Who Are We
DiscernU is a coaching service developed and honed by world class professors and psychologists over a 20-year period teaching at institutions such as Columbia University, Columbia Executive Programs, Duke Corporate Education and Fordham University. Many of the testimonials on our website show the significant impact that our process has had on our clients’ lives and careers.
We use validated and proven instruments and exercises to help you peel the onion layer by layer to uncover who you are. Rather than being wary of self-awareness, we seek to embrace your uniqueness, celebrate it and help you leverage it rather can force yourself into a life path that works for the “average person.” You are not average. You are a unique and complicated blend of fundamental ingredients. Plato wrote that the “unexamined life is not worth living.” We offer a corollary to Plato: “a good life can only be crafted when you understand the material you are working with.” The material in this case is your unique blend of personality, imprinting life experiences, values and motives. We must understand them if we are to craft a good life as we make decisions about what work to do, who to marry, how the relate to people, and how manage our weaknesses and cope with stresses. If our decision making in these key life and career areas is flawed, it it hard to be happy. Without self-awareness, a good life and career remains illusive.
Get to Know Us
Dr. Robert Hurley, Ph.D.
Coach, DiscernU
Dr. Robert Hurley realizes much gratification through using his expertise in people and organizations to help clients be happier and more successful. He has taught and done coaching on leadership, self-awareness, self-management and emotional intelligence at Columbia, Duke and Fordham Universities for the past 30 years. He and his wife Kathy have also raised three children all of whom have who made successful transitions from college to the workplace. Dr. Hurley has been teaching personal development classes with undergraduates, MBA’s and executives for many years and his sessions on Leadership Styles and Self-Management have been a key part of the High Impact Leadership program at Columbia University Executive Programs for the past 30 years.
In recognition of this work, Dr. Hurley has received teaching awards and was recognized as one of the Top 100 thought leaders on trust in 2012 and ethics in 2014. The Washington Post selected his book, The Decision to Trust: How Leaders Create High-Trust Organizations, as one of the best leadership books of 2011. He also won the 2013 Alpha Sigma Nu national book award.
Dr. Hurley’s work has been translated into many languages and is widely cited by other scholars around the world. He has published academic research in the Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review, Oxford University Press, and California Management Review. His work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times as well as on MSNBC, CNBC and TheStreet.com. Dr. Hurley holds a B.S. from Fordham, an M.B.A. from the Wharton School and a doctorate from Columbia University.
Rachel Ciporen, Ph.D.
Coach, DiscernU
As an executive coach, organizational development consultant and educator Rachel works with global executives across multiple industries and has coached over a thousand leaders to successfully respond to strategic business challenges through expanding their behavioral repertoire, developing and communicating a clear and compelling vision, and more effectively motivating their team or division. Rachel is a core faculty member of the Columbia University Coaching Certification Program and the Gestalt Organization and Systems Development Center. Rachel has been coaching in Columbia Business School’s Senior Executive, Emerging Leader, High Impact Leadership, and Non-Profit Management Programs since 2004.
Rachel received her doctorate in Adult Learning and Leadership and her Masters in Organizational Psychology from Teachers College, Columbia University. She is a Board Certified Coach through the Center for Credentialing and Education. Rachel’s research on leadership development, executive education, and transformative learning have appeared in several journals including The Academy of Management Learning and Education, The Journal of Leadership & Organizational Studies, and The Journal for Action Research, New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education and an edited book on Internal Coaching. She is certified in numerous assessment tools including: Culture in the Workplace, EQi 2, Hay Group ESCI, Individual Directions Inventory, The Hogan Assessment Suite, and the Neethling Brain Inventory (NBI).
Mark W. Kiefaber, M.A. Clinical Psychology,
Coach, DiscernU
Mark W. Kiefaber, co founder of Focus Leadership, brings more than 30 years of experience in leadership development and executive coaching, with particular expertise in helping leaders become more self-aware, be better aligned with their teams, manage paradox, and engage others with emotional intelligence. Mr. Kiefaber serves on the faculty for Mercer Leadership Development and Columbia University’s High Impact Leadership Program.
Prior to forming Focus Leadership, Mark worked with W. Warner Burke Associates and the Center for Creative Leadership. He also has management experience, both as a Marketing Manager and Senior Management Consultant with Citicorp. His client work has spanned major companies in more than a dozen industries, including Novartis, Merck, Bank of America, Dell, British Airways, Ford Motor Co., NASA, Royal Caribbean, Proctor and Gamble, Florida Power and Light, New York Life, Shell Canada, Pepsi, and the Japanese Management Association.
Mr. Kiefaber is a master practitioner of the most popular personality assessments, including the Hogan Suite. He has also developed two assessments: the Kiefaber Paradigm Preference Indicator (KP2) and, together with Ginny Whitelaw, the FEBI® (Focus Energy Balance Indicator).
Mr. Kiefaber was the co-author of Parent Burnout (Doubleday), a successful book on stress management. He has also appeared as an expert guest on many national television programs including CNN, NBC’s “Today Show” and ABC’s “Good Morning America.” He graduated from Loyola University in Maryland with both B.A. and M.A. degrees in Clinical Psychology.