Best Practices Board of Directors

Best Practices Associates and Thought Leaders

Louis Carter, MA is a global leader in analyzing, developing, designing, and implementing best practices in the fields of organizational learning, knowledge management and leadership and human resources development. Carter is the founder and chair/president of the Best Practices Institute and publisher of Best Practice Publications, LLC - a research and development association of professionals worldwide that provides best practices coaching, analysis, and research in results-driven people practices to organizations and individuals. Besides working as a senior executive (Vice President) at numerous corporations, Louis has written/edited and directed over 8 books, 3 major research projects on leadership and change, and numerous large-scale learning events on best practices in organization development and change. His most recent book, The Change Champion’s Fieldguide has been endorsed as a book that, “will become one of the most quoted, referenced, and used business books in the first decade of the 2000's,” by Vijay Govindarajan, Earl C. Daum 1924 Professor of International Business, Director, Center for Global Leadership, Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College. Lou is also an advisory board member of the Society for the Leadership of Change. Louis has been featured in Investors Business Daily, Business Watch Magazine, The Supervisor's Guide to Quality and Excellence, Symphony Orchestra Institute, The American Society for Training and Development, U.S. Army War College, The New England Human Resource Association, and business and government courses around the world. He has lectured domestically and abroad including such universities as Tsinghua University School of Economics and Management in Beijing, China, Texas A&M University, Seton Hall University, the American Society for Training & Development, and for many executives in Fortune 500 organizations. His workshops on best practices in leadership development and change have received the highest reviews in the U.S. and abroad in such countries as Thailand, China, and Singapore. His new book, Best Practices in Leadership Development and Organization Change (Jossey Bass/John Wiley and Sons) was just released in 2005. Click here for endorsements. Carter received his Masters Degree in Social/Organizational Psychology with honors from Columbia University and was inducted into its Kappa Delta Pi International Honors Society.

Dr. W. Warner Burke is author of Organization Change: Theory and Practice, a leading expert on organization development and change, and is recognized as one of the 'founders' of the field of organization development. Dr. Burke is the author of more than 100 articles and book chapters on organizational development, training, planning, change and organizational psychology. He is the author, co-author, editor, or coeditor of 14 books including Organizational Development: A Process of Learning and Changing, Managing Organizational Change and Behavioral Science and the Manager’s Role. His latest work, co-authored with William Trahant, is Business Climate Shifts Profiles of Change Makers. Warner’s work received numerous awards and recognitions including: the Public Service Medal from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (1989), the Distinguished Contribution to Human Resource Development Award (1990) and the Organization Development Professional Practice Area Award for Excellence, The Lippitt Memorial Award, from the American Society for Training and Development (1993). Dr. Burke also served on the Committee on Techniques for the Enhancement of Human Performance, National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences. Warner is a Fellow of the Academy of Management, the American Psychological Society, and the Society of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. He served on the Board of Governors of the Academy of Management and the American Society for Training and Development. Dr. Burke is a Diplomate in industrial/organizational psychology, American Board of Professional Psychology.

Marshall Goldsmith Widely recognized as one of the world's foremost authorities in helping leaders achieve positive, measurable change in behavior: for themselves, their people and their teams. In 2000, Forbes listed Marshall as one of five top executive coaches and Human Resources rated Marshall as one of the world's leading HR consultants. He has also been ranked by the Wall Street Journal as one of the "Top 10" executive educators. His work has received national recognition from the Institute for Management Studies, the American Management Association, the American Society for Training and Development and the Human Resource Planning Society.

