Riley McDonough
Executive Coach
Riley McDonough is an Executive Coach and Senior Advisor of MCG Partners. MCG specializes in leadership, culture, and talent optimization by aligning your business and people strategy for maximum results. MCG has worked with over 175 organizations in the last 10 years. Riley’s experience includes over 30 years of driving revenue, product innovation, and organizational success with global media and digital content companies.
In his role as SVP/GM and Head of Global Sales at Thomson Reuters Consumer Media, Riley was responsible for the commercial strategy and sales of all multimedia products across online, mobile, and digital out of home platforms. In addition, he developed and successfully launched a transformational user data strategy to support programmatic audience buying and selling, audience acquisition and management, ecommerce, and direct marketing.
When Riley was SVP of Consumer Markets at WebMD, the leader in online health and medical news and information, he successfully lead sales, marketing strategy, and revenue execution across all consumer and wellness product categories. During his tenure at WebMD, the company experienced a fivefold increase in revenue which led to a successful IPO.
While at ESPN, he was VP of Sales and Marketing and responsible for sales and strategic marketing sponsorships and played a central role in establishing ESPN as the dominant market share leader and top Internet sports destination. Under his leadership, the company captured a 400% increase in revenue through strategic account development and large scale integrated Digital/Cable/Print advertising programs with leading national marketers.
Earlier in his career, Riley was the Publisher of Inc. Magazine, where he oversaw the sales and business operations for this leading entrepreneurs’ magazine and increased publishing frequency from 12 to 16 issues, expanded circulation to over 650,000, and grew annual revenue by over 40%.
Currently Riley is coaching and advising executives and their management teams on growth and revenue strategies and how to build effective organizations. He serves as a coach for Harvard Business School Executive Education programs, where he works with global senior executives to help them accelerate and sustain their leadership effectiveness and organizational impact. Riley regularly mentors startup companies on revenue strategy, and is an angel investor in the green/sustainability ventures, e-commerce, and business service industries.
Riley currently serves as a board advisor for several early stage digital companies. He was a founding board member of the Online Publishers Association, and a board member of the Interactive Advertising Bureau. He served as an adjunct professor at Pace University in the Masters of Publishing program, and has lectured on sales strategy and marketing at his alma mater, Iona College, where he is currently a member of the Legal Board of Trustees. He received his Executive Coaching training at the New York University School of Professional Studies, and is certified in the Predictive Index® (PI®) and DiSC®.