About Us
Meet the Team
Joe Gordon, Founder and Partner
Joe Gordon is the founder of UpFor Consulting, a sales and growth focused business consultancy group. UpFor concentrates on helping emerging companies create, hone and master their business development strategies, approach and communications, with an emphasis on building powerful and effective sales teams.
Joe cut his teeth in sales at TSG Reporting, Inc. starting in 2004, selling directly into Amlaw 200 law firms and Fortune 500 legal departments. Entering the company as one of their earliest employees, Joe worked his way from Account Executive to Senior Account Executive to Director of Sales to Vice President of Sales to the Global Head of Sales. By 2021, under Joe’s leadership TSG had grown to a team of 25+ business development and sales support members and company revenues had grown by over 90x from its founding.
Along the way, Joe established the company’s sales culture, instituted the company’s communications tone and tenor, created and implemented the blueprint for hiring and training the sales team, established and managed the sales team’s KPIs and authored the company’s sales playbook.
Known as a thought leader, Joe now shares his "selling on purpose" strategies with burgeoning companies who are hoping to achieve outrageous outcomes. He is instantly approachable and his desire to help others who are up to good things is built into his DNA.
Joe proudly resides on the Lower East Side of New Yok City as he has for the past 30 years with his wife and two teenage sons. He holds a B.A. in Law & Society from American University, an Executive MS in Industrial and Organizational Psychology from Baruch College and is a Minority Owner and Board Member of the Danish Professional Football team Akademisk Boldklub.
Jay Mafale, Founder and Partner
Every Batman needs their “Alfred” – a dedicated, highly skilled ally – committed to the success of the mission. Jay is that ally. Specializing in communication and education, Jay has been collaborating with Joe since he was one of Joe’s earliest clients and Joe recruited him to serve as TSG’s Client Relations Specialist and Sales Trainer.
Employing decades of experience and finely tuned expertise, Jay is adept at demonstrating strategic solutions to audiences of 2 to 2000. A charismatic public speaker and educator, clients especially appreciate Jay’s engaging sense of humor, enthusiasm, and ability to create a calm atmosphere around him - instilling confidence and yielding superior results.
An off-hours award-winning songwriter/guitarist/producer, Jay enjoys traveling with his wife Catherine and chatting with neighbors on daily walks with their 10-year-old lab mix, Walter.
Jay holds a B.A. from Hofstra University and an unhealthy compulsion to collect vintage toy robots!
Cait Cafaro, Senior Change Consultant
Cait Cafaro is the organizational Tetris master you didn't know you needed. After orchestrating transformations across B2B, B2C, and non-profit landscapes, she's developed an uncanny ability to make the pieces fit—even when stakeholders swear they're playing different games. She's built vibrant teams from scratch in institutions older than sliced bread, gently coaxed print traditionalists into their digital renaissance, and orchestrated teams across seven time zones while keeping more plates spinning than a circus performer on espresso.
A crossword puzzle nerd, Cait approaches organizational challenges with the same methodical delight—filling in the blanks, connecting the seemingly unrelated, and occasionally erasing everything to start fresh. Her childhood between Iowa, Tokyo, and Thailand taught her that adaptation isn't just a skill—it's an adventure.
When not transforming organizations, Cait is raising one human daughter with her husband Carmine, while negotiating peace treaties with their two naughty Boston Terriers—arguably her most challenging change management project to date.
Cait holds an M.S. in Organizational Psychology from Baruch College (where she met Joe), an M.A. from CUNY Graduate School of Journalism (which explains her insistence that every good strategy needs a compelling narrative), and a B.A. in History from Beloit College—where she learned that organizations, like civilizations, either evolve or end up as fascinating case studies in what not to do.
