TEAM

Mark Light, MBA, Ph.D. has more than 20 years of frontline leadership experience. Known for his contagious enthusiasm and high energy, he is president and founder of First Light® Group LLC, which is Putting Your Future Within Reach® with client-centered services including Leadership for Good™ leadership development; On Tour presentations and workshops; Publishing research, reports, and books; and Results Now® strategic, operating, and governance planning.

As a practioner, Mark's past experience includes 15 seasons as president of the Victoria Theatre Association where he inaugurated its famous "You are the star" mission and led its turnaround into a top-30 performing arts center with audiences up five-fold to 900,000, annual income up 24-fold to $21.3 million, an unbroken string of year-end cash surpluses, and the opening of three new venues including the $100 million Schuster Center in 2003. He was a decade-long Tony Awards® voter and won the first ever Outstanding Achievement in Presenter Management Award from the League of American Theatres and Producers, whose members vote on the Tony's.

As an author, John Wiley & Sons published Mark's first book, The Strategic Board, in 2001 and BoardSource published his Executive Committee in 2004. Wiley will publish his newest book, Results Now, in 2009. His writing has appeared in Board Member magazine, the Nonprofit Management and Leadership Journal, and the Nonprofit Quarterly, which is currently the home of Mark's Dr. Conflict advice column.

As an educator, Mark is a faculty member at Case Western Reserve University, Antioch University McGregor, and Wright State University. Courses currently taught include behavior in organizations, leadership, and social enterprise; recent work includes conflict management, competitive strategies, ethics in global business, and nonprofit management.

As a volunteer, Mark is a mediator for the Dayton Mediation Center and he is on the board of American Humanics - Wright State University chapter and Mound Street Academies - a charter school serving out-of-school youth. His past board service includes the Ohio Association of Nonprofit Organizations, Bank One - Dayton NA, the National Alliance for Musical Theatre, and AIDS Foundation Miami Valley.

Mark is a member of the Kellogg Action Lab College of Consultants providing services to WK Kellogg Foundation grantees. He holds a BFA from Drake University, an MBA from UCLA, and a Ph.D. from the Antioch University Leadership and Change Program.