MEET THE FOUNDERS
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CECI HUDSON TORN
CHIEF OPERATIONS OFFICER - DSW, LPC-A
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ROBERT HILLIKER
CHIEF CLINICAL OFFICER - LCSW-S, LCDC
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WILL DAVIS
CHIEF BUSINESS OFFICER
CECI HUDSON TORN
CHIEF OPERATIONS OFFICER - DSW, LPC-A
An exemplary, long-spanning career in mental health and finance has put person-centered-care at the heart of Ceci’s work. She has gathered a wealth of experience at one of the nation’s largest residential summer camps, which provides her with a unique lens to approach treatment in a residential setting. Ceci received her master’s degree in Clinical Mental Health from Wake Forest University, as well as her Doctorate of Social Work from the University of Southern California with a focus on building behavioral health in adolescents and young adults. Since co-founding Ethos Behavioral Health Group in 2018, Ceci now spends her time providing clinical services and business leadership across all Ethos healing centers as a Licensed Mental Health Professional and Ethos’ Chief Operations Officer. She and her husband Chris are continuing to serve children and families with the launch of Camp OTX in the Texas Hill Country, all while raising 5 children of their own.
ROBERT HILLIKER
CHIEF CLINICAL OFFICER - LCSW-S, LCDC
Robert is driven by a deep commitment to serve others and is passionate about the subject of hope and despair in clinical treatment. His 17 years in the field of addiction and mental health encompass private practice, clinical supervision, the creation and management of clinical programming, and the co-founding of The Lovett Center in 2014 and its parent company Ethos Behavioral Health Group in 2018.
Throughout his educational and professional careers, Robert has gained valuable experience. He earned his Master’s degree from the University of Houston’s Graduate College of Social Work and his education includes a fellowship at the Center for Psychoanalytic Studies and a Postgraduate Social Work Fellowship at The Menninger Clinic. His resume includes long standing leadership positions at The Council on Alcohol and Drugs Houston, The Menninger Clinic and The Daring Way LLC, where he worked with Dr. Brené Brown and served as the Chief Clinical Officer. Currently, Robert serves as Ethos Behavioral Health Group’s Chief Clinical Officer and is a doctoral candidate at the Institute for Clinical Social Work in Chicago.
Robert’s career has been marked by meaningful recognitions. He earned a Menninger Clinic Pillar Award for Integrity for his work in the Professionals in Crisis Program, an honor meant to recognize those who best exemplify Menninger’s core values: excellence, teamwork, hope, integrity and caring. The Houston Business Journal named Robert a 40 Under 40 Class of 2018 Honoree. In 2019, University of Houston’s Graduate College of Social Work honored him as a 50 for 50 Alumni for embodying the college’s social justice vision.
Robert lives in Houston with his wife, Maria, and their daughters, Anna, Carmela, Mary and Emilia.
WILL DAVIS
CHIEF BUSINESS OFFICER
Will’s passion for functional, welcoming spaces to serve a variety of industries led him to a career in commercial real estate spanning over 15 years, parallel to a decade of business development and management. In 2014, he co-founded The Lovett Center with Robert Hilliker, and then went on to co-found Ethos. The driving force behind his professional journey is a passion for connecting people for a shared, greater good. His thoughtful hiring and leadership style has helped build countless strong, creative and united teams that produce positive results.
ADMINISTRATIVE TEAM
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ASHLEY O’BRIEN
DIRECTOR OF ADMISSIONS
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CARLA GOMEZ
DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS
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CYRUS MARTIN
VP OF OPERATIONS - LMSW, LCDC
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JORDE MATTHEWS
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
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KELSEY SHEPPARD
OPERATIONS MANAGER, MSW
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MARTHA FONTANA
VP OF OUTPATIENT SERVICES
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TIMOTHY LANKAU
VP OF RISK MANAGEMENT AND HUMAN RESOURCES
ASHLEY O’BRIEN
DIRECTOR OF ADMISSIONS
As Director of Admissions for all Ethos Behavioral Health Group healing centers, Ashley works to connect both clients and the community as a whole with quality treatment, meeting them with empathy, compassion and understanding, and building relationships as they begin their journey towards healing and wellness.
While Ashley knew at a young age that she wanted to help people, her path became clear during a psychology class in high school, where she fell in love with mental health. In college, an internship with an adolescent outpatient center only helped solidify her goals, and she has been working in the mental health field as a Licensed Master of Social Work for 20 years now.
