SCANNER FREEMONT / Data Analyst
Freemont is responsible for the digital conversion of survey responses while adhering to strict quality standards set forth by its managers. Freemont began its career at TruScore in 1996 as a Data Analyst and quickly became pivotal to TruScore's success. As the years passed, Freemont has slowly matured into part-time Data Analyst while also holding many positions in the work environment including On The Floor, On The Empty Desk, and Hold The Door (AKA Hodor).
RON SACCHI / Master Coach
A former Operations Manager in the High Tech Industry, Ron Sacchi brings decades of leadership and management experience to the organizational development and the executive coaching arena. An energetic thought-leader with a track record of success in all areas of Human Capital development, he has consulted and coached managers in start-ups, joint-ventures, high tech, pharmaceuticals, and media. Because of his business acumen and creative approaches to behavioral change, he is respected in the HR community specifically for the ability to direct, motivate, influence and inspire leaders to improve performance.
Holding an MBA from Saint Mary’s College, Mr. Sacchi is also licensed in various management, leadership and psychological profiling tools.
CARLANN FERGUSSON / Master Coach
Carlann inspires leaders to reconnect to their individual purpose and lead with contagious energy. She ensures leaders gain deep self-awareness and eliminate self-sabotaging behaviors. Her guidance is based on coaching, training and selecting hundreds of executives across diverse companies as well as her own journey into the executive ranks.
Carlann is the author of the highly acclaimed book The Insightful Leader: Find Your Superpowers, Crush Limiting Beliefs and Abolish Self-Sabotaging Behaviors (Praeger, June 2018). She holds a master’s degree in Industrial-Organizational Psychology. Her thirty years of experience include leadership roles in Fortune 500s, the private sector, and the U.S. Government. Carlann has been a featured guest on ABC News Radio, Wharton Business Radio and has been cited in CBS MoneyWatch, International Business Times, Newsday and Workday.
DR CHUCH MELTZER / Master Coach
Dr. Chuck Meltzer is a Master Coach and President of the SynTECGroup, an organizational development consulting firm. As an executive coach, he draws on his training at a doctoral level in psychology, direct senior management experience and management consulting with a wide cross section of industries. He has developed an extensive series of strategies to assist leaders in creating organizational wide and personal change. Dr. Meltzer has a decade of direct senior management experience and 20 years’ experience functioning within his consulting and coaching practice. His coaching approach is solution focused and time framed. Based on determined goals, a personally customized approach to the process has enabled his clients to realize sustainable change in a manner that allows them to enhance their effectiveness and success as leaders within their organization.
Dr. Meltzer is certified and a master trainer in several coaching assessment tools that he employs within his practice.
ERIN HIRSCHLAND / Master Coach
Erin is an organization development expert with nearly two decades experience serving organizations of all sizes across industries on a broad range of issues. Working with leadership teams, she helps articulate an actionable vision and corresponding values, connecting these to organizational strategy, execution and results. Her tools of choice include senior team retreats, one-on-one executive coaching and proven survey and related instruments.
Erin’s additional expertise includes designing employee selection systems, developing performance management tools that increase performance across the organization over time and employee and customer experience metrics. An effective facilitator and coach, Erin works with leaders and their teams to build trust, commitment and results.
She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology from the University of California, Santa Barbara and a Master of Arts degree in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from the University of Colorado.
SONYA D HAMILTON / Senior Assessment Consultant
Sonya is a Senior Assessment Consultant at TruScore with over 24 years of experience designing and delivering 360 feedback solutions and providing 360-based coaching, training and interpretation.
Sonya has extensive experience working with Managers and Leaders, guiding them through the feedback and development journey and providing insights and direction to help maximize their impact within the organization. Sonya’s areas of expertise include 360-based coaching, 360 data analysis and interpretation, Train-the-Trainer certifications, facilitation, survey & questionnaire design, and the design and delivery of assessment programs.
Sonya has a Bachelor’s degree in psychology and a Master’s of Science degree in Industrial & Organization Psychology from Springfield College with a specialty in Counseling and Psychological Services. She is a Master Trainer for TruScore and the Clark Wilson Task Cycle surveys receiving a Certificate of Achievement in “How to Train a Trainer”. In addition, Sonya is certified to administer a variety of other psychometric instruments including employee engagement and organizational instruments as well as the line of Hogan Personality Assessments.
