Board of Directors
Launch Pad Job Club is led by our all volunteer Board of Directors. Each member is elected to a three year term. We provide guidance and direction to the organization.
President – Patricia V. Hayes, J.D.
Patricia is a licensed attorney who serves as an executive advisor, career empowerment coach and authentic networking strategist. She empowers professionals to up-level their careers during life transitions by creating personalized career plans an building strengthened professional networks. She is the owner of PVH Consulting Group, LLC, a strategy consulting and leadership development firm. Previously, she has served in senior leadership roles at the local, regional and state levels, including being a senior advisor to a State Senator, Lieutenant Governor, Commission of Education and University System Chancellor.
A passion advocate and community leader, Patricia has served on numerous community boards and committees, most recently as the Immediate Past Chair of the Community Advancement Network and the Greater Austin Black Chamber of Commerce. She graduated from Pepperdine University School of Law and the University of Texas at Austin. She is married with two children.
Patricia V. Hayes on Linked In
Vice President – Ahmed Zouhair
Ahmed is a serial entrepreneur and seasoned business consultant who understands what it takes to build an enterprise from scratch. He likewise learned to interact with many different types of people, skills he would later refine as a volunteer business coach and workshop presenter for SCORE. He is also a mentor for the Newchip accelerator. These best practices have been captured in his recent book entitled Demystifying Project Management: Project Management in Plain English for Startups.
His overall life mission is to inspire and help people reach their full potential, in whatever capacity. Ahmed is based in Austin, TX.
Treasurer – Kathy Holmes
Kathy moved to the Austin area in 2016 from Houston where she spent the majority of her career at NASA, the Johnson Space Center, working on Human Spaceflight programs, with a few years in oil and gas. After earning her B.S. in Biology, she “launched” her career in the Neurophysiology Lab where she flew NASA’s zero-G aircraft conducting motion sickness research. She spent many years as a biomedical engineer flight controller in Mission Control-Houston for the Space Shuttle and NASA/MIR programs and was a technical trainer for flight controllers, and occasionally astronauts, that included designing training programs and conducting simulations in the International Space Station (ISS) Lab module mockup. She also worked for the ISS Program in numerous senior management contractor roles including Operations, Contracts Management, Program, and Project Management.
She holds various certifications including NASA Instructor Training, NDIA Configuration and Data Management, and Project Management Professional (PMP) training through Consulting Solutions.net. She is currently applying her wide variety of skills full time as a Servicing Project Manager in the mortgage industry helping New American Funding start up their Project Management Office in Austin.
She was a volunteer Project Manager with Launch Pad’s Leap to Success Program and a LPJC graduate. She is currently serving on the Development Committee focused on helping to identify and obtain new sources of funding.
Secretary & Parliamentarian – Beverly Moore
Combining experiences in Program Management, Organizational Development, Organizational Change Management (OCM), and Operations, Beverly has a proven record leading successful process and technology changes to get products and services to market, build new competencies, merge organizations, and drive business transformations. She has been with Charles Schwab since 2017 as a Director in the IT department, executing strategic initiatives. Prior to joining Schwab, Beverly held leadership positions in companies spanning a variety of industries including at XO Group (now The Knot Worldwide), 3M, Dell, Seton-Ascension Health, and Misys (now Allscripts). She has a passion for continuous improvement and is trained in Lean Six Sigma, Agile, and SAFe (Scaled Agile Framework).
Beverly is a three-time alum of Launch Pad Job Club, first connecting with the organization after a lay-off in 2004. She is a recurring donor and happily serves on the board of LPJC as a way to “pay it forward.” She is also a member of the Women’s Interactive Network at Schwab, and is actively participates in Austin Women in Technology, the Austin chapter of the Society for Information Management, and the Texas chapter of the Association of Change Management Practitioners.
Social Media Chair – Jennifer Roberts-Stutzriem
Jennifer is a Certified Professional Coach (CPC) and Consultant with 25+ years of progressive experience in talent management strategies and organizational effectiveness. As an Executive Coach with IMPACT Group, she provides coaching, training and mentoring for their leadership development, relocation and career transition teams. She is a Senior Consultant with Clarity Consultants, where she designs and delivers leadership and professional development programs for Fortune 500 clients. Jennifer is also a Coach with Clarity’s clients as well. Prior to her current roles, Jennifer spent 17 years in both full and part time capacities with Right Management as an Executive Coach and 15 years with New Horizons Computer Learning Centers as a Global Franchise Consultant.
