Caslione Biography

John Caslione is the founder and President & CEO of GCS Business Capital LLC (GCS), with offices in Chicago, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Frankfurt and Milan.  Founded in 2005, GCS is a mergers and acquisitions (M&A) advisor in US, Euripean, Chinese and other Asian middle market companies seeking to globalize their business through mergers, acquisitions and strategic equity joint ventures.

Prior to his founding of GCS, Mr. Caslione founded (1991) and served as President and CEO of Andrew-Ward International, Inc., an international management consulting firm assisting U.S. and Europe firms to develop global account programs, and global marketing, sales and distribution channel strategies.  Mr. Caslione has personally executed business development strategies in 88 countries on six continents including the U.S., Europe, China, India, Russia and CIS, Central Asia, the Middle East, Australia, Southeast Asia, South America and Africa for many companies, including ABB, Becton-Dickenson Biosciences, Caltex Lubricants, ExxonMobil Chemical Films, GE, Hewlett-Packard, Johnson & Johnson, IBM, Philips N.V., RJ Reynolds Nabisco, Sandoz, and many more large and middle market firms.

Mr. Caslione and noted marketing guru and thought leader, Philip Kotler, have recently co-authored their new book, Chaotics™: The Business of Managing and Marketing in The Age of Turbulence (AMACOM Publishing), which will be released in May 2009.  As the world has now entered into a new age of increasingly frequent and intense periods of turbulence in the global economy there is a need for businesses to develop a new mindset, one that takes into account intermittent periods of disturbance, and still thrive while under threat of global, industry, market or company chaos.  Chaotics presents a new system and set of strategic guidelines designed to help businesses navigate through the waves of uncertainty and chaos affecting customers, employees, and other stakeholders.

Caslione is a frequent keynote speaker and chairman of conferences, where he speaks on the new global economy and global business development in many forums including; the China Private Equity and Venture Capital Conference, the Dubai Global Strategy Conference, and many events in the U.S,. Europe, Middle East and Asia.

John Caslione is a frequent guest lecturer at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, where he speaks to business executive in Kellogg’s Global Initiatives in Management Program (GIM) on global marketing and business development, including in China, India and other markets in Asia.  Mr. Caslione is also guest lecturer for executive management events at venues including the Institute for Management Development’s (IMD) Program for Executive Development (Lausanne, Switzerland), IAE in Aix-en-Provence (France) and many others.

Caslione previously authored Growing Your Business in Emerging Markets: Promise and Perils, (Greenwood Publishing), is considered to be a leading authoritative book on the globalization of business with a special focus on developing sales and distribution strategies in emerging markets.  His book, Global Manifest Destiny: Growing Your Business in a Borderless Economy, (Dearborn Publishing), is a practical how-to book for small and medium size firms with the desire to become true global companies and provides critical insights and a competencies roadmap for middle market companies to successfully compete in the global business environment.

Mr. Caslione also has two books top-rated books published in China, Going Global – How to Globalize Your Business and Developing Successful Global Sales and Distribution Channel Strategies (Economy & Management Publishing House).  These two practical how-to books focus upon critical issues for China’s emerging global businesses seeking to develop successful business growth strategies to globalize their businesses.

John Caslione has earned his Bachelors of Science and MBA from the University of New York (Buffalo, USA) and his J.D. (Juris Doctor) from Chicago-Kent College of Law (Chicago, USA).  Mr. Caslione is a founding member of Rotary International’s first English-speaking international member club in Frankfurt, Germany in 2006.

Caslione’s book entitled, "Global Manifest Destiny: Growing Your Business In A Borderless Economy" (Dearborn Publishing), provides critical insights and a competencies roadmap for companies to become true “global organizations” to successfully compete in the new global business environment Global Manifest Destiny is a featured book recommendation and chosen as one of the top business book selections for six consecutive years (2002- 2007) by Harvard Business School’s “HBS Working Knowledge."

Caslione’s first book, "Growing Your Business in Emerging Markets: Promise and Perils" (Quorum Publishing), is considered the leading authoritative book on developing new market entry strategies as well as sales and distribution channel strategies in emerging and developing markets worldwide.

To talk with us directly, set up a conference call with John Caslione, or to schedule a speaking engagement please call +1 847.230.9816 or email us:  contact us

Caslione and Kotler collaborate on

their first book -

“Chaotics™:

The Business of Managing and Marketing in The Age of Turbulence.”

A Personal Message from John Caslione:

Turbulence, risk and uncertainty are now the more normal condition of industries, markets and companies—the new normality, punctuated by periodic and intermittent spurts of prosperity and downturn. 

And turbulence's chaos has two major effects.  One is Vulnerability, and it is against this that companies need defensive armor.  The other is Opportunity, which needs to be exploited. 

Bad times are bad for many and good for some.  Opportunity occurs when a strong company can take away a weaker competitor’s business or even to acquire a weakened competitor at a bargain price.  Opportunity is also present when your company doesn’t cut critical costs—but your competitors do.

To counter the effects of turbulence and chaos in 2009, companies need a Chaotics management system—

a system of new strategic behaviors—for dealing with the uncertainty that comes from turbulence’s chaos.  Dealing effectively with uncertainty now becomes an inescapable imperative in 2009. 

Caslione speaks on Chaotics and helps business leaders better understand how to maneuver through turbulence, avoid chaos and exploit both to their advantage in this new age in which we’ve now entered—The Age of Turbulence.