Meet six members of the Dallas Business Journal Leadership Trust
Texas prides itself on being fertile ground for new businesses. In fact, Dallas is home to some of the world’s most talented leaders and their thriving companies. From education experts to real estate gurus, the innovative leaders profiled here are building businesses that enrich every aspect of the community. These executives, selected for membership in the Trust for their experience and insight, are making Dallas what it is today.
Read more about their contributions below. Then, if you’re a Dallas business leader, apply to join the Trust or nominate an outstanding candidate.
Alex Doubet, CEO, Door
Alex Doubet was astounded by how much money his mom had to pay her realtor when she sold her home. The realtor earned over $2,500 an hour. He didn’t think it was fair.
Alex saw an opportunity to disrupt the longstanding traditional real estate model where agents earn 6%. Believing you should have an honest professional looking out for your interest instead of their commission check, he launched his own business, Door, at age 28. The goal was to create a no-nonsense approach to buying and selling real estate where clients pay a flat fee of $5,000.
Now, Alex’s company is one of the fastest-growing residential brokerages in Texas and has transacted more than $500 million in real estate in the state. It grew 400% in the first two years.
Alex is a Harvard graduate who attended Highland Park High School in Dallas. He was a 40 under 40 honoree in 2018.
This year, he plans to continue the company’s national expansion.
Byron Sanders, President and CEO, Big Thought
Big Thought is one of Dallas’ most esteemed education nonprofits, offering accessible educational programs to children who need them most. Byron Sanders began working with the organization in 2008 as a supporter, volunteer, advisor, partner and board member. In 2018, he became the President and CEO.
“I grew up in southern Dallas and I benefited from programs very similar to what Big Thought provides to Dallas students,” he says.
Every day, Byron explores innovative ways to narrow the opportunity gap for children. For him, this means teaching children to be creative thinkers and develop social and emotional learning skills that will prepare them for jobs that don’t exist today but will exist in the future.
Byron’s professional expertise spans the fields of banking, education, philanthropy and entrepreneurship. He is the former executive director of the Dallas Education Foundation, where he built and cultivated philanthropic, corporate and community relationships to support initiatives benefiting the students of the Dallas Independent School District. He also served as vice president of Group Excellence, a mentoring and tutoring organization serving at-risk K-12 public school students.
You can read a recent interview with Byron here.
Nicole Green, VP Regional Operations, Team Rubicon
Nicole was an Air Force intelligence officer who served in Iraq before becoming a disaster relief expert with Team Rubicon, a nonprofit that recruits veterans to respond to natural disasters and humanitarian crises. Nicole says the organization offers veterans an opportunity to use their skills and experiences to help communities on their worst day.
Nicole herself was in search of a purposeful career when she left the military in 2006. She earned a master’s degree in diplomacy from Norwich University in Vermont and spent two semesters teaching English in Russia. After working in consulting and exploring several other career options, she heard about Team Rubicon from a friend. Inspired by the organization’s mission, she joined the team.
“No matter what anyone tells you, don’t be afraid to walk away from a sure thing to follow a passion that leads you somewhere else,” she says.
As vice president of regional operations in Dallas, Nicole focuses on the organization’s long-term growth strategy, including leading the regional operations team, measurement and evaluation, budget and resource allocation, team member engagement and growth, building capacity and capabilities to respond to disasters, and support for partnership and donor relations.
Melanie Shaffer, Founder and CEO, Talent Suite
Melanie Shaffer has worked in the talent management space for almost two decades. She is no stranger to starting businesses that help companies optimize their talent.
Though the process of acquiring and cultivating talent is often a subjective one, Melanie makes it objective using science-based methodology. This gives her clients the ability to align, measure and design the talent they need to best solve their business challenges. She does this all through Talent Suite using Predictive Index to design and align high-performing teams and predict workplace behaviors and on-the-job performance for any job function in any industry.
Melanie is also an active partner at another firm, The CFO Suite, and was part of an ownership team that led that company through significant growth, evidenced by a two-time placement in the Dallas 100 fastest-growing companies.
Melanie is on the board of the Corporate Culture Consortium of Dallas and serves on auxiliary boards for the Children’s Medical Center and Community Partners of Dallas.
Jeremy Brandt, CEO, We Buy Houses
Jeremy Brandt is a serial entrepreneur and has founded, funded and run multiple companies, including WeBuyHouses.com, Fast Home Offer, 1-800-CashOffer, Calucro and others. He is the current CEO of We Buy Houses, which empowers real estate investors to succeed through training, marketing, technology and business tools.
He got his start in the ’90s, working for high-tech companies focused on network design and project management. After the dot-com bubble burst, he switched gears and started investing in real estate in the Dallas area. That’s also when he founded FastHomeOffer.com, a company that connects distressed home sellers with experienced real estate investors.
In 2007, after identifying fraud in the real estate industry, he founded 1-800-CashOffer to provide a national brand under which ethical investors could operate. The company quickly garnered national media attention.
Jeremy gives back through Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO), a nonprofit dedicated to developing entrepreneurs. Most recently he was chair of the governance committee working with members from around the world. He has also served as President of EO Dallas and Founder of the EO Fort Worth chapter.
Robert Wright, Cofounder and Attorney, Wright Connatser
Robert Wright (Bob) is an attorney, enterprise strategist, community activist and teacher. He may be one of Dallas’ busiest residents, but he’s also among the most passionate.
He founded and serves as Chairman Emeritus of Social Venture Partners Dallas, an initiative that seeks to apply venture capital principles to philanthropy. Bob also sits on the Board of Directors of United Way of Metropolitan Dallas and helped to create (and still serves on) the advisory committee of United Way’s Social Innovation Fund.
Bob also chairs, by gubernatorial appointment, the OneStar Foundation, whose mission is to build a better nonprofit sector for a better Texas.
His legal career has focused on corporate and philanthropic capital transactions and structures. After thirteen years at Jenkens and Gilchrist, Bob left to become general counsel for three software companies. Along the way, Bob also played games — meaning he organized, built, ran and sold three computer game companies.
In addition to practicing law, Bob is a senior lecturer on entrepreneurship at the University of Texas at Dallas. He enjoys mentoring promising young entrepreneurs and spending time with his three daughters and ten grandchildren, beekeeping, playing piano and learning about jazz theory.