Jennifer holds her Master of Science in Psychology from UOP, and Bachelor of Arts in Communications and Psychology from Indiana University, Bloomington. She earned an MBA Certificate in Franchise Management from the University of St. Thomas and earned her Alternative Dispute Resolution Mediator Certificate from UCLA. Jennifer is certified in numerous leadership and personality assessment tools including the MBTI, Birkman, Total SDI, DISC, and more. She is a Certified Train the Trainer (TTT), Modern Classroom Certified Trainer (MCCT) and Certified Franchise Executive (CFE).
Jennifer is actively involved in community outreach and engagement and serves on several Advisory Boards and two Board of Directors, including Launch Pad Job Club. She is an animal lover, a food connoisseur, a globetrotter and believes in making memories with her family and friends that will last a lifetime!
Jennifer Roberts-Stutzriem on Linked In
Founder & Past President – Kathy Lansford-Powell
Award-winning trainer, skilled in design and presentation of seminars and workshops that have helped thousands of job seekers secure excellent career opportunities.
Kathy is the creator and Facilitator of Launch Pad Job Club, Austin’s largest nonprofit networking and support group for job seekers through which members are informed, motivated, and entertained as they slog through the job search process.
Kathy Lansford Powell on Linkedin
Member At Large – Seaufy Peg Frey
Seaufy Peg is professionally diversified with proven abilities in cultivating strong relationships with clients, stakeholders, and peers. As one of the three founding officers, she initiated the role of Secretary-Treasurer, and in that role produced the club’s first by-laws as well as contributed to the foundation of the club’s mission and vision. Later, from January 2012 thru December 2018, Seaufy Peg served as LPJC’s first Parliamentarian and instituted accountability measures for enhanced growth and success of new and developing programs.
Following studies at the LBJ School of Public Affairs, she served in Texas state government in labor economics, management of workforce programs, health and human services, emergency management, and area non-profit leadership. Prior to graduate studies, Ms. Frey held positions in healthcare, non-profit organizations, the private sector, and is currently a Senior Certified Professional Candidate with the Society of Human Resource Management. As a lifelong learner and nontraditional student, she shares her enthusiasm for education, non-fiction, and proudly wears an alumna badge for Louisiana State University, McNeese State, and UT’s LBJ School of Public Affairs. Most recently, she became part-owner of the NFL’s Green Bay Packers.
Skills: Program Management, Data Management, Healthcare Acumen, Community Engagement, Presentations and Training, Microsoft Office, French
Member At Large – Westley R. Deshazer
Westley is a results-driven, versatile, and collaborative learning and development leader with a proficient growth mindset developed across higher education, government, technology, and other Fortune 100 sectors. His career experience offers an innate and innovative ability to bridge technology capability and humanity-centered goals for effective management, design, and instruction strategy. Able to adapt quickly to emerging trends with a keen eye toward aligning project effort with business metrics, Westley serves as the Organizational Effectiveness lead for the board.
Westley R. Deshazer on Linkedin
Member At Large – Jose Cortez
A results-driven professional, Jose started his career in the Winchester hard disk electronics industry. He later became intrigued how a most basic element on the ground, “sand”, can be developed and processed to build the most sophisticated electronic components in the electronics business sector that are used in environments from small pocket radios, flat screens as well as used in self-driven vehicles, to space travel aircrafts, medical devices, etc.
Jose holds an Electrical and Electronics Engineering minor in Computer Science and Mechanical Engineering, a Masters in Business Administration, is a Quality Auditor in ISO 9000 and TS16949, and Lean Manufacturing, 7 Quality Tools, Green Belt, Black Belt.
Learning and development continued in companies from Micropolis, HP, Conexant/Rockwell, NXP and Applied Materials. His excitement and dedication today comes from leading Global teams across multiples countries and managing a multi-billion dollar customer base influencing his work environment but also customers in the Quality and Reliability engineering discipline.
