HCI People

Dr. Robert Rosen
01-703-351-9901
Dr. Robert Rosen is an internationally recognized psychologist, best-selling author, researcher, and CEO adviser to world-class companies. Each year he speaks to thousands of executives worldwide and appears regularly in the international media.

Bob is the founder, Chairman and CEO of Healthy Companies International, a Washington, DC-based research, education and consulting firm whose mission is to partner with CEOs and executive teams to understand, develop and lead people in building healthy, high performing organizations. HCI also delivers leadership programs via the Internet to companies, governments, colleges and associations around the world.

In 1991, Bob was awarded a six-year multi-million dollar grant from the John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation to study leadership and healthy organizations. He has interviewed more than 250 CEOs and worked with organizations in more than thirty countries, including AT&T, Motorola, Federated Department Stores, Johnson & Johnson, Northrop Grumman, Allstate, Citibank, Herman Miller, Discovery Communications, BAE Systems, Booz Allen Hamilton, PricewaterhouseCoopers, ING Group, and others.

Experienced in understanding both people and business, Bob teaches corporate leaders how to recognize the obstacles and leverage the opportunities of the new global economy. This most recent book, Just Enough Anxiety: The Hidden Driver of Business Success (Portfolio/Penguin) is provocative and challenges readers to redefine their relationship with change and uncertainty and follow the example of the world's best leaders who are using anxiety as a positive force for change. Filled with inspiring stories of real leaders and a proven road map for turning anxiety into productive energy, Just Enough Anxiety is the right book for leaders in today's turbulent times.

Bob has written three other books: Global Literacies: Lessons on Business Leadership and National Cultures (Simon & Schuster, 2000), which was chosen as one of Fortune Magazine's "Best Business Books;" Leading People: Transforming Business from the Inside Out (Viking, 1996), which The Wall Street Journal cited as one of the most recommended books in its field; and The Healthy Company: Eight Strategies to Develop People, Productivity, and Profits (Putnam, 1991), declared by Warren Bennis to be "one of the most important management books of the decade."

Bob Rosen received his B.A. in Behavioral Sciences from the University of Virginia, and his M.A. and Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Pittsburgh. Since 1984, he has held the position of Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the George Washington University School of Medicine. He is also senior faculty at Duke Corporate Education, a Batten Fellow at the Darden School of Business, University of Virginia, and vice-chairman of the Signature Theater board in Arlington, Virginia.

James Owen Mathews, HCI President
01-703-351-9901
Jim Mathews joined HCI in 1996 following 20 years as an executive with Citicorp and 10 years running his own consulting practice. He brings a strong, results-based business perspective to both HCI and to our clients in helping develop the leadership and execute strategies needed for world-class business performance.

Jim’s background in business development and finance has positioned him to understand the challenges of running a successful business. His responsibilities at Citicorp included working in corporate banking with U.S.-based bank holding companies in formulating and financing their non-bank investments, and leading marketing teams to expand the bank’s middle market lending in the Southern California markets.

Jim also spent eight years developing and helping execute the Private Banking Division’s nationwide expansion plan for lending and investment products, and founding and managing the Private Bank’s Mid-Atlantic regional office based in Washington DC. He was responsible for the region’s lending activities and matrix responsibility for investment management and other Citicorp products to clients in the area. By applying strong, leadership driven principles to the region’s business strategy, his team became one of the top three performing profit centers in the network in its first year of operation.

Upon leaving Citicorp, he established his own consulting firm, applying results-based leadership principles to developing investment and value creation strategies for a small group of high net worth clients.

In his role as President of HCI, Jim has led our work with major clients in assessing and developing executive team leadership capabilities, integrating business and human capital strategies, facilitating the creation of new visions and values for clients, and developing and guiding multi-year, organization-wide performance-driven culture change initiatives. Clients have included ING Group, ING Investment Management, Rolls-Royce, Bayer, Freddie Mae, MedStar Health, Union Memorial Hospital and Northrop Grumman Newport News.

He holds a BA in Economics and Philosophy from Washington & Lee University.

