As a team, we aim to help you find the essence of your executive presence— not to conform to a set of rules, but to apply a set of tested and proven principles.
Richard Seyd, Executive Director
Richard Seyd is a Founder of Seydways Consulting. For over 10 years, Richard worked as the Senior Director for Stand & Deliver Consulting Group. There he worked closely with executives and their teams worldwide. He garnered a strong reputation in this position for his ability to identify patterns that accelerate learning and communication skills leading to transformational performance. Some of his clients include Cisco, Roche, BlackRock, Randstad, Ernst & Young, Actelion, VMware, and Amgen.
Richard is also one of the most highly regarded acting teachers in Los Angeles and San Francisco. A renowned theatre director for over 35 years, Richard has directed highly successful and award-winning productions in London, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, and San Francisco. He has taught at Stanford University and UC Davis.
Email Richard: richard@seydwaysconsulting.com
Bobby Weinapple, SENIOR coach
Bobby Weinapple was a Founding Partner of BRT Communications, and is a skilled executive coach, workshop leader, event facilitator, and keynote speaker. He leads teams in workshops focused on communicating with impact and inspiring others to action, fostering trust and bonding in teams that help them to work with more synergy and efficiency.
Bobby’s international clients include: Cisco (in 20+ country offices), Randstad (Netherlands), World Wildlife Fund (India, Rwanda), BlackRock (USA), Ernst & Young (Germany), Shire Pharmaceutical (Switzerland), and Singapore Exchange.
Bobby has taught at Stanford University in the Graduate School Business Program (2015-present), is the Principal Acting Coach at Seydways Studios (1999-present), has served as head of the Acting department at The San Francisco Conservatory of Music (1992-1999), has run several acclaimed performing arts school drama departments, and teaches master classes on Shakespeare’s plays at colleges across the country.
Email Bobby: bobby@seydwaysconsulting.com
STUTI MANDALA, LEAD coach & HEAD WRITER
Stuti is an executive coach certified by the International Coaching Federation in organizational development and change management. She specializes in helping leaders to develop executive presence through effective 360 degree communication. Her work involves helping senior leaders to develop and deliver their internal and external messaging, coaching company participants on communicating innovation and operational excellence, and coaching executives 1:1 on strategy for internal and external interviews. She has extensive experience facilitating virtual and in-person executive presence and leadership agility programs for cohorts from Operations and Sales divisions.
Stuti has coached individual contributors, managers, senior managers, directors, senior directors, executive directors as well as intact functional, geographic and global leadership teams at Amgen, Workday, Temenos, Boehringer Ingelheim, PepsiCo, VMware, GE, Datavant, Convatec, Keyloop, Appnovation, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, Ticketmaster and Ogilvy. She is a member of the SAG-AFTRA Actors Guild and spent two years improvising conflict management scenarios and career conversations with managers in Meta headquarters to help them improve their internal and cross-functional effectiveness.
Stuti grew up in New Delhi, Manila, London and the US. She has an interdisciplinary background in communications, finance and the arts. After getting her start in oil & gas investment banking on Wall Street, she earned a master’s of science in development management from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Stuti holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Cornell University and speaks English, Hindi, Telugu and Urdu.
Email Stuti: stuti@seydwaysconsulting.com
JEFF RAZ, coach
Jeff Raz helps leaders build rapport and physical presence, craft compelling stories, and bring heart and authenticity to their leadership. He has worked with the consulting firms People Rocket and Stand & Deliver, offering trainings from Berkeley to Beijing, Lisbon, Tokyo, São Paulo, Amsterdam, and New York for clients such as Cisco Systems, Deloitte, Singapore Exchange, Sony, Invesco, Lyft, IMD, and INSEAD.
Jeff is also an acclaimed playwright, director, producer, writer, and international performer who has starred on Broadway and with Cirque du Soleil. He has taught acting, clowning and mask performance to Cirque du Soleil acrobats, actors at professional theaters and students at the Tony-award winning American Conservatory Theater, and Stanford and New York Universities. He also appeared with Cirque du Soleil on Late Night with Jay Leno.
