Catalyst Strategies Professional Services Team

Trish Hayward
Founder and Managing Partner

Trish has pioneered an approach to growth strategy that unifies analytical discipline and practical experience to define which strategies/solutions are ideal for Catalyst Strategies’ clients. The firm is known for quickly and collaboratively working with the client teams to drive action and market results. She now leads a growing team of consultants, serving some of the leading global brands in the technology and service sectors.

Trish serves high profile clients including SAP, Charles Schwab, Intuit, Yahoo!, Cisco Systems, Kodak, eBay, Citibank, Univision Communications, and Blue Shield of California. She also advises private-equity and venture-funded companies backed by, among others, Kleiner Perkins, NEA, Sequoia Capital, Sand Hill Capital, Sprout Group, and Goldman Sachs.

Prior to founding Catalyst Strategies, Trish was a consultant with Booz Allen & Hamilton’s New York Strategy Practice and a partner with Marketing Corporation of America, where she served a variety of Fortune 100 consumer-services clients. Trish has held VP-level line management positions, including those at Turner Broadcasting and at Themestream, one of the web’s first user generated content sites, which was funded by Kleiner Perkins and Redpoint Ventures.

Trish holds a MBA from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business and a BS from the Pennsylvania State University.

Mary Culley
Partner

Mary's experience includes sales strategy, sales operations, and field marketing initiatives for Cisco, McAfee, eBay, Entercept Security Technology, diCarta, Vividence and Sun Microsystems. She has expertise in the thermal management, security, CRM, ERP, web services and mobile markets.

Mary has a track record of building high performance sales teams, aggressively driving customer acquisition and revenue within a range of industries and company profiles. She has also successfully led numerous sales integration teams during significant mergers and acquisitions. Prior to consulting, she held senior manager and VP positions at Symantec, Delrina Technology, CKS US Web, SCO (The Santa Cruz Operation), and Vividence, a Kleiner Perkins and Sequoia Capital portfolio company. She holds a B.A with Honors from UCSC.

Sandra Smith
Principal

Before joining Catalyst, Sandra was a Director of Advised Offers for Charles Schwab. She had P&L responsibility and directed all aspects of the business including marketing strategy, pricing, sales and distribution, operations and technology infrastructure. Under her leadership, the service was developed, launched and scaled up to almost $1B in assets during its first year. While at Schwab, Sandra also worked as an in-house consultant, successfully launching new retail businesses and improving the profitability of existing ones.

Sandra spent three years as a Project Manager at the Boston Consulting Group where she successfully managed strategic projects in corporate strategy development, growth opportunity identification, market entry planning, acquisition due diligence, post-merger integration, and strategic planning process design. Sandra also brings world-class experience in new product and service development from her four years at Bell Canada.

She holds a MBA in Finance from the Wharton School of Business, a Masters of Applied Science in Management Information Systems from the University of Toronto and a Bachelor with Honors in Industrial Engineering also from the University of Toronto.

Isabelle Finney
Consultant

Prior to joining Catalyst, Isabelle was Vice President of Marketing (North and South America) for DHL. She was responsible for directing the company’s marketing strategy, advertising, pricing, yield management, market research and client acquisition and retention strategies. She also managed a significant re-haul of the DHL brand during its acquisition of Airborne in 2003. During her eight years with DHL, she worked in a wide variety of roles based in Europe and the US.

Isabelle also spent three years as an independent consultant in the investment banking industry. She consulted on a wide variety of projects with Credit Suisse Financial Products, ING Barings, Daiwa Europe and Saudi International – all based in London. In addition to services marketing, Isabelle has extensive experience in product and consumer goods marketing, having begun her career with Unilever in South Africa.

Isabelle has a Bachelors degree in Finance and Marketing, and a Postgraduate Degree in Management Accounting from the University of Natal, South Africa. She is also a Certified Management Accountant, with the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants in London.

Sarah Hammann
Consultant

Since 2006, Sarah's clients have included Johnson & Johnson, Blue Shield of California, Microsoft, and Advanced Micro Devices as well as early stage companies in health care, technology and retail services.

Before joining Catalyst Strategies, Sarah was Chief Marketing Officer of Posit Science, a life sciences company in brain health. Sarah built marketing and sales from scratch - leading a team to craft the brand, value proposition, business model, and offer strategy.  Previously, Sarah was General Manager of Small Business Services for Intuit.  Her team delivered double-digit growth by identifying and launching two breakthrough services.

In her New York era, Sarah was SVP of Market Development for Standard & Poor's.  She led global product management, marketing, research, and communications for six divisions.  Prior to S&P, Sarah was VP of New Business Development for Reader's Digest Association where she launched the company's digital media business and profitably expanded the customer base.  Sarah started her career in brand management with Procter & Gamble and in consulting with McKinsey & Company.

Sarah holds an MBA from Cornell University as well as a BA with honors in History from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Jill Richards
Consultant

Jill previously served as Vice President of Marketing at Visto Corporation and directed member acquisition and product marketing at Netscape Communications and America Online. As a consultant, Jill has developed strategies and led marketing, business development, and market research programs for many leading professional services companies, including AT Kearney, Bain & Company, Booz Allen Hamilton, Deloitte Consulting, Gartner, Kurt Salmon Associates, Mellon Financial, and The Parthenon Group.  She has also been a consultant at Price Waterhouse, KPMG, and Braxton Associates.

