. His information security and IT background originated in IT network engineering and his career has spanned the past 18 years. He has worked extensively with enterprise level clients in the U.S. and internationally, implementing strategic information security programs that help organizations protect their employees and critical information assets.

He has performed enterprise information security audits and is a security expert in all architectural IT layers; this has enabled him to work and communicate with large cross-functional IT teams that ensure all aspects of information security are considered. He holds numerous information security related certifications such as CISSP, CISA, QDSP, IRCA ISO27001 and CGEIT and he is an active member in the Silicon Valley information security associations and communities.

Mr. Finnis is a graduate of Thames Valley University in the U.K.

DAVID HAEDTLER - Principal
David Haedtler has over 20 years of experience in building high-performance teams through executive retreats, focus groups, offsite meetings and project launch sessions. He has directed a variety of consulting engagements including development of a significant change management program for a Fortune 50 firm, designing and conducting a series of IT Executive focus groups for a major technology research organization and facilitating an organizational strategic planning sessions for the Board of Directors of a 31,000 member association.

Mr. Haedtler is recognized as a leader in the use of electronic meeting facilitation systems and in managing real-time and asynchronous meetings using web-enabled communities and interactive presentation tools and techniques.

Prior to becoming an independent consultant, Mr. Haedtler was Vice President of Best Practices at Gartner, Inc. and was responsible for creating and managing sharing forums in which senior managers learned from one another about critical information technology and business issues. In this role, he managed and conducted conferences, workshops and seminars on a variety of IT and business topics for key Gartner clients, including ABN Amro, Air Products, Disney, NIH, Packard Foundation, Pfizer and U.S. Navy.

Mr. Haedtler earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in business administration from Michigan State University.

FRANK HANNIG - Partner

Frank Hannig, with a career that spans close to 30 years in the Information Technology industry, is currently working as an Executive and IT Consultant. His key focus is applying his technology, business, and management skills to assist  companies in planning, operations, and management. Frank was most recently the Vice President and Chief Information Officer for Altera Corporation for over 8 years.  Other experience includes LSI Logic, Price Waterhouse, and Watkins-Johnson.

Frank is currently Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees for Notre Dame de Namur University and the Past Chairman of the Sequoia Hospital Foundation.

Frank holds a BS degree from California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo and a MBA degree from the University of Santa Clara. He also holds a CPIM certification.

TAKEO T. HIRAI - Managing Partner, Communities

Takeo T. Hirai, has over 30 years of experience, in both consulting and IT management positions. He has assisted numerous clients in a wide range of industries on issues such as long-range information technology planning, business process transformation, business system assessments, hardware and software selection and implementation, organizational effectiveness, and operational efficiency. Tak served as the Senior Director of International Information Technology for Lam Research where he was responsible for IT in all international sites and applications development and support globally.

He holds a BS degree in Physics from UCLA, a MS degree in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA, both from UC Berkeley. Tak is Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) certified.

BILL LANDRY - Principal

Bill Landry is an accomplished, results-driven information technology leader with demonstrated success in strategic and operational management in the life science industry.  Career focus on building and leading IT teams in delivering a broad range of internal and outsourced IT services.

A sample list of recent clients includes: AmGen, Genteric and SuGen

Past employers: Exelexis, Novartis, Systemix, Cap Gemini, Ernst & Young and Computer Sciences Corporation

Bill has a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Management from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.  He undertook additional graduate studies at the University of Texas at Arlington.

DEAN LANE - Founder and Partner

Dean Lane has almost 30 years of hands on experience in the IT industry, having been a CIO at four different companies: Allied-Signal, Morton-Thiokol, Plantronics, and Masters Institute of Technology. Additionally, he held the positions of Senior IT Director at Symantec, and Corporate Director of Materials at Allied-Signal. Dean has also been a consultant for Ernst & Young, AT&T and the Gartner Group. His experience is global, and he is considered an expert on outsourcing and offshoring. Dean has been certified in the (CGEIT) Corporate Governance of Enterprise IT by ISACA.