In 2000, Jeff founded the country’s only professional clown training program, The Clown Conservatory. Jeff’s first book, The Secret Life of Clowns, was launched at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. in 2017. He has written two more novels, all inspired by his career, and a history of the influence of Chinese acrobatics on American circus.
Email Jeff: jeffraz18@gmail.com
Janet Watson, coach
Janet is an accomplished executive coach and communications consultant who excels at enhancing executive and leadership presence for senior leaders, teams, and organizations both in the US and internationally. She is known for her agility, critical thinking, and her custom-tailored approach which provides actionable guidance that is readily implementable.
Janet's lifelong commitment to competitive athletics fuels her dedication to performance coaching, bringing a high level of focus and dedication to her diverse clientele. Her years as a corporate media spokesperson have ingrained in her the importance of presence and delivery, encapsulated in her mantra, "How you show up matters."
Currently, Janet serves as the Senior Advisor at the Center for Teaching Excellence at Berkeley Haas. She also consults with prestigious universities, including CAL, UCLA and Stanford, where she teaches in Executive Education. Her corporate clients include Apple, Mozilla, The Federal Reserve Bank, Jeep USA, and Informatica. Janet is a member of SAG/AFTRA, holds an Associate Certified Coach credential from the International Coaching Federation, and has academic degrees in Psychology and Communications.
Email Janet: janet@janetwatsoncoaching.com
RYAN MITCHELl, COAcH & business development manager
Ryan is an experienced sales and business development professional and expert with twenty years of experience under his belt. In his corporate life, Ryan has worked for several fortune 500 corporations as sales and coaching manager, including J.P Morgan Chase and Verizon Wireless. Developing sales communication processes from scratch, building sales teams and training representatives for the field and face-to-face communications has been his specialty for over a decade.
Ryan attended early school in the Maplewood/South Orange New Jersey school system, where he first started to explore his artistic interests. He played saxophone for seven years before choosing to pursue athletics over art, playing football through high school and his early years of college at Montclair State and Rutgers University in NJ. He combines the lessons in mental toughness and discipline he learned in athletics, with the communication, sales and psychological acumen he has developed in his professional life to help his clients strive to be the best version of themselves with every person they meet.
Email Ryan: RyanM@seydwaysconsulting.com
marcelina Willis, coach
As an executive leadership coach and consultant, Marcelina has deep expertise in communications, public speaking and assessments. She is driven to help her clients show up as their best selves. Born to a Salvadoran father and a mother from the Philippines, Marcelina thrives in environments and with client groups that are culturally diverse.
Marcelina has worked with clients in North America, Europe and Asia, and across multiple industries: Apparel, Aerospace, Advertising & Digital Marketing, Biotech, Engineering, Entertainment and Media, Finance, Government, Higher Education, Healthcare, Hospitality, Human Resources, Legal, NGO, Non-Profit, Pharmaceuticals, Technology, Utilities, and Research/Think Tanks.
Marcelina holds a Master’s Degree in Positive Organizational Behavior and Evaluation from Claremont Graduate University, and is an ICF-certified Coach. She is also a professional actor, improviser and member of the Screen Actors’ Guild, having appeared in plays, independent films, commercials, and training videos.
Faith Rumer, coach
A professional Voice, Dialect and Singing teacher for over 25 years, Faith Rumer has successfully coached Academy Award-winning actors, Grammy-winning recording artists, NBC Commentators, and world-class entrepreneurs. She has been consistently sought after to work with the clients of numerous major record labels, TV and film producers, and award-winning film directors.
She holds a Master’s Degree in Speech Pathology/Voice Science from California State University, Los Angeles and received her Music/Acting education at DePaul University, Chicago and Butler University, Indianapolis.
Faith has been a guest lecturer in professional voice at California State University, Long Beach, and at Los Angeles City College, as well as working as a corporate speech consultant. She is a current working actor appearing in film and TV.
Email Faith: faith@seydwaysconsulting.com