John D. Ela Contact us
With a 30 year track record of creating change and growth for both large and small organizations, John Ela brings a broad experience to the issues facing senior managers and owners. As a CEO Coach and Strategic Adviser, he helps clients achieve greater performance and lower stress by bringing a real world approach to C-level Executive Coaching. He believes that organizational performance is driven by the combination of clear strategies, management alignment, and effective leadership. When these elements are established, Leaders can generate desired results, lead a high performance team, achieve personal work/life harmony, and have a lot more fun.
He began his career with Exxon and technology companies in senior strategic planning positions and quickly moved into a CEO role when he was 28 years old, by spinning off a struggling Telecom product line. He was successful in re-positioning the products, building an organization, developing several next generation product lines, and creating a successful high growth business.
Building on that early experience, blending strategy and execution, he has moved between consulting and CEO roles to improve a number of challenging situations in diverse markets. As a CEO, he has led corporate spin-offs, start-ups, family owned companies, turnarounds, and buyouts within consumer, industrial, manufacturing, construction, and e-commerce industries. His CEO Coaching and consulting work has focused on assisting owners of privately held companies to re-invent themselves for competitive advantage. This has included strategic planning, process improvement, lean manufacturing, cultural change, teaming, leadership, management alignment, and business development. In addition to CEO Coaching and consulting, he taught the capstone Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship courses and served as an adviser for seniors entering the Holloway Innovation-to-Market Business Plan Competition at the Paul College of Business and Economics at UNH. In 2018, John founded the Association for Corporate Development, a membership organization for C-level Executives and advisors involved with creating, growing, and capturing business value. Additionally, John has helped develop Boards of Directors for privately held businesses and also serves on a number of Corporate Boards.
John has an undergraduate dual degree in Business Administration and Economics and a Masters in Economics from the University of New Hampshire. He has numerous publications, and holds 7 patents. John was appointed by NH Governor John Lynch in 2010 to represent the manufacturing industry on the NH State Board of Fire Control. In 2012, he was recognized as the Certified Green Professional of the year by the NAHB. John lives in New Hampshire with his wife to whom he has been happily married for 30+ years. He enjoys the outdoors, is an avid gardener, downhill skier, and a jazz enthusiast.