Eric L. Sass, HCI Chief Operating Officer
President, Strategic Communications & Learning
01-703-351-9901
Eric Sass specializes in the use and convergence of intellectual assets, media, and technology, and their functionality for users and learners. In addition to being HCI's Chief Operating Officer, he is leading HCI's design and deployment of enterprise-wide leadership learning systems with clients and their employees world-wide.

Before joining HCI, Eric was the President and Chief Operating Officer of WK Networks, Inc., a Princeton, NJ-based software company specializing in applications using intelligent agent technology for digital media acquisition, knowledge management, online privacy, and personalized advertising.

Eric draws on a distinguished twenty-two year career as Senior Vice President of the PBS TV Network, working in programming, new technologies, business development, and as the CEO of PBS Learning Media, where he transformed the small educational video unit into a highly profitable consumer and educational sales and distribution business with sales of $87 million. PBS Learning Media became the nation’s largest non-fiction video distributor, and led the industry in developing interactive and Internet-based learning products for use in the classroom and in lifelong learning.

Eric is a director and co-chairman of the GreaterRestonArtsCenter (Reston, VA). He has served on the Board of Directors of the National Urban League, Jacksonville (FL) Urban League, and Special Interest Video Association.

Eric holds a BA in Communications from the University of Maine, with studies in Mechanical Engineering.

K. Leigh Shields, President, HCI Consulting Services
01-703-351-9901
As President, Consulting Services, Leigh leads Healthy Companies’ delivery of advisory and consulting services to help CEO’s and their executive teams develop their leadership, culture and learning strategies required for strategy execution success. In advising clients as they define and implement their human change agendas to achieve and sustain their performance goals, Leigh is at his best in engaging leaders to tap deeply into their capabilities to achieve success through other people.

Prior to joining HCI Leigh was Principal of Leigh Shields & Associates, an executive coaching and leadership development practice with clients including General Electric, BAE Systems, Angelica Textiles, Technology Council of Maryland and the American Chemistry Association.

Previously, he served as Vice President, Human Resources for Xerox Engineering Systems, leading a global HR team supporting a successful culture change strategy that enabled a business turnaround while dramatically improving employee satisfaction. Additionally, during his Xerox experience, he led a business process re-design initiative to streamline customer-facing processes, provided human resources operations leadership for US and European businesses, managed customer satisfaction programs, managed international executive compensation, and implemented manpower planning processes.

A member of the Greater Washington Board of Trade and the Human Resources Leadership Forum, Leigh holds a B.A. in English Literature from Bucknell University and Masters Degree from Colgate-Rochester Divinity School.

Melinda Bickerstaff, Senior Vice President
01-703-351-9901
Melinda, HCI’s Senior Vice President and Senior Consultant, is a highly sought after speaker in the areas of workplace learning and performance, knowledge and information management, organizational transformation, business narrative and strategy.

She was most recently the Senior Vice President for Learning and Development or Chief Learning Officer (CL0) for Discovery Communications, LLC, where her responsibilities included learning, leadership development, Discovery University, organizational development and transformation, talent management, succession planning, knowledge management and performance management.

From 2001 to 2006, Melinda was the Vice President of Knowledge Management or the Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO) for the Bristol-Myers Squibb Company headquartered in Princeton, New Jersey. Prior to joining BMS, she was a Director and Senior Leader in KPMG Consulting, Inc.’s Strategy and eWorkforce Solutions Group and a founder of the firm’s Knowledge Management Group. She’s also held key senior level Executive positions with such premier organizations as: the Vice President–HR for Chevy Chase Federal Savings Bank (DC); Senior Manager for Organizational Development in the Office of the Chairman and top HR Executive to the Managing Partner for Deloitte Consulting at Deloitte & Touche (NY); and, Director for Worldwide Management Education at American Express (NY).

For many years, Melinda served on the Board of Directors of the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) and received numerous awards for her leadership and contributions to the Society and to the field of workplace learning and performance. In 2000, she received the highest award given for leadership, “The Gordon M. Bliss Memorial Award”, for her significant contributions to advancing the Society’s vision and goals, improving her employers’ or clients’ workplace and business performance, and enriching the lives of the people in the communities where she lived by freely volunteering her time and professional skills.