Downturn in the industry brought an opportunity to meet and lot of good people whose resilience was being tested in life. This humbling experience gave Jose the opportunity to learn more about people and their hardship but above all the need to help, support and provide guidance to others in a desperate need for their own self-development and get back to work. With the help of staff at local job clubs, he learned how to identify voids where people needed support not only to build confidence but also learn basic skills later grabbing the opportunity to teaching basic skills in the MS Office suite, mocking interviews and providing instant feedback to club members where their skills needed an update or where club members needed confidence reinforcement. Since these experiences, Jose’s volunteering and learning Emotional Intelligence have become a norm to continue to serve best those in need. Launch Pad Job Club provides a great platform to continue in the journey to help and serve others and he looks forward to meeting you all.
Staff Members
These individuals are not board members, but play key roles in the support of LaunchPad Job Club.
Club Leader – James Lampasona
James is intensely passionate about helping people achieve their personal and professional goals. He has fifteen years of experience in Professional & Life Coaching, Talent Management, Team Process & Facilitation, Learning & Development, and Project Management.
As the Club Leader at Launch Pad Job Club, he facilitates numerous weekly programs, shares networking opportunities, and provides compassionate and empathetic guidance to Austin-area club members.
Recently, James pivoted his career to provide Professional and Life Coaching to individuals and teams. James provides career, team, and executive coaching. He is highly passionate about coaching older adults to help them reach their desired health objectives, determine their post-retirement identity and legacy, and realize long-held dreams and goals.
Formerly, James worked as a Talent & Engagement Manager at the Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS) in the Investment Management Division. Before TRS, he was an organization development manager at NI (National Instruments). In this role, James introduced competency-based programs and coaching that impacted the entire employee life-cycle journey. He also has worked with other Fortune 500 companies like AT&T and Ameritech in global organization development, coaching, and operations line-management roles.
James earned a Master’s degree in organization development from Loyola University Chicago. He is currently studying at iPEC (Institute for Professional Excellence in Coaching), working towards a Professional Coaching Certification (PCC) accredited by the International Coaching Federation (ICF).
He lives in Austin, TX, and enjoys time with his family and friends, volunteering, cycling, self-development, and reading.
Executive Director – Shannon Mantrom
Shannon Mantrom is Executive Director of Launch Pad and Program Manager for the club’s signature program, Leap To Success. The Leap to Success program offers pro bono, professional projects assistance to Austin and Central Texas nonprofit organizations. Since its founding in 2012, Leap to Success has delivered over 115 projects to more than 100 nonprofits totaling over $500K in services. The program won the “2013 Nonprofit Advocate” award from PeopleFund and in 2017 won the “Nonprofit of the Year” award by the Austin LGBT Chamber of Commerce.
Shannon’s background is 20 years in sales and event coordination (with time off to raise two amazing daughters!) and she has been with the job club since 2012, first as a member, then as Program Manager for the Leap to Success program, and then finally being named the club’s first executive director in 2020. When not heeding the clarion call of the club, she enjoys trying to be a green thumb in her backyard flower garden and escaping Texas summer heat by heading to her family’s cabin in Colorado.
Accountant – Susan Hein
Susan Hein spent her career as a CPA in public accounting and tax management, mostly in San Francisco. After retirement she spent 6 years in Austin assisting in the care of her mother. During her years in Austin Susan became involved in volunteer work including being a former treasurer of Launch Pad Job Club.
In 2018 Susan moved to Sonoma, California where she enjoys swimming, motorcycling, hiking, and unending home improvements. And fortunately that still leaves time to pick up the accounting mantle again for Launch Pad, with the intention to provide the Board with the most meaningful financial reports and information.
Website – Scott Killen
Scott is a retired Enterprise Agile Coach. He tries to forget that at one time or another he’s held CSM, CSP, PMP, SAFe SA, SAFe SPC and CSQE certifications. Of more note, he’s taught and mentored many, many hundreds of people fundamental and advanced agile development skills in corporate, university and non-profit settings.
In service to his community Scott was founder and first President of Agile Austin, co-Chair of Keep Austin Agile 2018, President of Austin Software Process Improvement Network, Chair of the PMI Technical Local Interest Group and a member of several other non-profit boards.
When not thinking about how to build better software, faster, he tells stories to children and adults of all ages. Previously recognized by the Texas Commission for the Arts, he’s told stories in diverse venues to audiences large and small, but stories around a campfire are still his favorite. Counter-intuitively, he feels honored to be an award winning liar, having placed second in two contests. And, to close, no lie, he’s a Distinguished Toastmaster!