KAYLEY MOTZ / Assessment Advisor
Kayley draws on her extensive customer service background to provide clients with prompt, quality support. In her role as Assessment Advisor, Kayley works to ensure clients’ needs are being met. She assists in project set up and management, as well as processing and quality checking feedback reports. Kayley also aids in the execution of the day-to-day responsibilities of the production team, such as coaching session scheduling and tech support.
CRYSTAL HUGHES / Assessment Advisor
Crystal leverages her extensive background in Industrial-Organizational (I-O) psychology as she manages the day-to-day operational and tactical aspects of multiple and large scale projects for TruScore.
Crystal assists clients with setting up and managing feedback projects, and serves as the point of contact throughout the entire process. She quality checks feedback reports, and provides tech support when needed.
ELLIE SOLOMON / Assessment Advisor
Ellie manages project implementation for the entire 360 assessment feedback process and ensures that each client’s unique needs are met on time and in an efficient manner. Ellie consults with clients who use TruScore’s off-the-shelf Task Cycle® instruments as well as providing hosting solutions for clients using their own survey content, including custom processes and reports. She helps clients navigate through the TruScore® survey hosting software, having literally written the handbook that several clients are using.
She coordinates and implements all translation efforts, including soliciting bids, managing timelines, providing files to the translation companies, implementing translations for the web pages, and testing.
ULLA WESTERMANN / Software Engineer
Ulla uses her years of experience as a software engineer to maintain and add new features to TruScore's applications. She also helps with customizing feedback reports based on client needs.
HANK CURTIS / Business Development Manager
Hank manages and assists in the analyzing, planning, research, and development of TruScore’s objectives and strategic plans in order to achieve business opportunities, growth, and financial profitability.
Hank drives the expansion of TruScore’s direct sales, establishes relationships with TruScore’s clients, identifies clients, and keeps up-to-date on industry trends and client developments.
TAYLOR BRANTON / Bookkeeper
Taylor is responsible for managing payroll and employee fringe benefits programs, in addition to organizing company gatherings and outings. Taylor oversees day to day accounting needs as it relates to client invoicing, accounts payable, and general compliance requirements. She also has a hand in month, quarter, and year end reports and works closely with the CEO and CTO to furnish details necessary to make accurate business projections and decisions.
KURT BLAZEK / Design Director
Kurt uses a unique blend of strategic thinking with dynamic executions to create TruScore’s visual and interactive design. He is responsible for creating, evolving, and sustaining the company’s brand to internal and external stakeholders through multiple mediums. He oversees all of TruScore’s digital strategies, along with the implementation of social media tools and techniques.
Kurt leverages TruScore’s marketing and messaging information to identify, evaluate, and apply methods to maximize the effectiveness of the search campaigns across all of the major search engines. He tracks and measures the ROI of search engine rankings, direct print, and marketing websites.
JOSH SHEETS / Chief Operations Officer
Josh is responsible for all day-to-day aspects of managing the operations and various functional areas including business development, sales and marketing, client delivery, vendor relations, human resources, and IT.
Josh helps to ensure outstanding customer service, and the administration of long-term and day-to-day business processes that complement the delivery of high quality, innovative customer-focused survey tools, assessments and hosted survey offerings.
TOM KUHNE / Managing Partner and CTO
Tom joined TruScore in 1995 and has served in a number of roles, including Data Analyst, IS Manager, and VP & CIO. In his current role as Managing Partner and CTO, Tom is the driving force behind TruScore's technology vision for the present and the future. He manages all aspects of TruScore’s information systems, ensuring all systems meet the highest functionality and security standards.
Tom enjoys working hand in hand with clients and partners to make sure TruScore® delivers the technology and advancement that has become expected of it as a leader in the online assessment marketplace.
DEREK MURPHY / Chief Executive Officer
Derek joined TruScore in 1996 and has served in a number of roles, including Data Analyst, Operations Manager, and President & COO. In his current role as CEO, he is responsible for planning and implementing the strategic direction of the company. In addition, Derek is involved in product development and overseeing the day-to-day business operations for TruScore.
TruScore founder Dr. Daniel Booth, a pioneer in the field of assessment of leadership and management skills, served as a mentor to Derek for more than a decade. During this time, Derek became certified on TruScore’s full line of management and leadership assessments. He currently uses these skills to lead content debriefings with customers and partners on a regular basis.
Need to talk?
Are you a client?
