Our team.
The Pacific Family Business Institute is led by family business experts Rich Simmonds and Mark T. Green.
Mark and Rich have held leadership roles in the development of several family business surveys, including the 2007 Family Business Survey (Laird Norton Tyee), the 2008 Family Business Survey (Laird Norton Tyee), the 2012 Northwest Family Business Survey (Pacific Family Business Institute), the 2013 Northwest Family Business Survey: Special Topic (Pacific Family Business Institute), and the 2014 Northwest Family Business Survey (Pacific Family Business Institute).
Rich Simmonds · Co-Director
For more than 25 years, Rich Simmonds has been working with family businesses and their advisors. As a Seattle-based family business consultant, he assists Northwest family-owned businesses in the development of next-generation family members, development of their business and family boards, and transitioning from one generation to the next.
Rich is involved with the family business initiatives at Gonzaga University and the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Board of Central Washington University. He is on the boards of several Northwest family-owned businesses and the Family Enterprise Research Council, an international nonprofit organization that conducts and promotes family business research. In the past, he served on the advisory board of the Austin Family Business Program at Oregon State University.
In 1995, Rich cofounded Tyee Asset Strategies, a company that grew from start up to $4 billion in assets. Tyee was a wealth management company located in Seattle, Washington. He served as Tyee's Chairman until 2004, when it was acquired by Laird Norton Company, a seventh-generation family business. Rich earned his degrees in marketing and finance from Central Washington University.
Mark Green, Ph.D. · Co-Director
Mark T. Green is an internationally known family business consultant, speaker, author, educator and researcher. Mark is co-founder of the Pacific Family Business Institute, serves as a Clinical Professor of Family Business at Seattle University and leads his own family business consulting firm. His expert counsel is sought by companies throughout the world on family business issues such as succession, governance, strategy, conflict resolution and leadership. He teaches executive education programs, workshops, seminars and academic courses for family businesses and professionals that serve family enterprises. Before founding his Oregon-based consultancy in 2011, Mark was a principal with the Family Business Consulting Group based in Chicago. He was also the A.E. Coleman Chair in Family Business and the Director of the Austin Family Business Program at Oregon State University. He co-founded the Family Enterprise Research Conference (FERC) in 2005, and has served as chair of the Educator and Research Conference for the Family Firm Institute.
Mark is the author of Inside the Multi-Generational Family Business, published by Palgrave Macmillan, and has authored or co-authored more than 20 academic journals, book chapters and book reviews. As a family business expert, he has been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, MSNBC, The Seattle Times, The Oregonian and many others.
He earned his Ph.D. in economics and political science, and a master’s degree in political economy from the Claremont Graduate School. He holds an MBA from Willamette University’s Atkinson Graduate School of Management, and a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Cal Poly Pomona. Mark has served on the board of directors for a number of family businesses and non-profit organizations.
Ron Dohr, Ph.D. · Co-Director, emeritus
Ron Dohr is a seasoned business consultant and family business advisor with more than 30 years of proven success helping businesses with all aspects of people and organizational effectiveness. As an experienced business psychologist, university professor, company senior executive, and long-time family business advisor, Ron has the ability to quickly uncover the root causes of problems facing clients and facilitate solutions that get to immediate results. He has consulted with all types and sizes of closely held businesses in various industries and stages of the business life cycle.
He is regionally recognized in the Pacific Northwest in the field of family business, and advises business owner clients on a wide range of topics including succession planning, governance, family dynamics, business transition and perpetuating family legacy.
Prior to starting his own consulting practice, Ron has held executive-level and consulting positions at Moss Adams, UTILX, Weyerhaeuser, NC Caterpillar, Moore Financial Group, and Bank of America. Ron has taught numerous graduate-level classes at Pacific Lutheran University, Central Washington University, and Seattle University. He is a Certified Mediator and Board Member of the Pierce County Center for Dispute Resolution and is an active member of the Family Firm Institute, Estate Planning Council of Seattle and a co-founding member of Northwest Family Business Advisors.
In 2023, Ron transitioned to retirement, leaving PFBI in Rich and Mark’s capable hands. He serves today as an emeritus member of the PFBI founding team.