Just like every NCS chapter needs a strong core leadership team to model NCS friendship for, and support and encourage, its members, NCS has a core team of leaders, advisors, staff and key volunteers who try to model NCS leadership for, and support and encourage, the NCS chapter leaders and who support NCS. It is a pretty small team, but it is a group committed to serving marketplace men by furthering the NCS mission and purpose.
Staff
James Anderson
James Anderson joined the New Canaan Society as President in 2015 and became CEO in 2017. Prior to this he worked at Focus on the Family handling West Coast Donor Relations.
James comes from an entrepreneur background after a career selling high-end real estate in Los Angeles for 10 years. James spent 5 years with Coldwell Banker before leaving to found the Pacific Luxury Group with Keller Williams. While there he earned the Quadruple Platinum Sales Award in four consecutive years as well as national awards from the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing for his innovations in sales marketing. Anderson then became a founding partner in the Malibu/Pacific Palisades office.
In his early career, James was the Director of Operations for Lakeshore Entertainment, an independent film production company based at Paramount Pictures, James was involved in many films, including Runaway Bride, Arlington Road and Million Dollar Baby. James left Lakeshore after having scripts optioned by Paramount and New Line Cinema before going on to direct Hometown Legend, a $2 million dollar film sold to Warner Brothers.
Anderson’s life changed in 2010. “I crashed my life with some terrible personal choices. I had an out of control ego, was materialistic and narcissistic, and nothing was ever enough. I was empty and alone. I am a man who has seen his own life radically transformed by Grace... I was rescued by a Jesus I did not know before, and He is redeeming my story.”
James attended Biola University and USC in Los Angeles, California, studying Screenwriting, Film Directing, and Marketing. He and his wife Carrie have been married for 20 years and have 2 daughters, Charlie Mae (10) and Lucy (8).
James is a self-identified golf addict. He also loves oil painting, fly-fishing and is a voracious reader.
Lauren Brown
Lauren Brown is Director of Events of the New Canaan Society. She has a BA from Wheaton College with a diverse background in teaching, resort management and non-profit events management. Prior to New Canaan she was Lead Planner for Public Affairs at Focus on the Family.
Liz Weed
Liz is the Chapter Coordinator and provides support for NCS CEO, James Anderson. She has worked for NCS since August 2010.
Liz graduated from Colorado State University with a degree in Restaurant and Resort management. She worked with Marriott International for 5 years and then switched gears to work in higher education for 3 years. She worked for Grand Canyon University and a higher education consulting group.
Michael Voytek
Voytek Law, LLC was founded by Michael T. Voytek in 2005. Michael’s vision has always been to provide high quality legal services at affordable rates. Initially, he exclusively represented a select group of corporate entities, entrepreneurs and hedge funds on transactional and corporate matters. His practice was strictly a traditional Wall Street one. Today, in addition, he has expanded his offerings to include litigation and dispute resolution services, trusts and estates, bankruptcy, foreclosure defense, family law, personal injury, criminal and other general legal matters in order to provide a fuller range of services to his clients.
Michael graduated from Fairfield Prep in 1983, from Fairfield University in 1987,magna cum laude, and from Emory Law School in 1990, with distinction. At Emory, he was the Managing Editor of the Emory International Law Review and was published in the Emory Journal of International Affairs. Michael is admitted to practice law in the States of Connecticut, New York, Georgia and Massachusetts. He is also admitted to practice before the U.S. District Court in Connecticut.
Michael started his career at Lord, Day and Lord, a Wall Street law firm in 1990. He worked principally on mergers and acquisitions matters in its New York office. After a brief stint in Boston at Goodwin Procter, Michael worked at Paul Hastings law firm in its New York and Atlanta offices for over 10 years. While at Paul Hastings, Michael acted essentially in an outside general counsel capacity for corporate entities, officers and directors and entrepreneurs in many diverse industries. After leaving Paul Hastings, from 2003 thru 2004, he bolstered the corporate practice of Goodkind Labaton in New York working on general corporate, contracts, and transactional matters such as m&a, corporate finance, securities and private equity deals. In 2005, he started the Voytek Law Firm (which is now known as Voytek Law, LLC).
In addition to his legal work, Michael is active in his community having served on a variety of charitable boards of directors (most notably on the Boy Scouts’ Connecticut Yankee Council’s Executive Board as its VP of Legal Affairs and on the Board of the Boys and Girls Club of Bridgeport). He also served on the Board of the Bethel Women’s Recovery Center as its General Counsel. He was the Chairman of the Steering Committee of the Connecticut Eagle Scout Association.
