Chief of staff and strategy leader
Jason
Gomory
I help executives bring order to complexity, then turn it into finished work.
Get in touch
About
I advise the people who run organizations. For six years I have worked beside presidents and boards, helping them rebuild teams, design multi-year strategy, and grow the revenue their institution depends on.
My work is pattern recognition. I hear what is said and what is not, I see what others miss, and I turn that into a plan people can actually execute. I am a pragmatic visionary: I can set direction at altitude, then land the plane and deliver the finished product.
What I care about most is bringing order to complexity, and building the kind of environment where good professionals do their best work.
Experience
Chief of Staff and Strategy, Office of the President
Hope College, a $120M private college
I serve as chief of staff to the president and partner with the leadership team to steward the college's $120M operating budget. I led an 18-month strategic planning effort from first prototype to Board adoption of Dare to Hope: Strategic Plan 2030, three pillars and fifteen initiatives over a five-year horizon, engaging every constituency from faculty and students to trustees, alumni, and donors. Alongside it, I rebuilt the executive leadership team and the systems it runs on, measurably raising trust and effectiveness across the group.
Special Assistant to the President and Board of Trustees
Hope College
I built the operating foundation of the President's Office, the communication flows, correspondence protocols, and calendar discipline that protect a president's time and keep decisions moving. I staffed and advised a 25-member Board of Trustees and strengthened governance with a new trustee handbook, an "ideal trustee" profile, upgraded board technology, and a full onboarding process. I was also a founding member of the program board for Hope Forward, a first-of-its-kind model that funds student tuition as a gift.
Communications and Operations Lead, Admissions
Hope College
I partnered with an incoming VP to redesign the team responsible for tuition revenue, from org structure to decision-making to daily operations. The result was a record class of 1,000 first-year students, up from a typical 750 to 800. I built the engine behind it: a Slate CRM implementation, an enrollment dashboard tracking the full prospective-student lifecycle, and a new brand and integrated campaign that reached more than 50,000 prospects. That engine has sustained enrollment and grown net tuition for five years, a rarity in higher education.
This is a highlight reel. The full record is in my resume.
How I think
See the whole board.
My first job is to notice what others miss. I read the patterns, hear what is said and what is not, and name the real problem before anyone solves the wrong one.
Simplicity is the goal, not the starting point.
True simplicity is not the absence of detail. It is order brought to complexity. I do the hard work of clarifying so the decision in front of a leader is clean.
Set direction, then deliver.
Vision without execution is a wish. I can shape the strategy and then run the project that makes it real.
Build the machine, not the moment.
I design how an organization decides, communicates, and executes, so good people can do their best work without me standing in the middle of it.
Show people their strengths.
The best outcome is a team that runs better because each person is in the right seat, doing what they are uniquely good at.
What drives me
What gets me out of bed is bringing peace to chaos. I love the moment an organization starts to hum: the right people in the right seats, a sound structure for how decisions get made and communicated, and the resources to execute on what is ahead.
I am not there to micromanage the result. I am there to build the environment where professionals thrive, to show people strengths they did not know they had, and to hand over a finished product. There is real beauty in a well-run thing.
Memos
Short pieces on how I work and what I have learned.
On bringing order to complexity
Simplicity is not where you begin. It is what you earn.
Read the memoA strategy is a set of choices, not a wish list
If a plan makes no one slightly uncomfortable, it probably is not a strategy.
Read the memoThe org chart is not the organization
Good design is about seats, not boxes.
Read the memoWhat executives need when it goes sideways
Peace is a contribution. Calm, and a clear read of what is actually happening.
Read the memoContact
If you are searching for a teammate to enhance your organization, let's connect.
I think there is a profound and enduring beauty in simplicity, in clarity, in efficiency. True simplicity is derived from so much more than just the absence of clutter and ornamentation. It is about bringing order to complexity.