Our people equal
PeopleFirm was founded with the idea of creating a different kind of consulting firm: A company focused on people and grounded in our collective experiences in transforming businesses and leading strategic change. Each day we’re inspired by our great team, our client partnerships, and the opportunities before us.
Our Team
M. Tamra Chandler
Tamra is the CEO and a founding partner of PeopleFirm LLC. In her 20-year career—which includes leading Arthur Andersen’s Pacific Northwest Consulting Practice and serving as the executive in charge of People and Solutions at Hitachi Consulting— Tamra has developed a track record of managing complex business transformation projects that require a blend of strategic, technical, and change management skills. Her results-oriented, down-to-earth approach and unwavering focus on the human element of organizations set her apart. Tamra’s trademark is an unerring ability to see the larger picture and achieve measurable and sustainable results. Today she brings her years of client experience and her passion for achieving strategic value into a single focus: People.
Beth Montag-Schmaltz
Prior to co-founding PeopleFirm, Beth was the vice president in charge of Hitachi Consulting’s Global Organizational Change Management Practice. In this role she built an industry-recognized comprehensive “best practices” approach to implementing change, while still maintaining hands-on relationships with her clients. Throughout her 16-year professional journey, she has frequently been sought after to architect and manage complex change management programs for strategic and high-risk corporate initiatives. Beth’s knowledge, experience, and creative energy allow her to guide organizations and their leaders through a structured yet uniquely tailored process that produces concrete returns on their investments. As an author of leading-edge articles and white papers, Beth provides companies with the unconventional wisdom to reach and often exceed their business goals through a practical approach to leading people through change.
Marcus Scott
Marcus, founding partner of PeopleFirm, has 20 years of experience as a thought leader within companies, as well as a consultant in business strategy, product development, and operations management. Throughout his career, Marcus has maintained a passion and respect for the human element of organizations. His combination of business-and-people-development acumen has made him a highly sought-after executive in companies across industries where change and new products are crucial components to success. Business leaders find tremendous value in Marcus’s cutting-edge perspective and diverse experience.
Alan Borgida
Always a steady hand at the wheel, Alan is highly valued for his calm and pragmatic approach, honed over 20 years in consulting, industry, and non-profit. His expertise lies in program, project, and product management, and his projects have ranged from IT strategy and complex systems implementation to organizational transformation. His experience includes work at Hitachi Consulting and Arthur Andersen’s Business Strategy Practice, augmented by a combined 12 years at a Fortune 100 food manufacturer, a start-up organization, and a global non-profit.
Bethany Jensen
Bethany brings an unparalleled gusto and passion for helping clients maximize their organizational performance through her systematic, detailed and comprehensive approach. With a background in enterprise-wide technology implementations, Bethany has played instrumental roles in supporting change management efforts through design, development, communication and delivery of systems application training materials. Much of her five years of experience has been spent with clients in the federal and high-tech industries. Prior to joining the PeopleFirm team, Bethany honed her skills within Accenture’s Talent and Organizational Performance global consulting practice.
Brenda Hay
Brenda has a diverse financial background with one common theme: financial accountability through internal controls, organization, and reporting. In her 15-year career, Brenda was the Treasury Manager at a hedge fund investment firm in Seattle, provided professional financial consulting services to high-net-worth individuals, was the Controller for an internet start-up and litigation consultant for a Big Six accounting firm. Her responsibilities at PeopleFirm include accounting, internal and external financial reporting, treasury management, operations and data-driven project deliverables.
Brian Clewes
A sought-after combination of deep executive experience and years of strategic level consulting in the energy, utility, and government sectors enables Brian to help clients turn strategy into action and desired outcomes. With over 25 years experience including a broad background in all disciplines of human resources, plus general management, Brian has a keen sense for workable and practical business and people solutions. As a business leader he has designed and led successful, complex change initiatives as well as been at the helm of some of the largest utilities in the world. As a consultant, Brian has enjoyed working alongside clients to help drive successful projects and HR transformation. He is ardent about driving business strategy through deliberate investments in people and people strategies. Brian brings a systemic and outcome motivated approach to consulting with measurable results.