Michael has also ben involved with local community groups in Bridgeport – serving as Chairman of the Committee to Ungag the People, as Special Counsel to the Boys and Girls Club of Bridgeport and the Derail the Jail Committee and as general counsel to various NRZs in the City of Bridgeport. By way of additional pro bono work, he has helped indigent tenants at the Security Deposit Clinic in Waterbury and Bridgeport.
In his spare time, Michael has made appearances on “Bridgeport Now”, a local cable news television show where he has provided commentary on local and state legal and political issues. He is also a member of the Knights of Columbus and the Roma Club and is actively involved with the New Canaan Society (both in Fairfield and in Darien) and the Bridgeport Republican Town Committee. Michael is proud to be an Eagle Scout.
Board of Directors
Bob Doll
Bob Doll serves as a leading member of Nuveen Asset Management’s Equities investing team. Immediately prior to joining Nuveen Asset Management, Doll served as a senior advisor to BlackRock, where he recently held the role of Chief Equity Strategist and Senior Portfolio Manager of the U.S. Large Cap Series equity team and had primary portfolio management responsibilities for these products. His service with BlackRock dates back to 1999, including his years with Merrill Lynch Investment Managers (MLIM), which merged with BlackRock in 2006. At MLIM, he served as the President and Chief Investment Officer and Senior Portfolio Manager of the Merrill Lynch Large Cap Series Funds. Prior to joining MLIM, Mr. Doll served as the Chief Investment Officer of Oppenheimer Funds, Inc.
Bob received a BS in Accounting and a BA in Economics from Lehigh University and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. He is a Certified Public Accountant and holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation from the CFA Institute. Doll appears regularly in the national financial press discussing economic developments and markets.
Bob appears regularly in the national financial press discussing economic developments and markets. Bob and his wife Leslie live in Princeton, New Jersey and have three children. He is also choir director at his local church and holds leadership positions in the NYC Movement Project and in the Global Executive Leadership Forum within the Lausanne Movement. Bob serves on a number of boards including the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, Word of Life Fellowship, New Canaan Society Advisory Board, Kingdom Advisors, Philadelphia Biblical University and the Wharton Graduate Executive Board.
Britt Harris
Britt Harris has more than 30 years of investment experience leading several of the largest, most successful, and most innovative investment organizations in America. In addition, Mr. Harris is currently a member of the President’s Working Group for Financial Markets and an advisor to the New York Federal Reserve. He is one of only a few people who have worked extensively in both the private and public sectors.
Mr. Harris is currently the President, CEO and CIO at the University of Texas/Texas A&M University Investment Management Company (UTIMCO) which is the largest public endowment in America. Prior to his arrival at UTIMCO, he was the CIO for the Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS), the CEO for Bridgewater Associates and was also the CIO and President for Verizon Investment Management Corporation. Previously Mr. Harris was a managing director for Asea Brown Boveri in Europe. Mr. Harris got his start in his home state of Texas. He has three times been named one of America’s leading pension plan investment chiefs. Mr. Harris has been consistently named one of the top five asset investors in the world. In 2013 he was honored with a lifetime achievement for distinguished service to the financial industry.
Mr. Harris also serves as an executive professor for “Titans of Investing” at his alma mater Texas A&M University. He has also guest lectured on investments and public policy at Harvard, Princeton, Yale and The University of Texas. In addition, he is a frequent speaker on various spiritual matters and serves on a variety of public and private boards.
Mr. Harris has been married for more than 35 years to his high school sweetheart. He and his wife Julia have four children and live in Austin, Texas.
Frank Vizcarra
Mr. Vizcarra and his family emigrated from Tijuana, Mexico in 1973 when he was 18 years old. He attended college and graduated from Ohio State University in 1979 with a BS in Education. He then went on to play professional soccer for several teams from 1979-1983. In 1983, he retired to begin his business career with Pizza Hut where he worked for two years before joining McDonald's Corporation in 1985 and worked there for over 20 years.
While at McDonald’s, he held a number of positions from restaurant manager to Director of National Training and several Corporate Vice President positions in the field and at the Global Corporate Headquarters including: VP of QSC, Corporate VP of Franchise Relations, Strategy and Innovation for the U.S. as well as, Corporate VP in the Restaurant Solutions Group which oversees operations around the world. Mr. Vizcarra led the strategy team that designed and executed the turn-around of the U.S business. In addition, he led the design of the restructure of the European and the Asia Pacific, Middle East & Africa markets. Mr. Vizcarra worked closely with senior management for 14 years on a variety of areas of the business.
After retiring from McDonald’s Corporation in April of 2006, He founded The Vizcarra Consulting Group (VCG) to help CEOs define their leadership platform as well as the corporate strategy and execution plans to drive the growth of their business. He also spends a significant amount of time as an advisor to established companies and start-ups.