David Ulrich - Ranked by Business Week as the #1 management educator and listed in Forbes as one of the "world's top five" business coaches. He is Professor of Business Administration at the University of Michigan where he is on the core faculty of the Michigan Executive Program, Co-Director of Michigan's Human Resource Executive Program, and Advanced Human Resource Executive Program. His teaching and research addresses the question: how to create an organization that adds value to employees, customers, and investors? He studies how organizations change fast, build capabilities, learn, remove boundaries, and leverage human resource activities. He has helped generate multiple award winning national data bases on organizations that assess alignment between strategies, human resource practices and HR competencies. He has published over 90 articles and book chapters. His books include: Organizational Capability: Competing from the Inside/Out (with Dale Lake) (published by Wiley); The Boundaryless Organization: Breaking the Chains of Organization Structure (with Ron Ashkenas, Steve Kerr, Todd Jick) (Jossey Bass); Human Resource Champions: The Next Agenda for Adding Value and Delivering Results (Harvard Business Press); Tomorrow's (HR) Management (with Gerry Lake and Mike Losey) (Wiley); Learning Capability: Generating * Generalizing Ideas with Impact (with Arthur Yeung, Mary Ann Von Glinow, Steve Nason) (Oxford); Results Based Leadership: How Leaders Build the Business and Improve the Bottom Line (with Norm Smallwood and Jack Zenger) (Harvard Business Press); HR Scorecard: Linking People, Strategy, and Performance (with Brian Becker and Mark Huselid) (Harvard Business Press); GE Workout (with Steve Kerr and Ron Ashkenas) (McGraw Hill)

Mark R. Sobol, M.A., is the founding principal of Leadership Strategies International, Inc. and is part of A4SL Coaching & Consulting, founded by Marshall Goldsmith, a world authority in helping successful leaders achieve positive, measurable change behavior: for themselves, their people and teams. Mark has gained international recognition from his work as a collaborator with executives of major corporations engaged in the design, engineering, and leadership of strategic change as they merge, acquire, launch new businesses, or transition to a new direction for their future. As a strategist and architect of change, Mark has been part of numerous strategic change initiatives across the globe as organizations establish new directions and move to turn strategy into action. With his unique action learning process for teams, Mark challenges leaders to further the development of their organizations through the deployment of leading-edge principles of strategic change, thus increasing an organization’s own internal capacity for sustained renewal. He understands the world of business, having held senior management positions in operations, bringing to his clients a rare blend of applied theory and business expertise, resulting in relevant solutions which make a measurable difference.
Mark has an M.A. degree in Organizational Design & Effectiveness, from The Fielding Graduate Institute, Santa Barbara, California.

John Renesch writes and speaks on matters of social and organizational change. He believes that commerce holds the key to bringing about a global shift of human consciousness thus creating a future of tremendous possibility for humankind - the possibility that will allow humanity to transcend the inevitable future that can be projected from current trends. No wide-eyed theorist, John has four decades of experience as a business owner and entrepreneur. He left his chief executive position in the real estate investment industry in the mid-1980s and embarked upon a new path. Since the late 1980s, John has compiled a dozen progressive business anthologies and published articles all over the world. His latest book is Getting to the Better Future. He also serves as a consultant to consultants and professional advisor. International leadership guru Warren Bennis says, "John Renesch is a wise elder who shines with wisdom." Stanford Business School Professor Emeritus Dr. Michael Ray says, "John Renesch is a beacon lighting the path of the new paradigm in business." He serves on the faculty of the Center for Leadership Studies. As a keynote speaker, John has presented his ideas to audiences in Tokyo, Seoul, Brussels, London, Sao Paulo, Caracas, Gold Coast, Budapest and many U.S. cities (see praise). The Futurist magazine calls John a "business visionary."

Debi S. Saini, PhD (Delhi) is a Professor of Human Resource Management at Management Development Institute, Gurgaon––one of the top rung Indian management institutes––and was earlier on the faculty of Gandhi Labour Institute, Ahmedabad and University of Delhi, Delhi. His specialization includes: HRM strategy, performance management, and new industrial relations. Apart from six books (edited or authored), 3 dozen research papers and nearly 100 book reviews he has authored a book-size volume on “Social Security Law: India” which forms part of the International Encyclopaedia of Laws, Kluwer Law International, The Hague. He was the Founder-Editor of Management & Change (1997-1999); and has been on the Editorial Board of Industrial Relations Journal, Blackwell, Oxford (1998-2002). Among others, he has done consultancy assignments for ILO, and GTZ (Germany). He has been associated with professional and corporate organizations in HRM related field in India and overseas. He has recently drafted the All India Authority of Vocational Training (AIAVT) Bill, which is expected to be introduced in Indian Parliament for enactment soon.

