Shahin Clark, President

 

Shahin Clark, President, has over 25 years of bank consulting experience with financial institutions in the United States, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Puerto Rico and is the President of Lodestone Banking Consultancy, Inc. Prior to Lodestone, Ms. Clark consulted to Marine Midland Bank/HSBC, BankBoston, Banc ONE, Continental Bank, Midlantic Corporation, Mid-State Bank, Star Banc Corporation, NationsBank, Commerce Bank and The Merchants Bank. Ms. Clark began her consulting career in MMB/HSBC’s bank-wide internal consulting division.

 

Over the past 15 years at Lodestone, Ms. Clark has lead over 60 deep penetrating consulting projects for 40 financial institutions that range from $200 Million to over $35 Billion in assets. Each of these projects have required 5 to 10 weeks of on-site 10 hour days to complete. Ms. Clark holds a B.S. in Management Information Systems (IT) and B.S. in Marketing from Syracuse University, Syracuse NY. Ms. Clark also received a business degree from Pitman College in London, England. Ms. Clark serves on the Syracuse University mentor program and also lectures to SU finance students about the opportunities for them in banking today and both the challenges that our industry has faced and the challenges it is currently facing.

 

Mark Clark, EVP

 

Mark Clark, EVP, is co-founder of Lodestone Banking Consultancy, Inc. Mr. Clark has watched over Lodestone’s client relationships since the firm was established in 1994 as the director of marketing, responsible for business development and client support. He has successfully brought together highly skilled bankers /financial consultants, which comprise Lodestone's services and management team. Mr. Clark has 25 years of experience in account relationship management and marketing, which is integrated into Lodestone's consulting and marketing approach. Today, Lodestone is consulting nationwide utilizing a high expertise-low leverage model that is thriving in the highly competitive bank consulting arena. Mr. Clark was invited to Beijing by the Chinese government in 1998 to lecture on the subject of “Bank Profitability.”

 

Kay Toscano, CRCM

 

Kay Toscano, CRCM - Senior Consultant/Operations Specialist over 25 years of banking experience. Prior to joining Lodestone, she provided compliance-based consulting and training to financial institutions ranging in size from community banks to multi-billion-dollar super-regional institutions. She has served as the senior compliance officer, senior risk officer and Bank Secrecy Act/anti-money laundering officer and has been responsible for the development and implementation of full-scope compliance programs, as well as internal audit, security and internal control programs. She was part of a Bank Secrecy Act consulting engagement with a $25-billion institution and has developed compliance training systems and policies and procedures for de novo financial institutions.

 

During her career in banking Kay has worked with several core systems such as Jack Henry Silverlake, HFS Phoenix, Metavante BankWay, and Fiserv ITI to name a few. She has served on three core conversion & merger teams and has successfully implemented many strategic projects throughout her career. Kay received the designation of Certified Regulatory Compliance Manager (CRCM) in 2001 through the Institute of Certified Bankers, and the designation of Certified Community Bank Compliance Officer in 1997 through the independent Bankers Association of America. She studied art and organizational studies at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Fla.

 

Scott Bass, SVP

 

Scott Bass, SVP with over 20 years of banking experience that includes both internal and external bank consulting. He began his career with Vanguard Bank in Valparaiso, Florida, a member of the Synovus Bancorp Family. During his 5 years at Synovus, he gained bank-wide experience working in deposit operations, loan operations and commercial lending. Prior to joining Lodestone, Mr. Bass rose to the position of Senior Vice President at Sterling National Bank in Manhattan where during his tenure, he served as Compliance Officer, managed the Core Banking System conversion to JHA SilverLake, Y2K Conversion Manager, Deposit Operations Manager and managed Sterling's internal consulting group.

 

Mr. Bass joined Lodestone in 2002 and immediately put his core system skills and his analytical skills to work at GreenPoint Bank on their Miser system finding lost income that 15 other consulting firms had missed prior to Lodestone’s arrival. Over the past eight years with Lodestone, Mr. Bass helped develope Lodestone’s queries/formulas for most of the core systems that are in use today. These proprietary consulting tools have consistently uncover hidden income opportunities. Mr. Bass holds a B.S.B.A. in Accounting and Finance from the University of West Florida and is a graduate of American Bankers Association's National Compliance School.

 

Mark Tarnakow, CFO

 

Mark Tarnakow, CFO - Senior Consultant has over 20 years of banking experience beginning as a financial services sector auditor, EDP auditor and financial consultant with Arthur Andersen & Co. After graduate school, Mr. Tarnakow spent ten years with Bank One in Corporate Finance and Accounting and as the strategic planning or finance manager of several areas of the bank including operations, technology, procurement, community banking, consumer lending, commercial banking and ultimately CFO of the Consumer Internet Group which included BankOne.com and Wingspanbank.com.

 

At Union Planters, Mr. Tarnakow was the finance manager of the Investment and Insurance Group as well the community banks in a three-state geographic area. Mark joined AmSouth Bank as the finance manager of the commercial line of business. Upon merging with Regions, he was made the finance manager of the five state Mid-West banking group. He left Regions to become the CFO of Superior Bancorp, a $3B publicly traded thrift where he worked to grow the bank. Mr. Tarnakow holds a B.S. degree in Accounting from Bob Jones University and a M.B.A. in Finance and Operations & Logistics from The Ohio State University.

 

Robert O. Lehrman

 

Robert O. Lehrman is Advisory Board Chairman of Lodestone Banking Consultancy, a management consultant firm for the banking industry.  Mr. Lehrman also serves as Special Counsel and Senior Advisor to several organizations in the banking, real estate, and not-for-profit fields.  He is a Trustee of The CRA Fund, and chairs its Governance Committee. Mr. Lehrman was President/CEO of CBANYS.  He also had been a Board Member of Community Capital Bank and Empire Blue Cross/Blue Shield.

 

Mr. Lehrman is active in affordable housing and other civic and philanthropic causes, including serving currently as a Board Member of the National Housing Conference, Citizens Housing and Planning Council, the Association for a Better New York Foundation, and F.E.G.S. Health and Human Services.  Mr. Lehrman has long served as Chairman of the New York and National Housing Conferences’ Annual Awards Luncheon. Bob Lehrman also served on the Executive Committee and Board of the New York Housing Conference, and formerly was on the Board of the Community Preservation Corporation (CPC) and on the Corporate Advisory Board for Neighborhood housing Services/NYC.