After 23 years in the trenches, running businesses all over the world doing from a few million in sales to a billion; and mostly turnaround situations, I retired to the simpler life. In four years, I improved my tennis game considerable, renovated two houses, took a number of community college classes, and traveled to Europe, but the fire was still there. I missed the action, excitement, and challenge of running a business. So I decide to get back into the game.

I realized that it was the time to give back. The time to share my wealth of knowledge and experiences to help others avoid some of the mistakes I made. Many business leaders like myself were making decisions in isolation and often getting it wrong. If we were able to share our experiences and knowledge, be a sounding board and challenge each others thinking, we could shorten our learning curve and improve our success ratio tremendously.

So I decided the next phase of my career would be doing what I enjoyed most while running these businesses; helping others to develop their leadership skills and be more successful. It was clear that CEO/business owners were the perfect group of people for me to mentor.

I formed the BEST Group in 2005 made up of business executives from diverse industries that were committed to a high level of success. That lead to the name BEST: Business. Executive’s. Success. Team: Since that time, I have brought together two groups and run monthly meetings. Also, I meet one to one with each CEO monthly to assist them in reaching their vision; business and personal.

Background

Business executive for over 30 years. Presently, President/owner of Phillips Leadership Resources where I work with and mentor CEOs and business owners in San Diego. I was Chief Executive Officer for Western Digital Malaysia and Applied Magnetics Asia and Chief Operating Officer at Solid States Circuits and Compubur. I also ran businesses for Memorex, Diceon Electronics and Unisys.

A few of my major accomplishments are:

• Received President's award for profitability while responsible for $13 M division of Memorex.
• Headed international expansion into Asia with Western Digital, P & L responsibility $1 Billion top line, 5000 employees.
• VP & Officer with Diceon Electronics when revenues grew from $16 to $140 million, with 18.5 % net profit.
• Outside consultant for Compubur, a private Mexican company in Guadalajara; transformed their Printed Circuit Board division from a non-productive money loser into a viable quick-turn business with 95 % on-time deliveries.
• Improved bottom line by $800,000/mo for a Unisys business; by expanding the customer base and operational changes.
• Had P & L responsibilities for privately/ publicly owned businesses for 23 years, revenues $4 Million to $1 Billion.
• Formed The B.E.S.T. CEO Groups; Chairman for two groups.

I earned my MBA from the University of North Carolina, my Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University .

I am a competitive tennis player, part time golfer and avid reader. My wife Judi, who is a lecturer at California State University San Marcos and an adjunct professor in the community college system, and I live in Rancho Bernardo with our three cats.

Beyond my professional accomplishments, group members have shared some of my personal characteristics that they feel make me an effective Chairperson for the group:

• An engaged listener
• A change agent
• Willing to challenge assumptions and dig deeper
• Committed to the success of others
• An entrepreneurial spirit
• A depth of business knowledge
• Experience as a CEO and other high-ranking positions in a successful growth organization
• Prior experience managing P&L
• A well-established business network or the ability to build one
• Facilitator, mentor and coach
• All around nice guy, loves his mother, cleans his room, picks up after himself, helps old ladies across the street - a gentleman, a scholar and a fine judge of horse flesh.