Mr. Vizcarra has served as an advisor to Goldman Sachs, The Coca Cola Company, McDonald’s Corporation, Pechanga Resort and Casino, Sycuan Resort and Casino and Served on the BOD of Oovoo Communications and Ensequence. He currently serves as an advisor to Goldman Sacks, Revalesio, Tender Greens, Anue Water technologies, and Uwanna. In addition, he serves on the Board of Del Taco, Tender Greens Board of Advisors and The Salvation Army National Advisory Board.
Mr. Vizcarra and his wife Anita co-founded, with the Barrio Logan College institute the “College Success Program” which provides four-year college scholarships and a comprehensive support system to underprivileged students.
Hal Rosser
Harold (Hal) O. Rosser is a Managing Partner of Rosser Capital Partners Management, LP, a Greenwich, CT based private investment firm he founded in 2011. Previously, he spent 15 years as founder and Managing Director of Bruckmann, Rosser, Sherrill & Co., Inc., a New York based mid-market private equity firm, established in 1995 and before that, 20 years at Citibank/Citicorp/ Citicorp Venture Capital. Hal earned his BS from Clarkson University and attended Management Development Programs at Carnegie-Mellon University and the Stanford University Business School.
Hal is currently a director/trustee of Brio Bravo Restaurant Group, Barteca Holdings, the Culinary Institute of America, and Wake Forest University.
Hal and his wife Rita live in Naples, FL and New Canaan, CT. Hal co-founded the Naples NCS chapter in 2006.
Jay Helvey
Jay joined Cassia Capital Partners LLC as the founding Managing Partner in 2011 after a successful career at CMT Asset Management, Ltd., an international asset management firm with offices in Chicago, London, and Hong Kong, which he helped establish in 2005. As principal partner, he was responsible for Risk Management and Portfolio Construction which included allocating to hedge funds.
Mr. Helvey is recognized as a leader in financial risk management with extensive experience in trading cash, futures, and derivatives instruments, as well as 12 years of experience overseeing large investment portfolios. As a Managing Director at J.P. Morgan, Jay served as the Vice Chairman of J.P. Morgan’s Risk Committee and Global Head of Derivative Counterparty and Hedge Fund Risk Management.
Jay earned a master’s degree in International Affairs, Banking and Finance in 1984 from the School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University in New York, where he was an International Fellow. He also attended the University of Cologne, West Germany in 1982 as a Fulbright Scholar. He has a Bachelor of Arts degree from Wake Forest University where he earned a double-major in Political Science and German in 1981. He graduated Magna Cum Laude, with Honors, and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa.
Jay serves on the Coca Cola Consolidated Bottling Co. (COKE), Computer Task Group (CTG), and Piedmont Federal Savings Bank Board of Directors. In addition, Jay served on the Pike Electric Board (PIKE) from 2005 – 2014. Jay also served as a Wake Forest University trustee from 1997 – 2017 and as a Wake Forest Medical Center Director from 2015 – 2017. In addition to his corporate board roles, Jay serves on the investment committees of Verger Capital Management, the Wake Forest University Health Sciences, and the Winston Salem Foundation.
Jay co-founded the Winston-Salem, N.C. chapter of the New Canaan Society, a Christian men’s fellowship organization. Married for 30 years, Jay and his wife have five children.
Kim Richards
Kim Richards founded The Athens Group in 1988. His real estate development career began in 1977 when he was named Vice President and General Counsel of The Estes Co., a Tucson, Arizona homebuilder and developer of commercial and residential communities.
After his 1983 appointment as President of Estes Properties, he was responsible for the successful acquisition, planning and development of several large-scale master planned communities including Tucson's award-winning Ventana Canyon. Kim acquired Estes Properties from The Estes Co. in 1988 and the company was renamed The Athens Group. In 1992, Kim and The Athens Group executives formed Hualalai Development Company and led the development of the Four Seasons Hualalai Resort on the Big Island of Hawaii. The project, which was completed in 1996, quickly gained a reputation as Hawaii's most exclusive resort community. Since 1997, Kim has led The Athens Group through a period of significant growth including the development of five major resort properties for The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company and Montage Hotels & Resorts in the western United States.
Kim received his undergraduate degree in political science from Western Michigan University in 1970 and a Juris Doctorate degree from the University of Arizona College of Law in 1973. He was involved in private practice until 1977 when he joined The Estes Co. He is a Trustee of the Urban Land Institute. Kim and his family reside in Santa Barbara, California.
Lindsay Parton
As a principal of DJM Capital, Lindsay Parton directs all property acquisitions and oversees all development and construction activities for over 310,000 square feet of retail and residential properties. Mr. Parton is also Chairman of the Board of Apolis, a global apparel brand operated by his family.
