Barry Rowan has a broad-based executive background and a strong track record of transforming companies from a range of C-Suite roles, primarily in the technology and communications space. Barry’s career has included building eight businesses through periods of hypergrowth and dramatic turnarounds, including the sale of one company for $10 billion. Grounded in a character-based approach to leadership, he has served as a division general manager, led two private companies as CEO/President, and has been CFO for four public companies, including Fluke Corporation, Nextel Partners, Vonage, and Gogo. Barry has also served as a director for public and private companies.
Motivated by his desire for giving back to the community and investing in the next generation of leaders, Barry has served as a trustee for Seattle Pacific University (where he was also the founding chair for the Center for Integrity in Business), Gordon College, the board of advisors for the Honors Program in Entrepreneurial Leadership at Gonzaga University, and as President of Bellevue Christian School. He has served on the national board of InterVarsity and chairs the board of the Harvard Business School Christian Fellowship and Alumni Association.
Barry and his family are committed to helping the poor locally as well as through bringing clean water to the people of Central America, and he and his wife, Linda, serve on the National Leadership Council for World Vision. Barry has taught university courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels and is a frequently requested speaker at a wide variety of forums. Having recently retired from a full-time corporate role, Barry and Linda are now pursuing an “encore calling” centered in prayer and expressed through “lines of service” flowing from an aspiration to place Christ at the center.
Barry earned his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School in 1983, and his B.S. summa cum laude in Business Administration and Chemical Biology from The College of Idaho in 1979. He has been married to Linda, his life partner for 41 years, and they have two sons and three beloved grandchildren.