While she spent time as a therapist and adoption specialist, most of Ashley’s experience has been in admissions and intake, and she has gained a true passion for helping clients during the start of their journey, when they are in a vulnerable place and have decided to seek support. She worked in the intake department of a state-funded clinic in Arizona and spent more than five years in the Menninger Clinic admissions department, moving up to manager of admissions and earning the clinic’s pillar award in 2018 for exemplifying their core value of teamwork. She notes that it is truly rewarding to provide clients with hope and guidance, from that first phone call to starting their path towards healing and wellness.
At home, Ashley is married with two children, son Jack and daughter Charlie, and her family places a high importance on time and experience rather than material items. They love to travel and experience new things, new places and new people. She hopes to impart upon her children that as long as they have each other and spend time together, nothing else matters.
CARLA GOMEZ
DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS
- Decade-long career in communications specializing in oversight of communications, social media and/or public relations strategy
- Former and current clients range in size from Fortune 50 companies to medium-sized local businesses across the country, spanning behavioral health, hospitality, retail, automobile and oil and gas industries
CYRUS MARTIN
VP OF OPERATIONS - LMSW, LCDC
Our operations department is key to guiding the client and team experience, and Cyrus has been an integral part of both admissions and operations here at Ethos for quite some time.
From coordinating admissions and client relations to implementing electronic records, and even serving as a field instructor for our graduate-level interns, Cyrus’ expert leadership helps ensure we are continuing to improve the Ethos experience for clients, community and team members.
Cyrus is a third-year PhD student, developing innovative research methods to study mindfulness and student-intern professional identity development. Serving on several community boards, he also helps create meaningful connections and relationships with community stakeholders.
JORDE MATTHEWS
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Jorde has 20 years experience in graphic design, web design and illustration for local, national and international clients. He has spent the last 5 years creating result-driven graphic and digital assets in the behavioral health industry specifically.
KELSEY SHEPPARD
OPERATIONS MANAGER, MSW
In many ways, Kelsey has always known that she wanted to be a therapist. She loved talking with people and learning their stories, and many trusted her to hear and hold their troubles. In high school, she fell in love with the brain during an advanced psychology course and eventually found herself at Texas A&M majoring in Psychology, where she worked in an EEG lab conducting studies on racial bias in college students. While pursuing her bachelor’s, Kelsey found that she preferred the client-facing side of psychology, and she went on to earn her master’s in social work from the University of Houston Graduate College of Social Work, graduating in August of 2020.
Given that the core values and code of ethics of social work align perfectly with her professional values, Kelsey sees her career as the best choice she has made. As a queer therapist, she specializes in gender, sexuality and related periods of transition, especially within the young adult and adolescent populations. Though she has a psychodynamic background, Kelsey is trained in Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT). Her practice is informed by multiple therapeutic approaches, including DBT, Solution-Focused Therapy and Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.
Kelsey cherishes the opportunity to interact with clients and be entrusted with their stories, and she aims to impart upon them the tools needed to face the pain they have or continue to experience. She hopes to ensure they are always staying true to themselves, and that the skills and coping mechanisms they develop honor their core beliefs and coincide with their values.
With a passion for process, project management and streamlining best practices for client care, Kelsey also serves in an operational capacity for Ethos Behavioral Health Group. This role allows her to not only help clients, but help those who help clients, and she finds it extremely rewarding to make sure Ethos clinicians have all the resources and tools needed to be successful and feel supported.
MARTHA FONTANA
VP OF OUTPATIENT SERVICES
Martha has a Bachelor's Degree in Psychology from the University of Texas at Austin, and a Master's Degree in Clinical Social Work from the University of Houston.
She was intensively trained in DBT by Behavioral Tech, and has completed advanced training in biofeedback from the Biofeedback Institute in San Francisco. She has completed the Chemical Abuse Counselors Course in chemical dependency at the University of Houston.
Other post-graduate clinical experience includes internships at the University of Texas Mental Science Institute in the Child, Adolescent, & Family Therapy Clinic, and Orchard Creek Hospital in addiction medicine, the codependency unit, psychiatric intensive care, and the child/adolescent/family programs.
Martha has extensive clinical and managerial experience working in outpatient and hospital- based programs with children, adolescents, adults, and family members. She has specialized in complex psychiatric syndromes and high stress family systems. She has a supportive, relaxed, and creative skills-based approach in working with clients and is dedicated to helping individuals and family members cope more effectively at home, school, and in the workplace. Her approach also emphasizes helping individuals achieve a more relaxed, rewarding life and assisting families in strengthening family relationships.
As the Director of The PRISM Center, Martha has worked for over 30 years to develop ethical, creative, effective treatment teams who deliver an exceptionally high quality of service.
