We all learn a few things in each decade of our lives….

I received my bachelors degree in Psychology from Cornell in 1978 and came to Ann Arbor to get a MSW in Social Work and my Ph.D in psychology from the University of Michigan in 1988. After a decade doing family therapy in private practice, in 1998 I became an executive coach author and motivational speaker. I met my wife Jan in graduate school and raised our twin sons. In 2008 we opened the Black Pearl restaurant. In 2018, I published my second book Be the Sun, Not the Salt, based on my Tedx talk, Heliotropic Leadership.

I’m attracted to what works…empirically. When I met Duncan Campbell, the founder of Friends of the Children, at the Detroit airport in 2017, I was looking for a way to make a difference. It was clear to me that he was the real deal. As a founding Board member of Friends of the Children, Detroit, I hope to be around for the next decade and more as our young first graders graduate high school.