A native of Pittsburgh, PA, Melinda received her Bachelors in Education with a German major and psychology minor from California State University (PA). She was a Fulbright-Hays Scholar at Justus-Liebig-Universitat-Giessen in Germany prior to receiving her Masters in Education in student personnel administration in higher education and counseling and guidance from the University of Illinois (IL). She’s completed doctoral coursework in adult psychology and education at the University of Nebraska (NE). She currently resides in Washington, DC.

David Rippey, Ed.D., Vice President, HCI Research & Development
01-703-351-9901
Dave Rippey, with his broad professional and executive expertise, is responsible for developing and converting HCI’s extensive research and knowledge base into the models, tools and processes supporting our work with clients and customers worldwide.

Prior to joining HCI, Dave led enterprise-wide education and training operations at Pennsylvania Blue Shield for nearly ten years, where he directed multi-site training operations including executive and management development, technical training, basic skills training and continuing education programs.

At Aetna Life and Casualty, Dave was an original member of the team that established and managed their Institute for Corporate Education. He also directed the curriculum and staff development team for the School of Professional Studies and the U.S. Foreign Service Institute. The team designed and delivered leadership and management programs based on experiential and action learning methods for use in embassies around the world.

Dave has held academic and teaching appointments at the University of Connecticut, Harvard University, and the Aspen Institute. He holds a BA in English from Lehigh University; an MA in Higher, Technical and Adult Education from the University of Connecticut, and an EdD from Harvard University in Administration, Planning and Social Policy.

Stephen Parker, Chief Commercial Officer
01-703-351-9901
Stephen has recently joined the organization to lead and accelerate Healthy Companies’ growth and expansion. He is responsible for our overall go to market strategy, leading our business development, marketing, branding and channel partner activities. He will utilize his broad industry and client expertise to integrate our rich history of client-centric consulting with the proprietary CEO research and burgeoning IP we have developed over the past 15 years, and take our message and point of view to new markets and clients. He will also partner with the other senior team members to build and refresh our thought leadership and hone our point of view.

Prior to this Stephen worked at the Global Leadership Development firm, BlessingWhite, where, across a 17 year career, he led sales and operations in London, Chicago and the Eastern United States before culminating in building and leading a Global Consulting Group. He has worked with clients as diverse as Estee Lauder and PepsiCo, The Federal Reserve and Analog Devices on a range of topics such as culture, leadership development, and employee engagement, also working with an array of leaders as an Executive Coach.

Stephen is a dynamic and engaging speaker and has presented on the topics of culture, leadership, coaching and employee alignment for, among others, SHRM’s Annual Conference, NY HRWeek, Linkage’s Annual Leadership and Coaching Conference, Society for Pharmaceutical & Biotech Trainers Conference, NEHRA, Synygy Sales Effectiveness Conference, and numerous regional and client events. His articles have appeared in Leadership Excellence, SPBT’s Focus magazine and on hr.com.

He began his career with a variety of banking and OD roles for Lloyds Bank in London and holds a B.Sc. in Physics from Imperial College London.

Aaron Wunder, Manager, Strategic Initiatives
01-703-351-9901
Aaron joined Healthy Companies in August 1996 and became Project Manager for the Global Leadership Forum, the $1.5 million multi-year research project that culminated in the Global Literacies book and its related programs. Aaron was instrumental in the success of this landmark study, in helping to identify and secure interviews with leading world-class CEO's of companies in thirty-four countries. He brings a wealth of knowledge and appreciation for world culture to the organization.

Aaron is currently Project Manager for our ongoing CEO research (The Healthy Company Project) and for The Growth Leaders Project, a new international research project, for which HCI has partnered with the Darden Business School's Batten Institute to study the unique characteristics of exceptional growth leaders. Aaron also manages HCI speaker services. He holds a BA in International Relations and Developmental Economics from Eisenhower College.