Cynthia LaRowe
Over the past 20 years, Cynthia has led complex organization transformation, process improvement, and talent management projects, as well as corporate brand, cultural change, and business development initiatives. Before PeopleFirm, Cynthia was an independent consultant and—for the majority of her career—led global organizations and initiatives at Starbucks and Microsoft focused on learning, high potential development, and staffing. Cynthia is known for her agility in aligning talent strategies with business objectives, and for her creativity in identifying and implementing sustainable and scalable solutions. Her systemic and research-driven approach and highly interactive style inspire trust and enable rigorous assessment, effective action, and measurable outcomes.
Erin Daly
With over 10 years consulting experience, Erin has built a reputation as a strategic partner, trusted advisor, and a successful architect of tailored change management approaches and plans. Erin honed her collaborative style while successfully partnering with clients in the technology, retail, and financial services industries, as well as the non-profit sector. Erin’s spirited, highly dedicated, and customized approach to change management has proven successful in her work leading strategic corporate initiatives.
Frances K. Firestone
To say that Frances is passionate about the people side of change is an understatement. Throughout her thirty years in business, Frances has comfortably and skillfully navigated the waters of even the most challenging and complex change management assignments. From heading organizational transformation efforts in global organizations to ensuring that teams at small and mid-sized companies successfully accomplish their implementation, business and people readiness activities, Frances has served her clients with mastery. Frances possesses expert-level knowledge and skill in organizational change strategy, strategic planning, project and business change management, relationship management, process assessment/re-engineering and communication. Her wisdom, acumen and integrity benefits colleagues and business partners alike.
Gabrielle Mangiola
With 10 years of consulting and industry experience, Gabrielle is highly-skilled in producing change management and communication programs that inform, educate and enhance transformative initiatives while supporting an organization's mission and culture. An advocate of the “do no harm” consulting philosophy, she has led enterprise-wide technology adoption projects that range from 35 to 135,000 global end-users, has deployed change management communities of practice within organizations and has a strong background in data management to support her clients by identifying the key performance indicators to measure the success of change initiatives.
Gretchen Asher
Gretchen’s 18 years of consulting have taught her that each project has its own story to tell and unique solution to be developed. It is this insight that keeps Gretchen's perspectives fresh and her creativity flowing. Having partnered with numerous companies across a wide variety of industries, Gretchen brings proven know-how to leading large scale organization transformation and process improvement initiatives. She recently designed and led a global food company’s change management strategy from end-to-end, which included both a merger and the creation of a subsidiary. Gretchen also possesses deep expertise in the areas of leadership and team development, executive coaching, team effectiveness, and operations improvement. Her industry experience includes utilities, telecommunications, consumer products, entertainment, and health care. Clients love her no-nonsense approach and accessible style, both of which contribute to her creating clients for life.
Guillaume Wiatr
When clients say they need someone who can think creatively, tackle technically challenging problems and remain people-focused, Guillaume enthusiastically raises his hand to assist. Possessing over a dozen years of experience leading global Government and Services transformation initiatives , Guillaume is known for his robust background in designing and building assessment tools that deliver qualitative and quantitative insights related to individual and organizational behavior. Designing, developing, implementing and analyzing the implications gleaned from company surveys, organizational audits and competency assessments make up only a fraction of Guillaume’s repertoire of proficiencies. A trusted partner, spirited colleague and reliable subject matter expert, Guillaume thrives at helping businesses turn today’s challenges into tomorrow’s competitive edge.
Jamie Hogg
Jamie has more than 14 years of consulting and industry experience, focused on program management, change management, business process realignment, and learning initiatives. Prior to joining PeopleFirm, Jamie led program and corporate operations for Futures Group Global, an international health development firm with operations in 40 countries. He has worked for clients throughout the federal government, including the Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, and the U.S. Agency for International Development. Jamie is known for his talents in understanding client needs and structuring human capital solutions that consistently produce success, satisfaction, and results.
Jill Prichard
From mom-and-pop outfits to Fortune 50 companies, Jill has managed every size of project, focusing on finding the right solution, efficiently and effectively, for each client. After years as an external consultant at Towers Perrin, Jill became Microsoft’s Director of People, Organization, Capability. Over the last two decades she has built a successful track record developing customized solutions for clients, ensuring their specific needs are met and the improvements are sustainable well past the implementation.
Keely Killpack
Keely has over 11 years of experience influencing leadership, culture change, and employee performance across a diverse range of cultures and industries. In her tenure with a Big 4 firm, she worked with clients in North America, Europe, Asia, and South Africa in the energy, travel, healthcare, and high technology industries. Beyond her successes on large, corporate projects, Keely’s past clientele also include non-profit organizations, entrepreneurs, family-owned businesses and residential property management. Keely specializes in Work Motivation and Team Development, leveraging best practices and psychological science in her client engagements.
