Kay Cioffi
President

Kay Cioffi is the President and founder of Texzen Partners, LLC. She began her career in professional services with EDS in Dallas, Texas. Prior to establishing Texzen Partners, she was a consultant with Whitehead Mann, a London-based executive recruitment and coaching firm. Kay joined Whitehead Mann from Heidrick & Struggles. Over the past decade, Kay's clients have included multinational companies with a particular focus in the CIO office.

Committed to attracting more women and minorities to Fortune 500 opportunities, Texzen Partners has launched new services to help corporations develop alternative pipeline for talent from Sports and Military. In addition, the firm is also working with corporate boards to study the need for IT expertise on boards.



These initiatives are part of the firm's ongoing strategic partnership with the National Center for Women & IT, an organization whose mission is to ensure that women are fully represented in the professional sphere of information technology and computing.

Kay attended St. John's College in Santa Fe, and received a bachelors degree in biological sciences from Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas. Her professional education includes graduation from the Women's Director Development program of the Kellogg School of Management. She is the co-chair of Girls Inc. of Westchester County, a national nonprofit youth organization dedicated to inspiring all girls to be strong, smart, and bold. Furthermore, Kay is a member of the Westchester Property Tax Commission.

Sharron Todd

Sharron Todd has over 12 years of human resources experience. With a diverse background that includes service with the Military Intelligence Corps, United States Army, Sharron served as a Korean Cryptological Linguist with a Top Security Clearance, working closely with the National Security Agency (NSA). Later, she was appointed as the Battalion Commander's personal translator and his liaison with the Republic of Korea (ROK) Army Generals and other high ranking officials. She also served as the Battalion Administrative specialist where she was responsible for HR services for over 600 soldiers. Sharron's corporate experience includes Aramark, Town & Country Magazine, and Robert K. Futterman & Associates. Her executive search experience includes working with finance, marketing and retail clients. Sharron attended Southern Methodist University and graduated from the Defense Language Institute as Valedictorian in Korean Studies. Sharron is also a member of the Council of Urban Professionals (CUP) where she serves on the Membership Committee with special focus on the Women's Affinity group.

Amy Acker

Amy Acker spent 18 years as a corporate human resources executive with global technology firms, including Nortel, Honeywell, Lucent and Avaya. While at Avaya, she designed and developed Avaya's first executive development program for the company's top 100 executives. The "Leadership Challenge" was the subject of a 2005 joint white paper titled "The Leadership Challenge, Accelerating Organizational Transformation Through Leadership Development." Prior to Avaya, Amy was with Lucent Technologies where she joined in 1996 as they approached their separation from AT&T. She was also the director of human resources for the New Ventures organization, a division dedicated to incubating start-up businesses. In 2000, Amy was part of the enterprise business that was spun off from Lucent to become Avaya. Amy was one of the founding vice presidents and led the executive staffing and leadership development organizations. In December, 2005, Amy retired at the age of 40 to pursue her interest in leadership development and HR effectiveness. Amy attended Pace University on a basketball scholarship where she was a two-time Academic All-American. She graduated in 1988 with a degree in Human Resources Management. She also holds an MBA in Strategic Management from Pace University.

Richard Azar, MBA, CPA has over 25 years of professional experience, including 16 years with the Big-4 consulting practices of Ernst & Young and its E&Y Kenneth Leventhal Real Estate Group and Pricewaterhouse Coopers and its real estate consulting practice. In those roles he directed hundreds of major organization redesign, process improvement and information technology projects in a wide range of industries. He also has extensive experience with real estate related financial services institutions on both the debt and equity side, including: Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs); Real Estate Operating Companies (REOCs); Fund Managers; Mortgage Banks; and CMBS conduits. Richard has completed a number of projects as a crisis or turnaround manager for troubled companies both as a consultant and as a hands-on interim Controller and CFO. Since passage of the Sarbanes-Oxley act in 2002 he has directed a number of Sarbanes-Oxley readiness projects. Richard earned his MBA with an accounting concentration from Pace University. He gained his early audit experience with Pannell Kerr Forster. He is licensed to practice as a Certified Public Accountant in New York State. He is a member of the Turnaround Management Association, the National Association of Corporate Directors and the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts.

Nancy Cote

Nancy Cote is a Partner and a leading recruiting professional and research manager with over 30 years of retained executive search research and corporate research experience. She holds an MBA from the University of Chicago and both undergraduate and graduate degrees in Library Science. Her corporate career includes Standard Register, Borg-Warner Automotive and Tracy-Locke/BBDO followed by retained search firm LAI Worldwide (now Hudson Highland Group) and Wachovia's Executive Search Group and her own research firm Christina Partners, Inc. since 2001. She is a member of the American Marketing Association, the Executive Search Roundtable and has served as President of the West Central Florida University of Chicago Graduate School of Business Alumni Club.