Global Gurus

Joanna Barclay is a corporate leadership consultant with thirty years of experience in business transformation. From Digital Equipment to Oracle Corporation to independent consulting, she has a passion for helping leaders build high performing, values-driven workplaces. Discovering your true purpose or calling in life connects to your inner passion for living. And that is what Joanna discovered in 2000, after taking a group facilitation course with the Institute of Cultural Affairs. As a result she changed professional careers and became a Certified Professional Facilitator. In 2010 she was introduced to the Barrett Values Centre and since then has been a Cultural Transformation Tools Consultant, empowering leaders to be the change they want to see. Now, every time she facilitates or speaks it’s in the role of servant leadership, helping leaders create a culture of engagement by developing collaborative connections, increasing team synergy, and building consensus.
In her work with teams and leaders Joanna has gained deep insight into the human dynamics of effective relationships and communication. She was Canadian director of the TLEX Program (Transformational Leadership for Excellence), a gold standard in leadership development that enables individuals and organizations to reach their full potential. The program is delivered by the International Association for Human Values, a global, non-profit, humanitarian organization. Working with leadership teams and being a facilitative leader gives her the opportunity to further change by the people, for the people, and help them reach their true potential. With extensive experience in information management and management consulting, Joanna has expertise in leadership development, public speaking, facilitating organizational culture change, strategic planning, designing and leading training seminars. Joanna has worked with a wide variety of clients including federal and municipal government departments, private corporations, associations, and non-profits. She also has years of business analysis, application development, and sales experience with major IT companies. Joanna is married with three children. A loving wife and mother, she counts these as the most meaningful of all roles in her life and a constant source of love, inspiration and growth.

Chris Dawson is President of Dawson Consulting Group, a management consulting firm based in Silicon Valley, California. The firm builds client capabilities in three practice areas: Strategy, Culture and Leadership. Dr. Dawson has 25 years as trusted advisor to C-suite executives and Boards of Directors, aimed at improving business performance to create shareholder value. Dr. Dawson has subject matter expertise, numerous tools and methods in strategy implementation, talent management, organization design, culture change, and executive effectiveness. His book Leading Culture Change: What Every CEO Needs to Know was published by Stanford University Press in May 2010, and he is a frequent speaker and author in the organizational effectiveness area. The new book is a practical handbook for senior executives, HR and organizational effectiveness consultants and graduate students who aspire to be CEO’s. It contains numerous case examples, practical tools and a framework for leaders to successfully change their culture in the service of value creation. His educational background – first as clinical psychologist working with families and then MBA in strategy and culture – provide a unique blend of capabilities in people and business. Much of his work has been with technology firms in Silicon Valley, helping executive leadership teams shape and change their organizational culture through focus on strategy alignment and modeling of authentic behaviors. He also has extensive experience in optimizing the interface between family dynamics and the Family-run Business, creating culture change and optimizing IT capability in Healthcare, in Financial Services and Professional Services firms.

Robert J. Ristino, Ph.D., APR, Fellow PRSA, has extensive knowledge of organizational behaviour, communications, culture, and change management. Retired from the faculty at Roger Williams University, Dr. Ristino currently serves as adjunct faculty in the graduate programs in the College of Professional and Continuing Education (COPACE) at Clark University. During a distinguished 30-year career in organizational communications he served in various public relations management positions serving such diverse organizations as General Electric and the UMassMemorial Health System. Until 2003, he also served as principal, Ristino/Peters Inc., a strategic communications counseling firm.
In his senior management roles Dr. Ristino was responsible for managing the strategic communications for numerous mergers, acquisitions, downsizings, corporate identity programs and new product launches. In addition to teaching at Clark, he has also served as adjunct faculty at Boston University, Simmons College, and Worcester State and Fitchburg State Universities. At Clark, he currently teaches organizational behavior and leadership to graduate students in Lodz and Warsaw, Poland.
A Vietnam-era U.S. Army veteran, Dr. Ristino is also a former president of both the New England Society for Healthcare Communications and the American Society of Health Care Marketing and Public Relations of the American Hospital Association. He has lectured widely before professional groups and associations on a variety of organizational communication topics. A prolific writer, he is author of numerous academic and business articles, and three books: The Agile Manager’s Guide to Managing Change, Integrated Strategic Communication: Influencing and Changing Public Opinion and Behavior, and his first piece of fiction, The Illuminati Protocol. His main academic interests continue to be consulting, research, writing, lecturing and teaching about organizational communication, culture and change management. Meanwhile, he continues to explore the terra incognita of fiction as he pens his second novel, The Illuminati Circle.

Stefan Sveningsson is Professor of Business Administration at the School of Economics and Management, Lund University, Sweden. He has been visiting researcher at Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, Melbourne University and Auckland Business School, Auckland University. Research interests include strategic and organizational change, leadership, identity, and management of knowledge work. Hij is momenteel betrokken bij een internationaal onderzoek van leader and leadership development. He has published in several international journals including Human Relations, Leadership Quarterly, Organization Studies, International Studies of Management and Organization, Leadership and Scandinavian Journal of Management.

Tom Smith is Co-Founder of Partners In Leadership and is a three-time New York Times Bestselling Author. He and his business partner, Roger Connors, have authored the most extensive body of knowledge on workplace accountability ever written. His books are featured on numerous bestselling lists, including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Publishers Weekly and Amazon.com. His company, Partners In Leadership, has thousands of clients, and has trained hundreds of thousands of people, in more than 50 countries. His books and materials have been translated into numerous languages. Tom has conducted workshops and consulting engagements throughout the globe with some of the most admired companies in the world. He and Roger are recognized as the worldwide experts on the topic of workplace accountability. Tom is a highly respected facilitator of senior executive groups and management teams. He has partnered with his clients to help them produce billions of dollars in improved profitability and shareholder value using the Partners In Leadership Training. His clients include 25% of the “Most admired companies in the world,” almost half of the Dow Jones Industrial Average Companies, all 13 of the top 13 most admired Pharmaceutical Companies and nearly half of the Fortune 50 largest companies in the United States, along with many other well-known and highly regarded organizations.