Kim Bailey
With a keen sense of people, business acumen, and breadth of experience, Kim helps clients navigate from concept and discussion to tangible, results-oriented solutions that have measurable and, often, profound effects on a business. His tenures as a consultant and software executive have taken him from production lines to boardrooms and everywhere in between, giving him a unique and well-rounded perspective on business process, technology, and service delivery. More importantly, it has shaped his understanding of people, helping him bring a smart, nuanced, and strategic approach to the hotly debated world of talent management.
Kris Konopka
As a “recovering” lawyer, Kris is proficient in turning chaos into structure. More importantly, Kris’s 13 years of experience have proven to her that the best structures emerge when there is an emphasis on innovation and engagement. As such, Kris ‘s work focuses on harnessing the energy of people, applying proven approaches, and designing and implementing forward thinking solutions to achieve needed results.
Kris has led large-scale and key strategic initiatives in the US and globally. Her work includes the merger of two hospital systems, revamping and simplifying the strategic planning process for a large non-profit organization, and the development of a training program for a software development firm. Her demonstrated strengths include strategy development, stakeholder engagement, business readiness planning, performance improvement initiative design, and program risk mitigation.
Leah Jacobs
Passionate about developing solutions that key stakeholders will want to own, Leah is known for her collaborative and creative approach to leading teams. She is quick to establish rapport and build relationships with employees at all levels of an organization. Leah's gift for successfully navigating complicated team dynamics is of great value to her clients. Her 14 years of consulting has be focused on providing strategic leadership to organizations across several industries, serving in both internal and external roles. Throughout her career, she has helped to grow businesses by playing key roles in disciplines including marketing, communications, project management, and organizational development. She excels at identifying and addressing areas in need of process improvement, better management of talent, and enhanced communication.
Mike D’alessandro
Mike’s passion is sitting side-by-side with his clients to define the desired outcomes, identify their challenges, create a plan of attack, and execute on that plan. Clients appreciate Mike’s ability to “see the big picture” and translate it into operational activities and solid results. Mike’s 13 years of consulting experience has focused on navigating public, for-profit, and non-profit organizations through major transformational change driven by events including organization realignment, enterprise-wide technology implementations, and mergers and acquisitions.
Nicole Holland
Nicole is committed to helping organizations solve complex issues that affect their greatest asset -- their people. Throughout her five years of consulting and industry experience, she has designed communication strategies for high-risk initiatives, led process improvement efforts aimed at eliminating inefficiencies, and built training tools for software implementations. Despite the program, one element Nicole knows to be true: cross-team collaboration is a key driver to success when partnering with clients to achieve desired results.
Quinn Christofferson
Quinn comes to PeopleFirm after recently completing his double Bachelor of Science degree in Economics and Political Science from the University of Washington. Interested in exploring the world of consulting, Quinn has proven to be an integral contributor to the daily operations of the organization, lending his go-getter enthusiasm to supporting the company and its resources however and whenever needed. A long-time player and coach of team sports, Quinn naturally embraces the values of working hard, taking pride in a job well done, being open, honest, willing, of preparing and being prepared. He understands that individual victories count for little unless the entire team succeeds – everything PeopleFirm is and continually strives to be.
Sam Crumley
Sam’s work and focus over the past five years has been in helping Human Resources be a strategic partner to the business. As Accenture’s Global Offering Manager for HR Outsourcing, he was pivotal in helping create, sell, and service people-related strategies and solutions for some of the largest companies in the world. From the client’s point of view, his commitment to balancing “big-picture” with situational details, communication, and commitment has led to a proven track record of positive and trusting relationships. Sam’s focus and dedication to successful delivery of everything from competency models to complex organizational transformation makes him an invaluable member of any project.
Sarah Singer
For over a dozen years, Sarah has contributed to the success of public and private sectors alike. She has led large-scale transformation programs for a public school system, developed strategic plans for a large community foundation, and driven process redesign for medical and aerospace companies. Sarah talents flourish in complex, cross-functional environments and she possesses a demonstrated track record in achieving results within highly political cultures. Sarah’s holds advanced degrees in both Public and Business Administration; this formal education, combined with her rigorous professional experience aptly speaks to Sarah’s unique strengths. She has proven time and again that she possesses the skills, knowledge, aptitude and intellectual capacity to help her clients clarify ambiguity, gain consensus and facilitate transformation.
