A familiar face in the Greenville business community has a new job leading the technology business of a regional accounting firm.
Toby Stansell spent decades as an executive with various firms — often selling computer technology — after getting a bachelor’s degree in financial management from Clemson University in 1977.
Early in his career, the 61-year-old sold forklifts from Spartanburg, IBM hardware and software from Asheville, and software from Greenville.
He worked as an executive in The Netherlands, Southern California, and Austin, Texas, before returning to the Upstate in 2004.
Back in Greenville, he ran two local companies: apparel provider Oobe Inc. and technology services firm Acumen IT.
Now Stansell is managing director of the Technology Solutions Group for Cherry Bekaert LLP, an accounting firm based in Richmond, Va., with offices stretching from Washington, D.C., to Miami.
He and his wife, Susan, currently live on Lake Keowee in Seneca, in his parents’ native county of Oconee.
But Stansell said they’re planning to build a house in Greenville “as my commercial endeavors and our community involvement make it impractical for us to live at the lake during the week.”
The Cherry Bekaert job is his first in the accounting industry.
Stansell said it gives him a platform to provide independent advice to clients on technology matters, instead of pushing one company’s particular products and services.
“The fact that we are systems-agnostic puts us in a unique position of not having to favor or promote any particular brand or product, and instead frees us up to recommend solutions that truly are the best match for the functional requirements of the business, while still staying within the financial parameters for technology investment,” he said.
Cherry Bekaert caters to the middle market and has special expertise in the technology, healthcare, and industrial sectors, “all of which are important industries to Greenville,” Stansell said.
The firm says it recently launched the Technology Solutions Group to meet the growing technology and business intelligence needs of its clients. Some of the group’s offerings include business process requirements assessments, software search and evaluation engagements, systems/software functionality requirements schedule, and disparate systems integration architecture and plan.
Stansell said he’s resigned from certain community roles and boards to focus on Cherry Bekaert clients.
But he won’t give up his extensive volunteer work at the Greenville Chamber, where he’s vice chair of economic growth and prosperity, co-chair of the Accelerate economic development initiative, and instructor for the Minority Business Accelerator.
Carlos Phillips, the chamber’s CEO, said Stansell has been a tremendous help to him since he took the chamber’s helm a little more than a year ago.
“Thanks to Toby and Craig Brown [president of the Greenville Drive minor league baseball team], both co-chairs of Acelerate, we have been able to keep investments up and a clear focus on what the chamber’s role in economic development is,” Phillips said. “With their leadership and determination, we’re on a glide path to get there.”
