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About Dr. Richard Pomerance |
 I’ve
been a psychologist since about age 5 (it's in the
family). After a first-rate education in clinical
psychology (Ph.D. from Boston University, with a
concentration in personality pathology) I thought I
had people pretty well figured out. I spent 20 years
as an individual, couples, and group therapist,
specializing in serious adult issues. It was
genuinely deep work, and effective.
But In the 90’s I needed a change, and, because I
also had some background in the financial area, went
to New York to help manage a lending-leasing company
that financed innovative businesses in the hi-tech
and medical areas. This work made clinical practice
look easy! I was dealing with people who didn't want
to be known: if they were a mystery, it gave them
the upper hand. Some customers passed all financial
tests, but lied and stole anyway. And I didn't pick
it up. It was a humbling experience!
I also realized that, personally, I'd made many bad
relationship judgments, and while none of them had
been catastrophic, they were serious and painful
enough! Despite years of training and personal
therapy, I had made more than my share of mistakes.
Nutty women, personality disordered business
partners, friends who really weren't friends – I'd
seen it all.
Finance in the roaring 90’s was a terrific
education, but ultimately not my passion. I returned
to psychology, and found a direction in one of those
“aha!” moments that happen occasionally. I
realized that the helping professions were failing
all of us who have to make critical relationship
decisions every day, in the absence of complete data
and the time to fully learn about the people we're
dealing with; and whose happiness in their personal
and business lives may utterly depends on these
decisions.
I began to “reverse engineer” the process of making
a smart relationship decision, to ask “what do we
really need to get it right?”
 From
that time on I've focused the question of how we can
best make decisions, under the same real life
conditions we meet every day. I've developed a
theoretical basis for this work, and for some years
now have been consulting to people who must make
critical people decisions, don't feel comfortable
making them, and don't know where to turn. I also
teach the subject. Students make great teachers; I
learn continually.
If you’re stuck in a personal or business situation,
or about to make a life-changing one, perhaps my
approach can help. With patience, persistence, and a
keen eye, you're very likely to get get on the right
track, and go on to make relationships that are
genuinely rewarding.
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