This is not one of those books you’ll read from cover to cover while sipping a cup of coffee with your feet up on your desk. It’s more of a textbook, or a workbook, for CEOs and their executive teams to work through issues involved in scaling up their businesses. The first chapter is an executive summary, and the author describes its fast pace and many lists as “drinking from a fire hose!” It’s intense, so keep both feet on the floor. The ideas in the rest of the book are served up in more bite-sized pieces, although it never really slows down.
Harnish describes the keys to scaling up as: attracting and keeping the right people; creating a truly differentiated strategy; driving flawless execution; and having plenty of cash to weather the storms. Accordingly, there are sections devoted to each of these topics. Each section has at least three chapters and numerous worksheets to be completed. I think, if you work your way through the book, you’ll be happy you did.
Verne Harnish – Scaling Up: How a Few Companies Make It… and Why the Rest Don’t
Book Reviewed by Dian Byington, Ph. D.
This is not one of those books you’ll read from cover to cover while sipping a cup of coffee with your feet up on your desk. It’s more of a textbook, or a workbook, for CEOs and their executive teams to work through issues involved in scaling up their businesses. The first chapter is an executive summary, and the author describes its fast pace and many lists as “drinking from a fire hose!” It’s intense, so keep both feet on the floor. The ideas in the rest of the book are served up in more bite-sized pieces, although it never really slows down.
Harnish describes the keys to scaling up as: attracting and keeping the right people; creating a truly differentiated strategy; driving flawless execution; and having plenty of cash to weather the storms. Accordingly, there are sections devoted to each of these topics. Each section has at least three chapters and numerous worksheets to be completed. I think, if you work your way through the book, you’ll be happy you did.
The book is an update from the author’s first book, Mastering the Rockefeller Habits. The Rockefeller Habits are ten fundamental habits that support the successful execution of a strategy, and they haven’t changed for 100 years since John D. Rockefeller first implemented them.
Here are the first five:
Harnish spends quite a bit of time discussing how to ensure that the executive team is healthy and aligned. Essentially, the trick is to hire the best leaders; make sure everyone is on board with the organization’s Core Values, Purpose, and Competencies; execute without drama and with profitability; and have enough cash on hand to handle the hard times.
Harnish makes a big point of having every organization with which he consults institute a “daily huddle.” This is a 5- to 15-minute meeting to discuss tactical issues and provide updates. He says, “This will help you avoid minor train wrecks and take quick advantage of unforeseen opportunities. Normally, a daily huddle saves everyone an hour or so of needless email updates and ad hoc interruptions.”
Of course, there are other regular meetings besides the daily huddle: the weekly meeting, the monthly management meeting, and the quarterly annual planning meetings. The author discusses each meeting in detail and describes how and when it should take place, who should attend, and what should be covered in the agenda. This level of specificity could keep teams from getting trapped in perpetual meetings that waste time and resources.
In the daily huddle, for example, the agenda should be the same every day, and it’s just three items long, with five minutes maximum per item: 1. What’s up (in the next 24 hours)? 2. What are the daily metrics? 3. Where are you stuck?
The last part of the agenda is the most crucial. First, there’s something powerful in simply verbalizing your fears, your struggles, and your concerns. Second, you want to focus the team’s energy on breaking through constraints.
As a non-CEO, much of the book was difficult for me to understand. For example, the section on creating a strategic plan went into depth on filling out a complicated work sheet. The work sheet might be extremely helpful if you understand what is being asked and take the time fill in the blanks. But it doesn’t look easy. Strategic planning is one of the most complex and essential components of business, and if you get it right, your business is likely to thrive. If you can’t manage to complete the strategic plan from reading the book, Harnish’s company, Gazelles, is available to walk you through it.
The idea of helping companies scale up is a fascinating one. Harnish says, “To scale up a business from a handful of employees to something significant (i.e., build a company that has a chance to both put a “dent in the universe” and dominate its industry), our tools and techniques focus on three deliverables: Reduce by 80%, the time it takes the top team to manage the business (operational activities), Refocus the senior team on market-facing activities, and Realign everyone else (onto the same page) to drive execution and results.”
He goes on to describe four outcomes, three barriers, and four fundamentals. It’s challenging to hold all of these components in your mind at once. But, then, scaling up isn’t easy. If it were, every company would be able to do it. Harnish reminds us that a few companies will make it…while the rest don’t.
Scaling Up has won a number of awards, including the 2015 International Book Award for General Business. My recommendation: take a few minutes and give this book a look, and decide for yourself whether it’s worth taking the time to read it.
