Leadership Team

John Dearing

John Dearing has played a key role in the growth of Capstone since 1996. As Managing Director, he oversees Capstone's project teams and leads strategic growth efforts for public and private clients, both internationally and domestically.

His experience transcends numerous manufacturing and service-oriented industries, including contract manufacturing, medical devices, life sciences, food processing, specialty chemicals, design, filtration, biotech, precision metal components, transportation, environmental consulting and financial services.

John's background also includes credit assessments and loan officer duties with the Export-Import Bank of the United States, The Americas Division, where he developed international banking and finance skills. As Co-Administrator of a health care insurance fund, John focused on accounting and operational efficiencies for for-profit and not-for-profit corporate entities. He gained additional consulting experience and privatization expertise while attending the Institute of European Studies in Vienna, Austria.

John has taught hundreds of executives about proactive external growth, namely M&A, and valuation. He spoke on "Finding, Selecting, and Appointing Distributors: Your New Strategic Partner" at the Center for Innovative Technology's exporting technology conferences in Williamsburg, Virginia and Richmond, Virginia. He was subsequently asked to lead the VALET Program's lecture on "Strategic International Partnerships: Exploring External Growth" sponsored by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership. Additionally, his talk on "International Growth Strategies: Finding the Right Partner" was presented to the Central Virginia Trade Network. John is also the Chairman of the VITAL program's Mergers and Acquisitions Task Force.

John graduated from Bucknell University with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration and went on to earn a Master of Business Administration at Georgetown University.

A Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), John is a member of the Washington Society of Investment Analysts. He is active on Bucknell's alumni board, and the founder of an investment partnership.

Wes Teague

Wes Teague is the Senior Vice President of Capstone, and as such is responsible for client engagements and program success.

Wes has over 30 year's combined experience in the field of corporate growth - as a commercial banker, an investment banker, in senior positions in company operations and corporate governance, as a consultant to small- and mid-cap firms, and in leading merger and acquisition effort for clients as well as for his own companies. He has additional expertise in alternative ownership structures, such as the sale of a large ESOP-owned privately-held professional services firm to a billion dollar publicly traded company, where he led the M&A efforts of this firm through numerous acquisitions and the ultimate disposition, resulting in the quintessential example of successful employee-ownership.

Wes has served a number of companies in progressively responsible positions as a Bank Officer, Broker Principal, Syndication Manager, Senior Vice President of Operations, Executive Vice President, and Chief Operating Officer, as well as served on the Board of Directors of both for-profit and not-for profit organizations. He is a member of and past Board Member of the National Capital Chapter of the Association for Corporate Growth, and is Vice Chair of the Board and Chair of the Strategic Planning Committee of a large not-for-profit organization, Goodwin House Inc., a continuing care retirement community providing housing and services to the growing senior population. He holds a BS in Economics from Auburn University and an MBA from The George Washington University.

Advisory Board

Jim Dunn

Jim Dunn serves as CEO for D Partners, a group of CxO-level senior executives who provide a full range of business management, development, and performance improvement services. He is an experienced Senior Operations/Financial Executive with 20 years of demonstrated success as a proven change agent, transforming tough business situations into profitable business ventures in the High Tech, Financial, BPO and Customer Care industries. Jim has operated in the capacity of COO, CFO and CIO for publicly and privately held companies.

Jim has specific experience in large-scale CRM/Call Center/Business Processing Outsourcing environments. He has the unique experience of having managed on both sides of the table for large scale operations in BPO relationships. Most recently Jim was responsible for rationalizing the customer service delivery organization for a $150M internet ecommerce company. Jim served as division COO and led a successful operational turnaround for a $125M CRM/BPO provider servicing best-of-breed high tech companies.

Jim earned his MBA-Finance and his BSBA-Economics from the University of Denver.

Dennis Mussell

Dennis Mussell is the retired former President and Chief Executive Officer of Chicken of the Sea International, a nationally branded packaged seafood company. He served in that capacity from August 1997 until January 2005. He previously served in various senior capacities with Van Camp Seafood Company, Inc., the predecessor corporation to Chicken of the Sea International, including most recently Chief Operating Officer. Dennis has extensive work experience in the packaged food industry. He holds a B.S. from Southwest Missouri State University.

Chris Cantarella

Chris Cantarella is a Partner in the Financial Officers and Private Equity Practices at Heidrick & Struggles, a premier provider of senior-level executive search and leadership consulting services. Chris leads searches for executives in a variety of industries, specializing in working closely with private equity (PE) firms to find executive talent, particularly CFOs, for their portfolio companies.

Prior to joining Heidrick & Struggles, Chris was Director of Ernst & Young's Private Equity Practice Mid Atlantic. He began his business career as a consultant for PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP where he worked on multiple engagements in strategy and business re-engineering for a wide variety of technology, manufacturing, and services companies.

Chris received a BS in Engineering from the US Naval Academy and an MBA from The George Washington University. He is also a graduate of Harvard's Executive Leadership Program.

Janet White

Janet White Janet Kendall White is founder and President of Berkshire Group, Inc. an Ohio based national consulting firm that provides the full range of organization development services including strategic planning, process and profit improvement, training and development and executive coaching and facilitation.

Janet's expertise is in coaching leaders and working with groups of people to identify their desired business outcome and mobilizing energy to receive desired results. She is often called on to help facilitate complex problems with diverse groups of people and then to implement the project plan that is devised.

Janet holds an MBA from Hofstra University and has completed post-graduate work at the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland and National Training Labs. She is a Certified Professional Consultant (CPC) and is certified in a number of leadership and assessment instruments. Janet speaks nationally on leadership, entrepreneurship, process improvement and organization change.

Jamie Hutchinson

Jamie Hutchinson, a partner in Goodwin Procter's Business Law Department and a member of the Private Equity Group, practices in the areas of corporate, securities and private equity transactional law, primarily on behalf of private investment funds and their portfolio companies. He joined Goodwin Procter in 2006.

Jamie's practice has involved a full range of corporate and commercial transactions, including leveraged buy-outs, mergers and acquisitions, venture capital and mezzanine financing transactions, private and public equity and debt offerings, senior secured loans, joint ventures and general corporate matters for public and private companies and private equity investment groups. In recent years, his practice has included assisting clients on behalf of private equity groups in the formation and acquisition of companies in various consolidating industries. In connection with this practice, Jamie is engaged in all aspects of leveraged buyouts, including equity formation documents, mergers and acquisitions and secured financing transactions.

He earned his J.D from Georgetown University Law Center in 1993 and his B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1988.