Carmen Bianchi has been a Family Business Consultant since 1991. She was the founder and director of the EMC Business Forum at San Diego State University, servicing the growth needs of family and closely held businesses. She was the founder of the University of Texas at El Paso Family Business Forum and was the executive director of the Forum. Ms. Bianchi has relocated to the San Diego area and is the founder and a principal of Carmen Bianchi & Associates, a consulting firm in Family Business. She currently teaches in the College of Business at SDSU to graduating seniors, a class on Family Business Management.
As a family business consultant, Ms. Bianchi has served as a facilitator for family business retreats, facilitator for conflict resolution and an advisor on a variety of strategic business issues. Ms. Bianchi is also an expert in family systems and the relationship between family, business ownership and the professional roles within a family firm.

Ms. Bianchi received national recognition and was elected to be the President 2007-2009 of the Family Firm Institute, the premier organization in the U.S. for professionals specializing in family business and wealth management. The Family Firm Institute in recognition of her outstanding achievements and contributions to the field of family business advising awarded her fellowship status. She was the Conference Chair for the FFI Global Summit 2013 held in San Diego. Carmen is the recipient of the Barbara Hollander Award, which exemplifies Barbara Hollander’s love of education and learning, life-long commitment to social causes, dedication to civic responsibility, belief in the human capacity to change for the better, and belief in giving to others generously.

In September 1998, Ms. Bianchi was invited to start a family business forum at the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland where she worked with MBA students on family business issues. At the United States Association for Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) Conference in February 2000, Carmen Bianchi & Associates was awarded the “Best Workshop Award in Family Business”. In January 2004, Ms. Bianchi has been invited by numerous national and international organizations to speak on family business issues. She has taught and put on a number of workshops on family business; June 2008 in Santiago Chile, March 2007 in India at the University of Hyderabad, Hyderabad and the Graduate School of Management in Coimbatore, India, the American University of Beirut where she did a 2 day seminar on family business issues and case studies in May 2006 and in October 2006 she presented a 2 day seminar at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. In December 2010 Carmen ran a 3-day education program for bankers and other financial service providers in Hong Kong for FFI’s Certificate Program in Family Business. Carmen was invited to South Africa to speak to family businesses involved in agriculture. She worked with numerous South African families on spouse and family issues. She has been a speaker/presenter at many seminar conferences. In 2014 she presented at The Exit Planning Institute Annual Conference, The Subway Global Convention, Selzer,Caplan Law Firm, UCLA Anderson School of Business, and at the University of Monterrey, Mexico. In 2015 Carmen presented at the FFI Conference in London as well as to IWDC convention in Sarasota, Florida.

Ms. Bianchi was born in South Africa where she was brought up in her family’s businesses, Bianchi Hotels, Inc. and Bianchi Investment Corp. She was a financial comptroller of South African Breweries Hotel Division.
She speaks six languages, having completed her high school in Florence, Italy and attending the Sorbonne University in Paris. She received both her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of Texas, El Paso. When not consulting to family business, Carmen spends as much time as she can with her family especially her 8 grandchildren. Or she can be found playing tennis, bridge, hiking, bicycling, skiing, and visiting art galleries, Opera and theatre. She serves on several charitable boards in her community.