Two Leading Experts on Organizational Change Join Marakon.

NEW YORK -- Jon Lurie and Paul Taffinder, two leading experts on organizational performance, behavior and change, have joined Marakon Associates as partners to strengthen its growing capability in the organizational aspects of performance and growth. They will be based in Marakon's London office.

Both Lurie and Taffinder were partners at consultancy Mercer Delta and members of its UK management team. Their experience is focused on leadership alignment, top team effectiveness, organizational transformation and change management. At Marakon, they will support all of the firm's practice areas, including Strategy, Execution, Organic Growth, Growth Through Acquisition, Productivity, Leadership & Organization and Managing for Value.

"We are extremely pleased to have two consultants of such experience and skill join our firm," said Marakon Chief Executive Ken Favaro. "Both are seasoned professionals with deep expertise in advising CEOs and senior executives on their organizational challenges and opportunities. They will increase the scope and impact of our distinctive capabilities for helping clients grow the value of their companies."

Adding specialist capabilities such as those represented by Lurie and Taffinder is part of a major, ongoing effort by Marakon to broaden and deepen the skills and experience the firm brings to its clients. For example, in 2003 Marakon hired a team from the Advanced Techniques Group, the marketing science unit of WPP's media agency, MindShare, to build its capabilities in organic growth and customer value management. Since then, the customer value group has grown and become increasingly involved in all aspects of the firm's advisory work.

Following are details on each new partner:

Jon Lurie has worked with many large organizations in the UK and abroad, helping them to implement their strategies through engagement with staff and stakeholders. Prior to joining Mercer Delta, he worked at Penna Change Consulting, where he was a director responsible for leading large-scale cultural change programs. He has been a consultant since 1990 - initially with KPMG for 10 years. Prior to entering consulting, he held senior human resources posts for several blue-chip companies, including Reuters and the London Stock Exchange. Lurie initially came to the UK from South Africa in 1979 on an industrial scholarship. He received his M.Sc. degree in Occupational Psychology from the University of London and degrees in Psychology and Economics from the University of Cape Town. He is a Chartered Psychologist and an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. Lurie can be contacted at [e-mail].

Paul Taffinder has advised many Global 500 companies on leadership and large-scale change. Prior to joining Mercer Delta, he was a partner at Accenture, where he was head of Organization and Change Strategy in the UK and specialized in CEO-led transformation. Previously, he held a number of management roles in the mining industry and with professional services firms. He has also written extensively about leadership and change, beginning with his first book, The New Leaders (Kogan Page), in 1995. His second book, Big Change (Wiley), won the prestigious Business Management Book of the Year Award in 1999 for what the judges called "his inspirational approach to corporate transformation". His latest book, The Leadership Crash Course (Kogan Page, 2000), has been republished in six languages, and a new, updated edition will be released later this year. Taffinder received his PhD, Master's and BA Honors degrees in Organizational Psychology from Witwatersrand (Wits) University in Johannesburg. He is a Chartered Psychologist and an Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society. Taffinder can be contacted at [e-mail].

For further information, contact David Fondiller at [phone] or [e-mail].

About Marakon Associates:

Marakon Associates is a strategy and management consulting firm that works with some of the world's best-known companies on the issues that most drive their performance and long-term value. The Economist has called it "a consultancy that has advised some of the world's most consistently successful companies." Marakon has offices in New York, London, Singapore, Chicago and San Francisco.

www.marakon.com/