Speakers
John Abraham
General Manager
Net Promoter Programs
John Abraham leads our Net Promoter® business unit at Satmetrix. His group is responsible for best practice exchange, conferences, training & certification, and online services for companies using Net Promoter to drive improvements in customer loyalty. Satmetrix created Net Promoter with customer loyalty expert Fred Reichheld, and the company now hosts the official Net Promoter community web site at www.netpromoter.com.
Prior to joining Satmetrix, John was with Risk Management Solutions (RMS), a leading risk management software and consulting firm, where he was responsible for marketing, training services, knowledge management, and customer loyalty programs. Prior to RMS, he worked as a management and systems consultant with Booz Allen Hamilton and Accenture. John has an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Ricardo Acevedo
General Manager
Four Seasons Hotel Miami
Ricardo Acevedo is General Manager of Four Seasons Hotel Miami, where he is responsible for the strategic planning and daily operations of a 221-room luxury hotel, including three food and beverage outlets, spa and recreational facilities. Under his leadership, the hotel has received numerous prestigious accolades, including American Automobile Association's top recognition, the Five Diamond Award. Prior to this Mr. Acevedo was General Manager of The Regent Singapore. He first joined Four Seasons in 1997 as opening General Manager of Four Seasons Resort Punta Mita where he helped create one of the most exclusive golf resorts in the world.
Prior to joining Four Seasons, Mr. Acevedo had a distinguished 18-year career with Hilton International in a variety of positions throughout Latin America and Europe, in both their hotels and corporate office.
Cyndie Beckwith
VP Customer Experience
AAA of Northern California, Utah, and Nevada
Cyndie Beckwith joined AAA of Northern California, Utah, and Nevada (CSAA) in 2002, bringing with her more than 16 years of customer marketing and customer management experience. From 2002 to 2007 Cyndie was responsible for managing all aspects of customer marketing for the insurance, membership and travel divisions, as well as user experience and brand management. She now leads the organization's Voice of the Customer team, charged with developing the capability to listen to Members during their customer experiences, and use their feedback to drive strategic and operational change.
Prior to CSAA, Cyndie was Vice President at Epiphany where she led the organization's worldwide CRM practice. Cyndie also served more than 12 years at Epsilon where she was a senior leader in the retail and telecommunications practices. In her career Cyndie has consulted with several leading Fortune 100 companies on effectively leveraging customer information for marketing, operations and strategic planning.
Vivian Hairston Blade
Master Black Belt, Marketing
GE Consumer & Industrial
Responsible for leading the global execution of Net Promoter Score (NPS) for GE Consumer & Industrial, Vivian Blade and her team are charged with driving cultural change across the business, embedding NPS and long-term quality accountability into key operating processes. The business has committed to strategic improvements in products, supply chain, operations, and services, enhancing the value of selecting GE as the brand / manufacturer of choice.
With GE for 11 years, Ms. Blade has served as a commercial Black Belt in Marketing and Product Management, launching innovative products such as the Advantium speedcooking oven and Prodigy laundry. As a Consumer Digitization Program Manager, she was responsible for content delivery and eCommerce applications on the GEAppliances.com and Monogram.com consumer websites. In her Range product manager role, she delivered nearly $100mm of revenue annually to GE Consumer & Industrial. She earned a BS degree in Business Administration from Berea College and an MBA from Eastern Kentucky University.
Jeanne Bliss
CustomerBLISS
For 25 years, Jeanne Bliss reported to the Presidents of Lands' End, Allstate, Mazda, Microsoft and Coldwell Banker Corporation as their Chief Customer Officer. In her role, she led achievement of 95% loyalty rates, changing the culture and DNA of companies with 50,000 person field organizations across multiple industries and business models. Ms. Bliss's expertise lies in helping organizations work collectively on behalf of its customers. Ms. Bliss now runs CustomerBLISS, as a worldwide keynote speaker and executive coaching firm for leaders who want to drive customer DNA inside their organizations. She is also the author of Chief Customer Officer; Getting Past Lip Service to Passionate Action.
