The newly hired dean of the George L. Argyros School of Business and Economics certainly carries credentials from the academy. Reginald (Reggie) H. Gilyard will bring a Harvard MBA with him when he takes over on Aug. 1 from Arthur Kraft, who has headed the school since 2006. Gilyard also has an undergraduate degree from the U.S. Air Force Academy. Need more? He’s got Chapman bloodlines, thanks to his dad, who earned an MBA there. Gilyard is a former partner and managing director in the Los Angeles office of the Boston Consulting Group, where he led the education practice in the U.S. …
There’s change in the rarefied air of our annual OC 50, which tracks top leaders in the business community. This year’s edition only came out a week ago, and already requires a couple of footnotes: Tom McKernan has stepped down as CEO at the Automobile Club of Southern California, where he’s now chairman (see story, page 1), and Jim Mazzo has announced plans to leave the top job at Abbott Medical Optics at the end of the year (page 4) …
How much has the real estate market improved in the past year? About 12% and then some, based on the crowd at NAIOP SoCal’s annual Night at the Fights last week at the Hyatt Regency Irvine. Attendance was up by that much, to around 900. Add some weight for the mood of the room, which was loosey-goosey compared with a downbeat feel a year earlier …
Jim Abbott came up with the Angels and showed the world that a one-handed pitcher can make it in the big leagues. He now lives in Corona del Mar, works as a motivational speaker, and has been busy on the publicity circuit for his book, titled Imperfect: An Improbable Life. Abbott might want to make a stop at DeLaSalle High School in Minneapolis, where pitcher Ben Albert is tearing up the locals despite having a birth defect known as hemimelia, which left him with no bone structure below his left elbow. Albert recently told the Minneapolis Star Tribune he’d like to meet Abbott. The Insider passed the story along to Abbott, who said he plans to contact the youngster …
Ex-big leaguer and Newport Beach resident Shawn Green got a lift from a current slugger. Green runs JockTalk, a social media site that links fans with sports stars. He got a big plug during a recent Fox game of the week, when the hot topic was a four-home run game by Josh Hamilton. Fox broadcasters picked up posts by Green and Carlos Delgado, a JockTalk contributor. Both are in the small club of players to belt four round-trippers in a single game …
Guy Marsala, who led Costa Mesa-based EZ Lube through a turnaround in advance of its sale earlier this year, had quite a day of his own last week, scoring his first hole-in-one while playing with friends at El Camino Country Club in Oceanside. That evening he got the Association of Corporate Growth Orange County’s annual award in the “Reinventing” category (see related item, page 89). Marsala has done turnarounds at several companies across the U.S., and he says he’s ready for the next challenge. It will have to be here, though—his stint at EZ Lube sold him on Orange County.
