Alumni External Executive Consultants

Nancy Ancowitz is a career advancement coach. She’s also a career director at NYU, and previously, a VP at JPMorgan. She’s been speaking, writing about, and coaching introverts since the early 2000’s. A pioneer of popular introvert literature, she wrote the book Self-Promotion for Introverts® and has been published by The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal; she blogs for Psychology Today. As a career coach, she helps clients communicate their gifts to the world, authentically. They do this by creating a powerful personal brand and sharpening presentation skills, online and in person. This can be life-changing – they get the job, the promotion, or the recognition they’re seeking.

After building a 20-year career in talent management across notable organizations such as Google, McKinsey, Cornell, and MIT, Liz Arnold launched Digital Orchards to coach high-achieving professionals on how to successfully pivot their careers into top tech companies and startups. To date, Liz has helped thousands of students and clients to land jobs in all of the major tech companies and many pre-IPO startups. Most recently, Liz served as Associate Director, Tech, Startups and Venture Capital at Cornell Johnson, coaching MBA students in career strategy, resume/pitch development, interview preparation, and offer negotiation. Prior to joining Cornell, Liz developed and led technical hiring programs at Google, built a university recruiting program at Endeca (exit to Oracle), and led marketing and membership at an early social networking startup. She also led career and leadership development programs at MIT and Harvard Kennedy School. Liz began her recruiting career at McKinsey.

Liz received her undergraduate degree from Princeton University, her Masters in Higher Education from the University of Arizona, and her MBA in International Organizations from the Université de Genève. She serves on the boards of the Homer Center for the Arts and Zonta Cortland and is a Political Partner with the Truman Project. She lives in upstate NY. Schedule a remote consultation with her by sending an email to cornell@digitalorchards.com

Lisa Bonk graduated from Johnson’s Metro NY EMBA program and has over 20 years Finance and Accounting experience.  Lisa spent 5 years at Deloitte in their Strategy and Operations group focused on finance, system selection and implementation, and merger and acquisition projects.  During her tenure at Deloitte, Lisa actively recruited full time Johnson students through informational, behavioral and case interviews.  She spearheaded the firm’s efforts to recruit directly from Executive MBA programs and coached EMBA students on how to transition into management consulting roles.  Lisa’s focus is assisting students understand and enter the management consulting field and building executive presentations.

Prior to her MBA, Lisa worked in financial leadership roles at both Fortune 500 and start-up companies.  After consulting, Lisa moved to upstate New York and opened a dog services company.

Schedule a consultation with Lisa via her email Lisa.m.bonk@gmail.com.

Rebecca Cain, MBA ’05, brings expertise in general management, sales & marketing, financial services, and client management roles to support students in their career pursuits.  Rebecca has held a number of corporate and talent management roles where she led or redesigned recruiting processes first-hand and has coached countless MBA students in their interviewing, networking, and general career strategy.  When she was at GE, Rebecca (in addition to her full-time role) led the Company’s recruiting efforts at Johnson and participated in the hiring of dozens of Johnson students into the company’s rotational leadership programs.  Prior to business school, she served in research, relationship management, and HR roles at a DC-based think tank, was a manager of HR at a national non-profit and was a director at a recruiting agency in San Francisco. She lives in New Jersey with her family and works remotely with students and alumni, specializing in more recent graduates (<5 years graduated). Schedule with her over email at rcc39@cornell.edu.

Margaret Chan is a Certified Executive Coach experienced in career transitions and leadership development. In her 25-year career in executive search, including 18 years at Spencer Stuart and Korn Ferry, the global search firms, she assessed over 3,500 executives as they pursued new career opportunities. Working with Chairmen, Boards of Directors, CEOs and their direct reports, she understands their expectations and leverages this knowledge in her coaching practice.

She works with professionals seeking career advice and new opportunities, and who are changing or relaunching careers. She helps identify their skills to target careers that leverage their strengths. Her experience includes assessments, career strategies, target careers, resumes/LinkedIn profiles, career narratives/positioning, interview preparation, returnships, offer negotiations, and support and confidence building throughout the process. She also has a particular expertise working with women relaunching their careers.

Margaret also partners with clients in executive coaching to help them identify their strengths and gaps as they pursue their next leadership level. She works with clients to increase their self-awareness, gain insight through self-reflection, and make behavior changes so they can become more effective leaders. Her clients appreciate her strategic and practical approach, and her humor combined with a warm personal style.

She has experience with financial services, private equity, insurance, consumer goods, retail, consulting, technology, and nonprofit. She has in-depth knowledge of multiple business functions, including general management, finance, investments, strategy, marketing, communications, sales, operations, consulting, technology, and nonprofit development.

Margaret is an Executive Coach for The Leadership Lab at Columbia Business School and a recommended coach for alumni of The Wharton School, Columbia Business School, University of Chicago, University of Pennsylvania, and Cornell/S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management. She had an earlier marketing career at General Foods, Citigroup, and Oppenheimer Management.