Lee Boykoff
Director, Digital Media Analytics and Distribution
A&E Television Networks
Lee Boykoff is responsible for leading the online marketing analytics and distribution efforts for A&E, The History Channel, and The Biography Channel. Before joining A&E, he was a consultant in the Analytic Insights Group at Information Resources Inc., where he focused on media mix modeling and pricing optimization for Fortune 500 consumer packaged goods (CPG) clients.
Prior to specializing in analytics, he spent 3+ years promoting live music events at arenas and theatres throughout New England. Mr. Boykoff has a B.A. in Economics from Bowdoin College and an MBA in Marketing from the University of North Carolina.
Dr. Laura Brooks
Vice President, Business Consulting and Methodology
Satmetrix
Dr. Laura Brooks is the co-creator the Net Promoter metric with Fred Reichheld and Bain & Company. Years of research and collection of "Recommend" scores and follow-on purchase behavior across multiple industries led Dr. Brooks and Mr. Reichheld to discover and quantify the power of Net Promoter. Since the publication of the seminal article on Net Promoter in Harvard Business Review in 2003, Dr. Brooks has worked extensively with leading companies in creating an effective Net Promoter Discipline that delivers results.
She and her methodology team continue to pursue leading edge research into Net Promoter, including published studies on credit unions and cultural differences in customer loyalty surveys and Net Promoter Scores. Dr. Brooks holds a Ph.D. in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from Rice University and a BS degree in Psychology from Duke University.
Deborah Carlisle
Manager, Marketing Planning
Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts
As Manager of Marketing Planning for Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, Deborah Carlisle is responsible for providing the company’s 74 hotels and resorts in 31 countries with resources for strategic planning and competitive benchmarking. In her role, she also oversees the guest satisfaction survey program, working closely with the hotels in the training, implementation and optimization of this feedback initiative. In her seven years with the Four Seasons corporate office, Ms. Carlisle’s other focuses have included property performance and web-site analytics, consumer research and internet search marketing.
During her 17-year career with Four Seasons, Ms. Carlisle has held a variety of positions in operations and sales and marketing for the company’s Toronto hotels. She holds a B.A.A. in Hospitality and Tourism Management from Ryerson University.
Philip B. Clement
Global Chief Marketing and Communications Officer
Aon Corporation
Philip B. Clement has responsibility for all marketing, including branding, market analysis, and demand creation as well as driving many programs in the area of sales, sales systems, and innovation for Aon Corporation, a $10 billion dollar company with 500 offices in 120 countries. Previously, Mr. Clement was a managing partner and founder of The Clement Group, where he served a wide variety of clients from the Fortune 50 to start-ups as an expert in revenue-oriented growth strategies, particularly in marketing, sales processes, go-to-market channels, and new product launches. Prior to that, he served as the SVP of global market development for Inforte.
Mr. Clement has taught at the University of Chicago graduate schools of business and public policy and DePaul University's graduate school of business. He received his MBA and Master of Public Policy Analysis from the University of Chicago with a concentration in statistics and an undergraduate degree from the University of Southern California.
Dwight Cooper
Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer
PPR Healthcare Staffing
Dwight Cooper co-founded PPR Healthcare Staffing, a company specializing in travel nursing and allied health placement and recruiting healthcare professionals from foreign countries, in 1996. Named one of America's fastest-growing private companies by Inc. Magazine and the 7th best small company to work for in the U.S. by the Society for HR Management and the Great Place to Work Institute, Mr. Cooper oversees 90 on-site personnel and 450 field-based healthcare professionals. The company's annual revenues exceeded $40 million in 2006.
Selected twice as a finalist for the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, Mr. Cooper attributes the success of PPR to hiring great people and giving them the power and the incentive to perform at their highest levels, along with listening to employee suggestions and constantly updating the company's HR policies. Mr. Cooper serves on the Board of Directors of the National Multiple Scleroses Society. He graduated from Florida State University in 1988 with a BS degree in marketing.
Margaret Dron
Senior Manager of Customer Loyalty
Sage Software
As Senior Manager of Customer Loyalty, Margaret Dron is responsible for customer loyalty focused strategy and initiatives for both Sage Accpac ERP and Simply Accounting product lines. Ms. Dron's strong belief in customer driven development and support led her to organize the first Net Promoter regional user group (Vancouver, BC, Canada) as an opportunity for industry-leading companies to discuss best practices.