Sam Kanner
Sam has spent 20 years in the HR trenches having held vice-president and director-level roles at Fortune 500 & 1000 corporations around the globe. So while “been there, done that!” could be his mantra, Sam’s humble style combines his rich background and experiences with a collaborative nature and a ready smile. Sam loves partnering with clients to design solutions that fit their cultures and address their unique opportunities and challenges. Whether building talent management solutions or leading change programs, Sam has the rare capability of bringing his years of experience and a healthy curiosity to consider what could-be. Sam’s talent management experience includes a blend of strategy, process, and technology programs that have leveraged leading tools such as SuccessFactors, Taleo, SumTotal, Unicru and Oracle. Sam’s talent management repertoire also includes a number of results focused programs including competency development, succession planning design and execution, performance management and talent review program design, and a variety of leadership development initiatives.
Shelly Jones
Having spent a better part of two decades providing human resource and executive search consulting, Shelly has spent more time than most company’s have thinking through talent management implications and solutions. His extensive experience with working at the executive levels of organizations to identify, qualify, and manage all things people is a tremendous asset to our clients and projects. In addition to his extensive work experience, Shelly takes great pride in serving on the Advisory Board for the University of Washington’s Business School as well as providing sage wisdom to the PeopleFirm Leadership Team.
Tara Beckman
In her last 13 years of consulting, Tara has developed deep expertise in change management, talent management, organizational alignment, and deployment strategies. She’s led a wide range of change initiatives, from building employee readiness for global business transformations to driving adoption of global, enterprise-wide technology implementations. During one of her more challenging engagements, Tara oversaw the implementation of a new career development program for 30,000+ employees—resulting in significant improvements in talent acquisition and retention. Prior to joining PeopleFirm, Tara was at Arthur Andersen Business Consulting and Deloitte Consulting’s Human Capital Practice where she led the West Region Human Capital Community Practice and is recognized for building Deloitte’s Change Management Office client-facing solution.
Terri Fincham Conner
Vibrant, flexible, intuitive and authentic are just a few of the words used to describe Terri and the work she has done in organizational development and performance improvement. With over twenty years spent helping individuals and companies diagnose the dynamics affecting productivity, Terri has worked with C-suite leaders and their teams to create and implement system-wide talent management solutions, resulting in improved performance, reduction in turn-over, increased employee engagement and expanded organizational capability. Throughout her career, Terri has held a number of internal vice president-level positions, which have enabled her to keenly understand and quickly establish credibility with clients. Terri has contributed to the success of companies in myriad industries including financial services, healthcare, insurance, high-tech, manufacturing, hospitality and retail, all of which have benefited from her engaging energy and outstanding track record in producing tangible results.
Tina Borgida
Having started her career in the healthcare insurance business, Tina has an amazing eye for detail, a keen focus on process and procedure, and a strong passion for helping people. Prior to joining the PeopleFirm team, Tina worked for one of the largest medical insurance companies in the Northwest managing a $60M book of business, which included client service, inter-departmental coordination, and the establishment of procedures and standards. Tina’s experience and background brings a combination of structure and strategy, with an emphasis on standards and measured outcomes.
Todd Vician
Todd’s work as a highly regarded external consultant for nearly 14 years aptly prepared him to take the lead in building the Human Resources infrastructure within his consultancy’s practice. Having turned his talents toward his internal clients six years ago, Todd is passionate about all aspects of the employee lifecycle. He is currently serving as PeopleFirm’s point person for recruiting, staffing, onboarding, training and career development. Since joining the firm, Todd has enhanced, created, and implemented best-in-class systems, processes and methodologies to support PeopleFirm’s team members, both individually and collectively. Perceptive, approachable, articulate, dedicated and with tremendous professionalism and humor, Todd is the consummate representative of PeopleFirm.
At PeopleFirm, we believe in a simple code and set of values...
- Do what we love and love what we do.
- Think straight, talk straight, act with integrity.
- Leave each client interaction better than when we came to it.
- Celebrate individuals, capitalize on our differences, achieve as a team.
- Take our work seriously; never take ourselves too seriously.
- Engage thoughtfully in our communities.
- Do no harm.
Your People = Your Success
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