Justin Menkes Ph.D.
Managing Director
Justin is an acclaimed author and the leading expert in the field of executive assessment. His research led him to the discovery and definition of the theory of Executive Intelligence (ExI). He also developed the ExI Evaluation, a rigorous assessment methodology that doubles the accuracy of traditional best-practice approaches to assessing leaders and managers. As a co-founder of Executive Intelligence Group, he had applied the methodology and his deep understanding of executive performance with clients like Hewlett-Packard, Texas Pacific Group, and Quintiles.
He has received national recognition for his expertise in executive assessment. The Wall Street Journal Best Seller book, Executive Intelligence: What all great leaders have (November 2005) and HBR article "Hiring for Smarts" (November 2005) help business leaders understand the truths about what drives executive performance. Justin has chaired master tutorials to train other I/O psychologists in best practice assessment techniques. He was inducted into the Sigma Xi Psychological Honors Society in recognition of his research contributions to the field of psychology.
During his doctoral work at Claremont Graduate University, Justin studied with some of the greatest minds of the 20th century, including Peter Drucker, Michael Scriven and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.
He graduated with honors from Haverford College and received his M.A. in psychology from the University of Pennsylvania. He holds a Ph.D. in organizational behavior from Claremont Graduate University.
Robert Stark
Managing Director
As an expert in leadership assessment and development, and co-founder of Executive Intelligence Group, Robert helped introduce the Executive Intelligence (ExI) Evaluation to the field of executive assessment.
Robert has worked with clients including Hewlett-Packard, Quintiles Transnational, and United Technologies to improve the performance of their leadership by rigorously evaluating and benchmarking senior executives. He has provided strategic leadership recommendations, and helped clients build actionable development plans to maximize the contribution of each executive. He has worked with private equity firms like Texas Pacific Group, helping them make decisions about senior executive hires. Additionally, he has evaluated and benchmarked internal and external CEO candidates for Boards.
Prior to founding Executive Intelligence Group, Robert consulted with diverse clients like Hewlett-Packard, McKinsey and Company, and Granite Construction. He helped clients align their leadership with strategic imperatives by developing succession plans; evaluating and developing senior executives; and assessing and changing corporate culture.
He served as COO, first for Hagberg Consulting Group, and then for HiringTools, Inc., a human resources software company that was acquired by Monster.com/TMPW. Robert was Vice President of Strategy and Planning for Monster, where he identified and evaluated acquisition targets.
Robert is on the board of directors of Clear Picture Corporation. He received an Honors in Business Administration from the Ivey School of Management in London, Canada in 1987.
Jeffrey Cohn
An expert in executive succession and development, Jeff has 15-years experience advising organizations about how to create an integrated and aligned talent management system that supports their overall strategy and culture. His Fortune 100 clients have included Allstate Insurance and Tyson Foods. Jeff has also designed and launched numerous customized executive development workshops for clients and for the CEO Leadership Institute at Yale University. Earlier in his career, Jeff was a Principal at the Law & Economics Consulting Group in San Francisco, where he helped launch the company’s strategy and organizational performance division. He was also a fellow at Harvard Business School, specializing in strategy and applied corporate finance.
Jeff has published widely in the areas of leadership development, succession planning and strategic management, including articles in the Harvard Business Review, Economist Intelligence Unit, CEO Refresher, and the Balanced Scorecard Report. He has also been quoted in BusinessWeek, the Economist, and Workforce Management.
Jeff graduated with a BA in Economics from Vanderbilt University and an MBA in Applied Corporate Finance from Tulane University.
Steven Blackman
Steven Blackman specializes in leadership assessment, succession planning, change management and executive coaching. As an assessment expert, he helps clients evaluate the readiness and suitability of existing and potential talent for senior positions. Additionally, as part of client engagements, he works collaboratively with senior executives to create action plans designed to help them further their professional development.
Prior to joining Spencer Stuart, Steven spent a large portion of his career at Mercer Delta Consulting where he was a partner working with multinational Fortune 500 companies across a range of industries. Leveraging his background in change management, he advised clients in successfully leading large-scale transitions such as reorganizations, strategy implementation and the onboarding of new leadership. While at Mercer Delta, he capitalized on his leadership assessment skills to design the firm’s executive coaching process that was used to privately coach CEOs and senior executives.
Before he joined Mercer Delta, Steven held senior-level positions in organization development consulting within corporate human resources at Coopers & Lybrand and Hughes Aircraft Company. He also gained entrepreneurial experience while living in Argentina, where Steven co-founded a media company which launched a city lifestyle magazine in Buenos Aires.
Steven holds a B.A. degree in psychology from California State University, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in organizational psychology from the California School of Professional Psychology. Steven has extensive experience working in Latin America and is fluent in Spanish.
Helen Roberts
Helen Roberts specializes in identifying and developing senior-level talent. As an expert in assessment, Helen evaluates individuals, teams and organizations across all industry sectors to ensure that clients have the right people in the right roles to achieve their strategic goals. She brings more than 20 years of experience in consulting and executive search to her role.
Prior to joining Spencer Stuart, Helen worked for a leadership consultancy, where she set up and ran its global assessment practice. Before that, she spent fourteen years at another major search and leadership consulting firm, initially as a search consultant focused on strategy roles and specializing in the TCM and professional services sectors. In 1997, Helen was instrumental in setting up the firm’s Leadership Consulting division, which rapidly became the UK’s market leader in executive and board-level assessment. In that capacity, she managed major UK-based and international projects. She started her career in management consulting with Andersen Consulting.
Helen has a degree in economics and economic history from Bristol University and an MBA from INSEAD. She speaks French and Spanish.