He holds a B.A. in Economics from Westmont College in Santa Barbara, he has been on the regional and international boards of Young Life, as well as being involved with the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington D.C.
Mike Timmis
Mike Timmis was born in Detroit, Michigan, where he has had a distinguished career as both an attorney and businessman. He earned his undergraduate degree from Wayne State University and graduated with highest honors from the Wayne State Law School in 1965. Mike has received honory doctorate degrees from University of Detroit Mercy and Ave Maria University.
Mike serves as chairman of Prison Fellowship International, comprised of 120 chartered countries, and Prison Fellowship Ministries (USA). He also presently serves on the board of Alpha International and is a past member of the board of Promise Keepers and The Navigators.
Mike is a Roman Catholic and a member of St. Paul Catholic Church, Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan. He is also a founding member of the National Fellowship of Catholic Men and most recently, one of our newest chapters – NCS Grosse Pointe.
He and his wife, Nancy, minister to the poor in the Third World and have developed self-help projects in Africa and Central and South America. They are also very active in addressing the educational needs of children in Detroit. Mike and his wife are in the Order of Malta.
The Timmises, who have been married for forty-eight years, reside in Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan, and Naples, Florida. They are parents of two and grandparents of five.
Timothy J. Keller
Dr. Timothy J. Keller was born in 1950 and grew up in Pennsylvania, where he attended Bucknell University, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and the Westminster Theological Seminary. During his seminary training, he met and married the former Kathy Louise Kristy of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They have three sons: David, Michael, and Jonathan.
After graduation, Tim began his ministry experience with three years as an associate on staff with InterVarsity Fellowship in Boston, Massachusetts. Tim was ordained by the Presbyterian Church in America in Boston and relocated to Virginia, where he served as a pastor for nine years. During that time, Dr. Keller also served as director of church planting for his denomination in the Middle Atlantic region, supervising the development of two dozen new congregations. During the mid 1980’s the Keller family moved to Philadelphia where Tim served on the faculty of Westminster Seminary teaching communication and leadership. In June of 1989 the Keller family moved to New York City to begin planting what is now Redeemer Presbyterian Church, a church that averages 5,000 attendees throughout Manhattan every Sunday.
Tom Cole
Tom joined Citigroup in July, 2010 as Co-Head of US Leveraged Finance, Citigroup Global Markets. He is responsible for the non-investment grade loan and bond financings for US Corporate Clients and leveraged buyouts.
He joined the firm from HSBC where he was Co-Head of Global Banking, Americas. His responsibilities included Client Coverage for Corporate and Investment Banking, Leveraged Finance, Equity Capital Markets, Private Equity, M &A, and Project Finance for the region.
Prior to joining HSBC, Tom was the head of Deutsche Bank’s North American leveraged finance practice, which he started in 2001. IFR Magazine recognized the group as U.S. Leveraged Finance house of the year in 2006. Prior to 2001, he ran the chemical industry group practice within Investment Banking. He joined the firm in 1987 in Corporate Finance in the Chicago office, and moved to London in 1992 where he oversaw the risk management associated with the firm’s distressed debt trading, derivatives, and corporate finance activities. Prior to joining Deutsche Bank, he spent three years at Continental Bank, and two years at General Electric.
Tom received a BS in Finance from Indiana University, where he currently serves on the Dean’s Council, and a MBA in Finance from the University of Chicago.
He is married to Kim, and they have three children, Jenna (27), Tara (25), and Jonathon (22).
NCS operates with an Executive Committee of four members of the Board of Directors that meets on a more regular basis to direct the month-to-month governance of NCS and its Board.
Founder
Jim Lane
Jim Lane founded the New Canaan Society in his home in New Canaan, Connecticut. He is a Principal of Devonwood Capital Partners and currently serves on the corporate Boards of Acacia Capital Management, LLC and Payoff.com.
Jim spent 20 years at Goldman Sachs & Co. where he was a General Partner and a founding member of the Firm’s global private equity business. Following Goldman, Jim was Chairman and CEO of SG Capital Partners, the private equity business affiliated with Societe Generale and SG Cowen Securities. Prior to establishing SG Capital Partners, Jim has a BA from Wheaton College and an MBA from Columbia University. He has served on several charitable boards including the Yale Center for Faith and Culture, The Trinity Forum, Wilberforce Forum (Prison Fellowship Ministries).
Jim and his wife, Susie, live in Dorset, Vermont, have three daughters, and two dogs, also female. Jim is a member of NCS Manhattan and NCS Manchester, Vermont (Green Mountain Boys).