She earned her Executive Coaching Certification at the highest level from Columbia University, an MBA from The Kellogg School at Northwestern University where she was in an accelerated one-year program, and a BS with honors from New York University. She serves on the board of the West Side YMCA New York and lives in New York City with her husband and two children.

Ellis has had a diversified, extensive experience in career and executive coaching, management consulting, and training in corporations, consulting companies, private practice, and colleges and universities. He has been a highly sought-after public speaker.

He currently maintains a varied consulting practice. Corporate clients have included Deloitte, General Electric, Estee Lauder, Goldman Sachs, The Gartner Group, Purdue Pharma, Swiss Re America, ING Capital, Penguin Putnam, American Civil Liberties Union, Hess Corporation, and Citigroup. In his private practice, he works with clients at all levels on career development and transition.

His employment history includes several years as Managing Director at Right Management Consultants and Systems Staffing Officer with the Chase Manhattan Bank.

He was an instructor with the Center for Career, Education, and Life Planning at New York University from 1987-2006, and, from 2001-2017, was a retained consultant to Columbia Business School in Experienced Professionals Career Management. Other work at Columbia has included several other colleges and graduate programs. He has appeared on CNN, CNBC, and has been a regular contributor to a wide variety of media.

For the past several years, he has also consulted with EMBA and Alumni Career Development at Cornell/SC Johnson College of Business, as well as delivering many live presentations and webinars. Other university work has included Sarah Lawrence College, Yale University, Clark University, University of Georgia Terry School of Business, the New School, Pace University, Fordham University Gabelli School of Business, University of Chicago Booth School of Business, and New York University Stern School of Business.

His first book, In Search of the Fun-Forever Job:  Career Strategies That Work, was released in April, 2013. The second, Networking, was published the following year.

Mr. Chase holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology and a Master’s Degree in English and Secondary Education, both from New York University.

Emily Hagen, Johnson MBA ‘05, is a certified executive leadership coach with more than 20 years of experience working as a management consultant, Human Resources leader and executive coach in global organizations including Booz Allen Hamilton, American Express and MSCI.

Emily coaches leaders to achieve their professional goals, with particular focus on developing critical leadership skills, progressing to senior levels of responsibility, managing teams, and transitioning to new roles or stages in career. Her coaching is grounded in neuroscience and is informed by her corporate experience in organizational development and effectiveness, change management, talent management, and executive development and succession. She coaches across a wide variety of leadership skills, including influence, resilience, executive presence, conflict resolution, communication, delegation, and change management.

Emily is a volunteer coach for The Womens’ Impact Alliance, a non-profit profit organization supporting the development of women leaders within non-profits, and is on the Foundation Board of the Montclair Public Library. She lives just outside New York City with her husband (a fellow ’05 MBA) and two children.

Robert Hellmann, President of www.hellmannconsulting.com, has helped thousands of individuals to define and achieve their career and job-search goals since 2003 via his private coaching practice. He is a certified GetFive Senior Career Coach and a LinkedIn-Certified Professional Recruiter.

Rob’s background includes 20 years of experience in Organizational Development, Finance and Marketing roles at American Express, JP Morgan Chase, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. This hands-on business experience greatly enhances his ability to add value for clients, as Rob has successfully navigated the challenges his clients often face; these include getting interviews, turning interviews into offers, negotiations, hiring and leading staff, managing work relationships, and career changes.

Rob has authored the books Advanced LinkedIn: For Your Job Search, Business and Career and PEAK Presentations. Jobseekers and career-advancers have also found value in his dozens of blog posts at www.hellmannconsulting.com/blog, on his LinkedIn profile: www.linkedin.com/in/roberthellmann, and in his articles for Forbes where he’s a contributor: www.forbes.com/sites/roberthellmann/. His career-related insights have also appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, Money Magazine, the Chicago Tribune, NBC News, ABC News and more.

Rob’s has successfully coached c-level executives, mid-level managers and recent graduates in industries and professions too numerous to list. He adds value for clients wherever they are in their career or job search.

Rob is active in Association for Talent Development’s New York chapter. He has a BS in Economics/Math from Binghamton University and an MBA from Fordham University.

Stella is an international executive and career coach, with over 18 years of global market experience gained from Europe, Middle East, Asia, and the US, where she lived and supported the development goals of multicultural executives across various sectors. Stella has helped thousands of candidates at all career levels to progress with their professional journeys due to her unique expertise in international career transitions.

After setting up and growing successfully for the past 5 years the Executive Career Development office at INSEAD, across France, Abu Dhabi and Singapore, she founded “Inspiration Ride,” an education and career consulting partner for individuals and corporations and later on she partnered up with Kompass Consulting in Dubai. Currently Stella coaches for executive MBA and MBA programs as well as alumni at INSEAD and other well-established schools in EMEA.

Credentials: MBA, American College of Greece | MSc International Management, University of Surrey| BA in Business Administration & Management, University of Macedonia Greece.

INSEAD Executive Coaching Certification

Stanford Design Your Life Certified Coach

Occupational Psychological Testing, British Psychological Society.

Coaching & Mentoring Certificate, UK Institute of Leadership & Management.