He serves on the advisory boards for the Society of Information Management, SFSU’s Center for Business Systems, is an active member of Executive World, the Project Management Institute, APICS, the CIO Collective, and is Past President of SIM’s Silicon Valley Chapter. He has written two books, CIO Wisdom and CIO Perspectives. Dean speaks internationally, has consulted with Ehud Barak (Israeli Defense Minister) and is a highly decorated US Naval Officer.

Dean obtained his undergraduate degree from the University of California (UCLA) and his MBA from National University.

JESSICA LAVALLE - Principal

Jessica Lavalle is an Business Technology Executive IT with proven ability to pioneer all phases of system development for the delivery of effective business systems solutions to meet internal customer needs.  Unique leadership blend of business process development expertise compliments tactical and strategic technology decision-making. 

Consistently recognized for ability to transform organizations and delivering outstanding results leveraging expertise gained across diverse industries.   Respected for keen ability to understand and address cross-functional business needs, own and prioritize IT development efforts, and manage multiple relationships across the business, 3rd party vendors and IT.

A sample list of clients includes: Chiron Corporation, Wells Fargo Bank, Providian Financial, and Department of Revenue of the State of Oregon.   

Past employers: Safeway Inc., Pacer Stacktrain, Whittman-Hart, The Clorox Company and Nestle USA.   

Jessica has a Bachelor of Science from California State University, Hayward, CA

ALLYN MCGILLICUDDY - Principal

Allyn McGillicuddy's IT leadership experience with large-scale, high technology solution delivery spans more than two decades, most recently as CIO at Golden Gate University in San Francisco, CA. There, she led her teams to establish the University's private, cloud computing environment including a wide area network based on Cisco's MPLS network architecture. In addition, she implemented the institution's first Voice over IP (VoIP) telephone system, installed comprehensive classroom technology, and launched its enterprise content management system.
 
In various software engineering executive roles at Filenet Corporation, Delta Dental (Dentegra), and Prudential Real Estate of California, Nevada, and Texas, McGillicuddy successfully led the design and development of a wide range of products and solutions including financial systems based on Oracle Applications; a dynamic website architecture to support more than 10,000 unique, real estate agent websites; Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems, and Enterprise Content Management Systems (CMS).

As Director for Scient Corporation, she led the teams that designed and delivered Wells Fargo Bank's Corporate Electronic office (CEO), the first commercial banking system offered via the Internet in the United States. This achievement followed her successful delivery, as IBM Global Services Project Executive, of Washington Mutual Bank's (WAMU) Internet retail banking system at wamu.com.

A certified Project Management Professional (PMP) and a certified IBM Project Executive,  Ms. McGillicuddy earned her Bachelor's degree at Case Western Reserve University, her M.S. in Information Technology at University of San Francisco, and her Master's Certificate in Project Management from George Washington University.

JOHN MILLICAN - Principal 
John Millican is a business-first manager with strong experience in driving value to the enterprise through IT and Information Security (IS). His experience is divided between positions in both industry and third party IT service and Information Security providers.

John developed and led the global Information Security team for Expedia Inc. as its Chief Information Security Officer and was VP of IT Operations for Hotwire.com. He also founded and led a twelve person independent IT/ Information Security service provider. Clients and employers have ranged from small wholesale/distributors to regional financial institutions and Fortune 1000 Internet-based companies. 

He is a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) and was the first person to be certified by the SANS Institute for its core security programs – Windows Security, Unix Security, Intrusion Detection Analyst, Incident Handling and Firewall Analyst.  Additionally, he was co-author of the SANS Security Essentials Toolkit.

John has a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration degree from the University of Akron.