Jill holds an M.B.A. from The Anderson School at the University of California , Los Angeles and a B.A. in International Relations from Pomona College .  She also studied business at the Ecole Supérieure de Commerce de Paris in Paris, France and international relations at the Institut Universitaire des Etudes Européennes in Geneva, Switzerland.

Dodie Sutro Crawford
Consultant

Dodie started her career in classic brand management at Clorox and advertising at Ketchum Communications, building brands such as Clorox Clean Up, Tilex, Hunt’s, Wesson and Bank of America. In the early 90s, she successfully brought her brand experience and innovativeness to online services. At Webvan, she held senior positions in merchandising and marketing, and developed strategies for positioning, segmentation, pricing, and customer retention. As the head of marketing for eBay’s brick and mortar auction house, Butterfields, Dodie was instrumental in leveraging the power of eBay to drive a significant increase in online auction participation. For both Webvan and eBay, she developed and tested concepts for new online tools and services and managed cross-functional teams to deliver them on time.

Recent consulting engagements have included developing an online channel strategy and development roadmap for a major insurance company, and identifying lead market opportunities and defining a go-to-market strategy for an enterprise software company.

Dodie has an MBA from the Kellogg School at Northwestern University and a BA in art history and economics from Connecticut College.

Weston Stander
Consultant

Since 2006 Weston's clients have included NetApp, SAP, Blue Shield of California, and Timbuk2 as well as advisory roles for startups.

Before Catalyst Weston was a technology executive for USWeb/CKS, Publicis Group, and two startup companies, where he oversaw up to sixty web professionals and delivered multi-million dollar technology projects. He has also built product strategy, technical organizations, and technology infrastructure from the ground up.

Weston's career began with artificial intelligence research at Nationwide Insurance and software engineering for Silicon Graphics where he also project managed the European deployment of the first, global, digitally-networked voicemail system. Weston holds a degree in Computer Science Engineering from The Ohio State University and multiple certificates including Project Management from AMA.

Freny Cooper
Consultant

Prior to joining Catalyst Strategies, Freny consulted for companies such as Palm, Inc., Apple Computer, Plantronics and KnightRidder, as well as numerous start-ups. She has held senior marketing communications positions at Silicon Graphics and Claris, where she significantly increased awareness and initiated e-commerce efforts for their products.

Freny has also spent several years in the online gaming industry, creating marketing plans and developing programs to introduce interactive play to new markets. She holds an MBA from the Marshall School at the University of Southern California and a BA from the Monterey Institute of International Studies.

Thomlyn Binnett
Consultant

Prior to consulting, Thomlyn spent over 11 years working in marketing and eBusiness at Charles Schwab. Her responsibilities included acquisition of new clients, development of the mass market segment of clients and managing online goal and portfolio planning tools. As the Director of the Independent Investing Foundational Service, Thomlyn had P&L responsibility and directed all aspects of the business including marketing strategy, pricing, and offer management for all self-directed clients with less than $100K in assets - representing 1.6M households and $470M annual revenue. Thomlyn's experience at Schwab also includes various roles in eBusiness where she managed online portfolio and goal planning tools.

Thomlyn holds a BA from Mills College .

Kim Drew
Consultant

Kim Drew brings over 15 years of experience in business strategy development and execution, primarily in the financial services and technology industries. Kim is a seasoned consultant, having worked as both an in-house and external advisor, who brings a perspective grounded in significant operating experience.

Prior to joining Catalyst, Kim spent eight years with Charles Schwab in a variety of strategic and operating roles. Her most recent role was Vice President, Business Strategy, where she successfully partnered with various Schwab divisions to develop new business opportunities and growth strategies. Prior to this, she was Vice President of Web Trading, responsible for all aspects of online product development and client user experience for www.schwab.com's trading and equity news and research capabilities.

Prior to Schwab, Kim was a Management Consultant with Arthur D. Little, in Cambridge , MA and San Francisco , CA . She advised multinational technology and telecommunications clients on product and marketing strategies, with particular expertise in market entry strategy development for manufacturers entering the US consumer market. In addition, Kim worked with several telecommunications firms to evaluate, benchmark and redesign new product development processes and build product portfolio management capabilities.

Kim has an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelors degree in Economics and Philosophy from Boston College .

Paige Hallsted
Consultant

Prior to Denning & Company, Paige was an Investment Analyst at GameChange Venture Capital, a seed-stage venture fund started by Mobius Ventures and Accenture Technology Ventures. Paige focused on identifying and evaluating business proposals, researching target markets and working with the team on investment strategy and process. Prior to joining GameChange, Paige was an Investment Analyst in the HealthNet Ventures Fund, where she worked directly with the two general partners on all Fund affairs, from deal origination to competitive profiling to quarterly reporting.

Paige began her career in private equity in 1998 at Hambrecht & Quist. Paige graduated with a B.A. in Human Biology from Brown University.

Dr. Leroy Miller
Senior Director, Business Research

Leroy has been on the faculty of the American University in the School of International Service and the World Capitals Program since 1983. As a Fulbright scholar he received his doctorate, magna cum laude, at the University of Bonn in international relations in 1980. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with his B.A.

The Extended Team

• Channel programs
• Marketing programs
• Primary market research
• Branding and naming
• Web design
• Employee engagement and performance

Learn more about our alliance partners.