Facilitation & Coaching languages: English & Greek

Market Portfolio: Middle East, Europe, North America, Asia (cross industries)

Donna Peters is an executive coach, lecturer, podcast host, and bestselling author. She is Johnson class of ’99, as is her husband.

As founder of The Me-Suite, Peters helps career-driven professionals shape the life they want to live. As a former senior partner in management consulting, Peters supported leaders with their greatest challenges for twenty years, mobilizing and motivating teams across geographies and functions. She helmed learning, recruiting, and diversity initiatives across North America.

Today, Peters hosts top-ranking podcast The Me-Suite, a 2020 and 2021 finalist for Best Business Podcast. She is faculty for the Executive MBA program at Emory University’s Goizueta Business School and certified through the International Coaching Federation. She is the author of #1 international bestseller book Options Are Power: Career Strategies for High Performers Who Want a Life.

She is a frequent contributor to Arianna Huffington’s Thrive Global community. As a professional actor earlier in her career, Peters was a company member at Playmakers Repertory Theatre, appeared in George Lucas’s Radioland Murders, performed her one-woman show, The Hoffman Hotel, way-off Broadway, and played the lead in the premier of Joyce Carol Oates’s Bad Girls. She co-owned a restaurant that won Best of Atlanta with her chef husband and taught English in South Korea. Peters has visited over forty-five countries, gardens with heirloom seeds, and lifts weights religiously.

She holds an MBA with Distinction from Cornell’s Johnson School, an MFA in acting from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, an executive coaching diploma from Emory University, and a BA from Davidson College. Peters’ core values are curiosity, freedom, and respect.

Vincent Ponzo is a member of the Amazon Web Services Startups team, where he works closely with startups of all kinds to guide them through the roller-coaster ride of starting and launching a business.

Prior to AWS, Vince spent four plus years as the Managing Director of the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School where he coached hundreds of students and alumni annually. Vince previously held executive level positions at a variety of startups including SelectMinds (exit to Oracle), Kargo and General Assembly (exit to Adecco), where he served as the General Manager of the
education business.

Vince is an active advisor to multiple startups through formal roles and volunteer programs such as Techstars, NEW INC and the New York City Venture Fellows Program. He serves on the board of Project Pericles and the Eugene Lang Entrepreneurship Center at Columbia Business School and is an invited member of the Tribeca Disruptor Foundation Fellows.

Vince has an MBA from Columbia Business School and a BS in finance from Boston College.

With 28+ years of progressive experience in healthcare management and leadership, D. Anne Stewart has had the great fortune of integrating executive coaching principles into her work as an operations and management leader at Weill Cornell Medicine and Columbia University Medical Center. She served as a leader to hundreds of direct reports, overseen substantial improvements to processes and workflows, as well as actively advised colleagues and senior leaders.

D. Anne became a certified coach in 2008 and has a history of success providing leadership and career coaching to clients, emerging leaders, and senior executives. As a leadership and career coach, D. Anne serves as a confidant and partner to her clients as they explore possibilities, career transitions, and develop strategic accountability plans. Her clients enjoy the authenticity with which she listens, while challenging their limiting beliefs, and offering encouragement as they hold themselves accountable to their success. D. Anne’s area of specialization is aiding clients in getting unstuck, replacing wishful thinking with progressive action.

D. Anne is currently a CFO and Department Administrator at Columbia University Medical Center. She obtained her MPA at Baruch College Zicklin’s School of Business and completed graduate work in Counseling Psychology at Teachers College, Columbia University. She is a thriving empty nester living in Nyack, New York.

Schedule a complimentary Connection Call with her at https://dstewartcoaching.com/home/ola/services/complimentary-connection-call.

Kathy Welborn McLean is an executive coach with over two decades of experience specializing in personal and professional development and work/life integration. She has worked with a variety of clients from C-level executives to high potential early career individuals. Her clients hail from a variety of industries and include Fortune 500 companies, small boutique firms and start-ups.

Kathy is highly sought after for her ability to quickly hone in on the strengths and gaps in her clients’ core competencies. She helps to identify and address behaviors needed to increase ROI on professional and personal decisions. Through her action-oriented and goal-driven approach, Kathy has worked with clients on a variety of engagements such as developing strong communication skills, strengthening the ability to influence others, increasing learning agility and using reflection and feedback to build self-awareness.

She has led individual clients at all levels through career transitions by developing career strategies, sharpening personal/professional objectives, and guiding them through interview preparation to align their strengths to the opportunity. She has also worked with special interest groups such as Management Leaders for Tomorrow (MLT) where she developed, launched and coached the MBA Prep Accelerated Program.

Kathy holds an MBA from the Wharton School of Business and earned a BS with honors in Industrial Engineering from North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University. She has previously been certified by the International Coach Federation and is also a Certified Facilitator for the Center for Creative Leadership Benchmarks® 360 Suite and a Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® and Strong Interest Inventory® Practitioner.

Currently, Kathy serves on the Board of Visitors and Center of Excellence in Entrepreneurship and Innovation at North Carolina Agricultural & Technical State University and lives in Arlington, Texas with her husband and three children.