JEFF RICHARDS - Managing Partner, Consulting Services

Jeff Richards is an inspirational leader with the ability to develop the ‘big picture’ strategy then drive it down to executable tactics for implementation. He has over 25 years of experience developing business strategy and aligning the supporting Information Technology and associated organizational changes to deliver the results. He developed his global perspective during significant P&L management level positions in Asia and Europe.

He focuses his in depth knowledge of Supply Chain, After Sale Service, Information Technology and Outsourcing to help our clients grapple with sourcing and operational issues on a global basis. His varied and diverse assignments have helped him to develop a broad depth of knowledge across multiple industry verticals including High Technology, Manufacturing, Financial Services, Energy & Utilities, Software, Telecommunications and Aerospace & Defense.

A sample list of recent clients includes: ACE, Agilent Technologies, Hewlett-Packard, Juniper Networks, Mitsubishi Motors, Motorola, NetScreen, Pacific Ethanol, Palm, PGP, Simons Petroleum, Southern California Edison, Sun Microsystems, Valeant Pharmaceuticals and Wipro

Past employers: Computer Sciences Corporation, Tatum, Cap Gemini, Ernst & Young, Boeing, Dresser and Baker/Hughes.

Jeff has a B.Sc. Business Administration in Management Science from Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania

PAMELA VAUGHAN - Partner

Pamela Vaughan is a business focused, high energy, proactive IT Executive. Born and raised in the Lake District, the northwest of England, she started her career in London as a software developer. Her first CIO role was 15 years ago with Hub Group Distribution Services, a third party logistics provider and four time Inc. 500 company during her tenure. Pamela has also held IT executive positions with Ariat International, The SAK, American Century Investments and The Dialog Corporation.
 
Pamela excels at transforming under-performing IT departments to strategic high performance teams focused on aligning with the corporate goals. She is experienced leading the ERP Selection, Implementation and Support of SAP, Oracle, PeopleSoft, Microsoft and Workday. At numerous companies Pamela has implemented Business Intelligence providing a “single version of the truth” and significant improvement and efficiency in reporting and analysis and Enterprise Planning solutions delivering collaborative real-time planning, greatly streamlining and enhancing the planning, budgeting, and forecasting process.

She is a contributing author of “CIO Perspectives” the book covering best practices from Silicon Valley's leading CIO’s. Pamela is the Chairperson of the Northern California IBM Cognos User Group. She is an active member of both the Office of the CIO and the Consortium of Information Systems Executives and former membership chair for the San Francisco Bay Area Society of Information Management.
 
Pamela holds both an undergraduate degree and a postgraduate degree, in Applied Statistics and Computing, from the University of Wales.

ANDREW WYATT - Principal
An operational leader with the ability to develop ‘big picture’ system objectives to meet business requirements and then prepare and execute detail plans for implementation.  Over 30 years of experience in finance, manufacturing operations and systems consulting roles.  Focus is to improve organizational effectiveness through improved business processes and integration of application software to improve information transparency.

His experience is divided between positions in both industry and consulting.  Industry experience includes the following roles in small and mid-sized companies - CFO, COO, Finance Manager, Materials Manager, Master Scheduler, Cost Analyst, Cost Accounting Manager, Embedded Systems Developer (assembly language).  His consulting roles include Consulting Partner for regional CPA firm, interim CIO, Application System Selection Consultant, ERP Implementation functional specialist and project leader, IBM Cognos TM1 OLAP / Budgeting System developer, Job Cost Data Warehouse / BI reporting developer, XML integration developer, External system API designer and implementer, Finance and Manufacturing business process improvement specialist.

A sample list of recent clients includes: Stored Energy Systems, Sunesis Pharmaceuticals, FlagShip Facility Services

Past employers: Spectra Physics, Diasonics, Andersen Consulting, Bizcomp, Frank, Rimerman & Company, LLP.

Andrew has a Bachelor of Arts in Human Biology and a Masters of Science in Industrial Engineering both from Stanford University in Palo Alto, CA