Dr. Li Jianfeng Author of several books on change management and human resources development, Professor of Human Resources Development at Renmin University in Beijing, China, and President of the Cisun Academy of Management. Dr. Li Jianfeng has also translated and published several management books into Chinese from the U.S. including the Change Champion's Fieldguide.

Joseph Martin Stevenson was appointed Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of Educational Leadership, and later as the first Provost at Jackson State University by the Board of Trustees, Mississippi Institutions of Higher Learning in 2001. He is a Kellogg Leadership Fellow during 2003-04 with the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education. Dr. Stevenson is the first African American male to receive a Ph.D. from the Division of Educational Policy and Management in the College of Education at the University of Oregon. Prior to his appointment, Florida International University appointed him as a Professor of Educational Leadership and the first Eminent Scholar/Endowed Chair in the College of Education. Joseph Martin Stevenson, is a former Provost/Campus CEO and Management Professor with Golden Gate University in Sacramento, California.

David Cooperrider, Chairman of the SIGMA Program for Human Cooperation and Global Action and Professor of Organizational Behavior at Case Western Reserve University's Weatherhead School of Management. He is co-founder of Appreciative Inquiry.

Kathie Dannemiller (Emeritus) co-inventor of the real time strategic change approach, was a passionate advocate for whole system change for more than 30 years. She co-authored Real Time Strategic Change: A Consultant Guide to Large Scale Meetings, Whole Scale Change, Unleashing the Magic in Organizations, and has written many articles on the real time strategic change approach.

Scott Ventrella, Principal of Positive Dynamics, and has recently appeared on CNNfn and ABC News World This Morning to discuss the topics of leadership and integrity in business. Scott is a dynamic speaker who gives frequent keynotes to professional associations and societies. Most recently, he was a featured speaker and panelist at Harvard Business School's "Dean's Conference on Leadership, Values, and Spirituality." In May 2001, Scott published his first book, "The Power of Positive Thinking in Business: 10 Traits for Maximum Results," which has been translated in over 14 languages.

William J. Rothwell, Ph.D., SPHR, is President of Rothwell and Associates, Inc. He is also Professor of Human Resource Development on the University Park campus of The Pennsylvania State University. As a consultant, he has worked with over 30 multinational corporations. As an academic, he heads up the #2-ranked graduate program in HRD in the USA. Dr. Rothwell is author of Effective succession planning: Ensuring leadership continuity and building talent from with, 2nd ed. (New York: Amacom, 2001), regarded by some as the "corporate bible" of succession management practices. He is also an editor of Practicing organization development, one of the top 3 bests-selling OD books of all time, and is an editor of the Wiley/Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer book series on OD.

Jerry Sternin Widely recognized as the "father" of applied positive deviance, Jerry has over 24 years of experience overseas implementing positive deviance in developing countries including 8 years with the Peace Corps in the Philippines, Nepal, Mauritania and Rwanda, and 16 years as a Save the Children Director in Viet Nam, Bangladesh, Egypt, Philippines and most recently, Myanmar. In January 2000 Jerry published an article on "The Power of Positive Deviance" in the Harvard Business Review, In December, 2000 Jerry was featured in an article on Positive Deviance in Fast Company Magazine. In addition, he recently contributed to the new book Best Practice Leadership Champions: The New Laws for Leadership in the 21st Century. The articles brought many queries from the corporate world on the use of PD and have helped to further broaden the PD audience.

Dr. John Sullivan is a well-known HR "guru," international speaker, author, and advisor to Fortune 500 and Global 1000 fims. Training magazine has called him a "visionary " and named him as one of its top thought leaders. FastCompany magazine called him "the Michael Jordan of hiring!" Industry guru Gerry Crispin called him "the Tom Peters of HR " because of his energetic presentation style. Tom Peters called his e-HR work "brilliant ."