Marakon Associates Elects New CEO

Brian Burwell has been elected Marakon Associates' new chief executive, effective immediately. Burwell, a managing partner in the firm's San Francisco office, succeeds Ken Favaro, who has served as Marakon's CEO since 2000 (two three-year terms). Favaro will continue to work as a managing partner and will pick up the additional title of co-chairman. Marakon Chairman and Co-founder Jim McTaggart becomes the other co-chairman. Favaro decided earlier this year to step down as CEO in order to spend more time on client work and the promotion of an upcoming book, The Three Tensions: Embracing the Struggle to Perform Without Compromise, to be published in December. He is co-author of the book with Dominic Dodd, a senior advisor to Marakon and former managing partner. Burwell joined Marakon in 1979 – a year after the firm's founding – and has more than 25 years of experience working with senior executives at some of the world's leading companies. Prior to joining Marakon, he worked with the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco and with a research group at the University of California. Burwell holds a BA in economics from the University of California and an MBA from Stanford University.