The Benchmark Team

There isn't enough room on this page to mention all of the integral members of our team. Benchmark employs coordinators, managers, executive team members, and call center support staff who are highly experienced with appropriate skill sets. Please select the team member you are seeking on the right for their contact information and experience description. If you need to contact a coordinator directly, you may do so by calling the site main phone number.

The Team

Jennifer Bacchi, Director of Human Resources
Scott Barrett, Chief Operations Officer
Misti Bearden, San Angelo Site Manager
Lamar Box, Austin Associate Site Manager
Kim Brittain, Director of Marketing and Communications
Charlie Ciarlo, Manager of Customer Service
Cori Favalora, New Orleans Associate Site Manager
Andrea Favalora, Director of Contracts / Budgets
Andrea Favalora, Director of Investigator Relations
Lauren Foreman, Associate Director of Marketing and Development
Eric Garcia, Sacramento Site Manager
Beau Garland, Western Regional Manager
Rita Gesch, Finance Director
James Girard, San Francisco Co-Site Manager
Ramona Irizarry, Fort Worth Site Manager
Mark Lacy, President, Chief Executive Officer
Ben Lacy, Chief Financial Officer
Michelle Listz, Austin Site Manager
Olivia Payton, Associate Site Manager
Melissa Reynolds, Director of Clinical Operations
Jason Roth, Director of Research and Development
Jeff Segner, New Orleans Site Manager

Benchmark History

Benchmark Research, founded in 1997 by Mr. Mark Lacy and Mr. Scott Barrett, began with the simple yet fundamental goal of providing exceptional service in clinical research. Benchmark's basic philosophy is that quality is paramount, and integrity, professionalism, dedication, and old-fashioned hard work should be applied to the burgeoning clinical trial industry. Starting in the Fort Worth , Texas metro area with one doctor (Dr. William Seger), the firm began providing services in a wide range of therapeutic areas.

As Benchmark rapidly grew, in 1998 the firm opened a second facility in Austin , Texas with the addition of Dr. Teresa (Tere) Coats. The Austin operations were similar to Fort Worth in that the site was an internal medicine group. However, the Austin location - adjacent to the University of Texas , one of the country's largest university populations - led quickly to tremendous growth. The Austin office's proximity to the University benefited the site greatly, by providing Benchmark with a vast pool of potential patients for acute condition studies.
 
Along with the leadership of Dr. Paul Bristol in 2001, Benchmark opened a site in the densely populated Northern Region of the Austin Metro Area in, near major employers such as Dell, Apple, Texas Instruments, and AMD. This site accesses a unique patient market of over 600,000 people in the rapidly growing cities of Georgetown, Round Rock and Pflugerville.

Also in 1998, Benchmark recognized and capitalized upon emerging industry opportunities by creating a centralized recruiting department, to facilitate aggressive, seamless, and appropriate advertising, as well as for pre-qualification of prospective patients. Thus, the Benchmark Research Support Center was opened in Miles , Texas to handle toll-free patient recruiting calls, print advertising / marketing, general administrative, and financial aspects of the young firm.

The following year (1999), Benchmark began operations in San Angelo , Texas with the addition of Dr. Darrel Herrington. San Angelo was an ideal site to serve an extensive region and population ignored by our competitors, and to utilize the large and prestigious West Texas Medical Associates (WTMA) facility. Association with the WTMA encourages doctor referrals and broadens Benchmark's scope of therapeutic capability.

The company's controlled growth in Texas led to expansion to the west coast in 2003, with the opening of Benchmark's site in the San Francisco Bay Area. After exhaustive research on area demographics, the city's public transportation network, and local advertising market, the firm chose to locate in the very convenient, central, famous, and lively Union Square. Benchmark is extremely pleased to be working with Dr. Ivor Emmanuel, and is continuing its tradition of excellent quality research that was first established in Texas years ago.
 

 

In January of 2005, Benchmark expanded into Metairie, the densely populated NW region of New Orleans. With the leadership of Andrea Favalora and physicians Shailaja Raj and William Renaudin, this site was successfully enrolling patients from its inception. Although the site took a minor hit from Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, operations resumed in November 2005, again with the support of our doctors and amazing coordinator team.

The Benchmark organization is unique in many ways. One small example is the firm's investment in maintaining a top quality in-house advertising department. This commitment to a custom-tailored, highly targeted, and effective marketing campaign for every study, to obtain robust enrollment, provides a distinct advantage in determining precisely what form(s) of advertising will work best for each individual trial and market.