Consulting Roundtable

April 22, 6:30 PM - 8:00 PM

Marge Johnson: Her Story of Consulting Entrepreneurship

Margaret Johnsson, founder of The Johnsson Group, will share her story of consulting entrepreneurship and will address questions such as:

• How do you get a consulting company started, and how is this different from being a sole proprietor consultant?
• How do you grow and expand the firm?
• Why and how would you sell a consulting firm?

Where:

Gleacher Center
450 North Cityfront Plaza Drive
Chicago, IL

Who:

Margaret ('Marge') Johnsson
Founder & CEO
The Johnsson Group

Cost:

No Charge

Program:

6:00 pm - 6:30 pm : Networking
6:30 - 8:00 pm: Presentation

Registration:

Please register Online

Questions:

Dennis Aust
DNAust@virtualstrategist.net

Event Description:

The second speaker in our Consulting Career Series is Margaret Johnsson, founder of The Johnsson Group, a fast-growing finance and accounting consulting firm with offices in Chicago, New York and Paris. During Ms. Johnsson’s tenure as Chairman and CEO, the firm became widely known for expert implementation of financial strategies for Fortune 1000 companies and its award-winning work/life programs and practices. Following the sale of The Johnsson Group to Altran Technologies, Ms. Johnsson founded Magnolia Restorations, a Chicago-based residential restorations firm in 2003.

In 1991, Margaret ('Marge') Johnsson founded The Johnsson Group, which serves the finance organizations of multi-billion dollar companies. A successful business owner and entrepreneur with significant finance expertise, Ms. Johnsson and her firm, The Johnsson Group, have received numerous awards including Fastest Growing Privately-held Companies - Inc. Magazine, and Best Entrepreneurial Employer – Working Woman Magazine. The company and its founder have often been featured in the business and financial press, including The Wall Street Journal, Business Finance, Business Week, CFO Magazine, Chicago Tribune, Chicago Sun-Times, Forbes, Crain’s Chicago Business, Crain’s New York, Inc., Magazine, Global Finance, ILCPA Society publications and NBC News.

Marge will share her story of consulting entrepreneurship and will address questions such as:

• How do you get a consulting company started, and how is this different from being a sole proprietor consultant?
• How do you grow and expand the firm?
• Why and how would you sell a consulting firm?

Speaker Profiles:

Margaret ('Marge') Johnsson
As a CPA, MBA and founder of two successful businesses, Ms. Johnsson has considerable financial strategy design and implementation experience. Her early career was spent primarily with Kraft Foods, Beatrice Companies, and Kipley Construction Company. In these companies she was responsible for acquisition integration, divestiture separation, high-end financial analysis and planning, various controllership functions and design and implementation of state-of-the-art financial systems and corporate controls.

Throughout her career, she has served on private company and non-profit boards in a variety of leadership and finance roles. Her board service has included AudioCast, Inc., Financial Executives International, Chicago Finance Exchange, Northwestern’s Kellogg Alumni Advisory Board, University of Chicago Women’s Business Group Advisory Board, The Joffrey Ballet, Community Television Network, the National Association of Women Business Owners, and Enterprising Women Magazine Advisory Board.

The United States Small Business Administration (SBA) selected Ms. Johnsson as the 2001 Small Business Person of the Year for the State of Illinois. The SBA cited Ms. Johnsson for her “hard work, great ideas and dedication,” in making the prestigious award, which instantly placed her among the top 50 small business leaders in America, and qualified her as a finalist for the SBA’s National Small Business Person of the Year award.

Ms. Johnsson is a frequent speaker and moderator of conferences and seminars, recently presented to executive MBA classes for North America, Europe and Asia at the University of Chicago the topic of 'The Importance of Human Capital in a Professional Services Firm.” Her most frequent speaking topics are entrepreneurial growth, corporate financial issues and work/life topics.

Ms. Johnsson earned a Masters of Management degree from Northwestern’s J. L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management in Strategy, Organization Behavior, and Marketing and a Bachelor of Science degree in Accounting and Computer Science from the University of Illinois-Chicago.

Ms. Johnsson is also a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accounts (AICPA), Executives’ Club of Chicago, Illinois CPA Society, TEC-Chicago Chapter, Women President’s Organization (WPO) and the National Association of Women Business Owners.