Jim Boulden,a consultant with Strategy Development, spent over 30 years in a variety of disciplines within the office equipment industry, primarily as director of financial operations (DFO) for IKON Office Solutions. 

Jim began his career in 1977 with A-Copy, Inc in Glastonbury, Connecticut in the service department and was rapidly promoted to field service manager.  In 1983, Jim was promoted to regional service manager in A-Copy’s Philadelphia operation and was subsequently promoted to director of financial operations.  A-Copy was acquired by IKON Office Solutions in 1983 and became IKON’s largest operating company.

Jim also served as DFO for IKON’s Boston and South Florida Marketplaces, with those operations having achieved IKON’s Marketplace of the Year several times during his tenure. In Jim’s 11 years in Boston, revenue grew from $60 million to $120 million and operating income from 16% to 22%.

As DFO, Jim had primary responsibility for cash flow, asset management, leasing, back office technology, operational effectiveness, and budgeting.  Jim was also the lead on major account pricing decisions.  As IKON progressed to a more centralized organization, Jim played a key role on the process re-engineering team focused to effectively centralizing inventory, billing and receivables. Processes were designed to insure billing accuracy, inventory management and efficiency of collections.  Jim’s business unit was considered “the model” at IKON.

Jim also served on IKON’s East Region Operations Team, assisting other IKON marketplaces to improve their operations.  Jim has been recognized as a member of the IKON’s Partner’s Club and also as an IKON East Region ACE.

Jim attended University of Connecticut and Central Connecticut State University with a focus in Business Management and can be reached at: boulden@strategydevelopment.org

For more than 20 yearsEd Carroll, a principal with Strategy Development, has led large, mid-size and small companies through successful turnarounds and growth cycles. He has an extensive background in the imaging industry with experience in all areas including financial, operational, sales and professional services.  As Vice President of IKON’s Capital Marketplace, a $150 million unit, Ed turned around an underperforming business unit, built a strong team, led the sales force into professional services and facilities management, and earned IKON’s prestigious Chairman’s Award for superior operation results.  Prior to this assignment, Ed was CEO and Chairman of CyLex Systems Inc., a venture funded document management company, where he led the expansion of services offered and the development of new channels.  CyLex was acquired by Ricoh in 2003. 

Prior to CyLex, Ed had a distinguished career at Panasonic, where he was President of Panasonic Document Imaging Company as well as President of Panasonic Document Systems Company, their direct operation he planned, and started in 1995.  Early in his career Ed served in various Financial Management positions within Panasonic leading effort to identify and reduce operating costs through consolidation and restructuring. 

Ed is a graduate of Canisius College with a B.S. in Accounting.  He has continued his education, completing executive development courses at Matsushita’s Overseas Training facility in Osaka, Japan and is formally trained in Six Sigma Process Improvement.

Ed resides in Leesburg, Virginia with his wife (Sharon) and two daughters (Kylie and Lily) and can be reached at carroll@strategydevelopment.org 

David Ramos, a consultant with Strategy Development, has led and trained successful sales organizations for more than a decade.  First as a major account manager for Xerox and then as a regional sales manager for IKON in Utah, David developed a strong track record of developing his employees and delivering results.  David was subsequently asked to lead sales training in IKON's West District, helping to reduce sales turnover by 8 percentage points and increase sales rep productivity by 14 percent.  David was then asked to lead the development of courseware and training at the management and sales levels for IKON's Mexico Operations.

David assumed responsibility for the Mexican sales operations as Director of Sales and had responsibility to deliver $30 million in equipment revenue through 8 sales managers and 70 sales representatives.  After the sale of the Mexican operations, David assumed responsibility for IKON's North Florida sales operations as General Sales Manager. 

David has a unique mix of successful field sales leadership and the development and delivery of sales management and sales training.  He is also bilingual in English and Spanish.  David is adept in sales management process has been instrumental in helping our clients develop their employees.

A graduate of the University of Alaska, David can be reached at ramos@strategydevelopment.org