In her previous role of Product Marketing Manager for Simply Accounting, she was responsible for product line launch strategy execution in addition to driving the development of Simply Accounting's new online support community, successfully growing active traffic by more than 150%. Prior to joining Sage, Ms. Dron was Marketing Lead at Response Biomedical Corp., where she was responsible for branding and competitive analysis.
Diana Dykstra
President & CEO
San Francisco Fire Credit Union
With more than 30 years experience in the financial services industry, Diana Dykstra is responsible for the credit union's $435 million in assets and 21,000 members. While financial targets are important to the success of any business, the number one focus for the credit union is service and with that a 2010 goal of moving their Net Promoter Score to 85%. Ms. Dykstra is a graduate and current instructor of Western CUNA Management School. In 2001, she was awarded the James D. Likens Alumni Recognition Award, and the Distinguished Service Award at the 2002 California Credit Union League Annual Meeting. She is past Chairman for California Credit Union League and CU Direct Lending, and currently serves as Vice Chair of Prime Alliance Solutions and board member of O'Rourke Career Connections.
Deborah Eastman
Chief Marketing Officer
Satmetrix
Deborah Eastman leads the global marketing efforts of Satmetrix, the co-developer of Net Promoter and the leading global provider of applications and consulting services to measurably improve customer loyalty. She brings extensive experience in marketing, sales, and strategic business development. She has spent her career working with customers to deliver solutions that leverage new technology to drive improved business performance.
Prior to joining Satmetrix, Ms. Eastman was the Managing Principal of Windward Solutions, providing advisory services to business-to-business marketing professionals. Previously, she was Executive Vice President of Sales & Marketing and Chief Marketing Officer for Biz360, an information services company that provides Market Intelligence to marketing executives. Before joining Biz360, Deborah served as a Vice President and Managing Director at BearingPoint (formerly KPMG Consulting), where she held a number of global leadership positions including marketing, global accounts and strategic partnership development.
Jonathan Farer
Manager, Customer Listening Systems
AAA of Northern California, Utah, and Nevada
Jonathan Farer joined AAA of Northern California, Utah, and Nevada (CSAA) in 2002. His group is responsible for building the infrastructure for the organization's Voice of the Customer program, which includes the systems for capturing customer feedback through the internet, in branch offices, and in contact centers. Jonathan has more than 15 years of experience defining business requirements and leading integration for large scale information technology, data warehousing, and customer data systems, including development of CSAA's new membership system.
Prior to joining CSAA, he was a Principal Consultant in PwC Consulting's financial services practice serving clients such as State Farm, OneBeacon Insurance, Liberty Northwest Insurance, CSAA, and Fireman's Fund Insurance.
Matthew Fleckenstein
Group Product Manager for Customer Experience, Microsoft Office Live
Microsoft
For more than a decade, Matt Fleckenstein has leveraged his strategic and product marketing skills to help technology companies gain market share, build and launch products/services in new/adjacent markets, and drive short- and long-term value creation by focusing on delivering a standout customer experience. As Group Product Manager responsible for the Customer Experience across the various Office Live properties at Microsoft, he leads a team charged with relationship marketing, customer communities, and Voice of the Customer initiatives, which includes understanding and improving Net Promoter Scores.
Previoulsy, he was VP of Marketing at mSpoke, a provider of personalization solutions for web content, online advertising, and product recommendations; and a venture capitalist, advising startup companies including Vivisimo.com (search engine), Click Cadence (web analytics), and Entermedia Corporation (social network). His passion for "empowering consumers to make media relevant" has been noted in publications including Behavioral Insider, Direct Marketing Magazine, and iMedia. He has an undergraduate degree in English/Communications from the University of Pittsburgh and completed the Entrepreneurial Management Program at Carnegie Mellon's Graduate School of Industrial Administration.
Carlo Gagliardi
Partner, CRM Global Service Line
Accenture
Biography is not available at this time.
Mary Ellen Griffin
Executive Director of Support Services
St. Joseph Hospital in Kokomo, Indiana
Mary Ellen Griffin is the Executive Director of Support Services for St.Joseph Hospital in Kokomo, Indiana (part of St.Vincent Health System in Indianapolis) and Ascension Health in St. Louis, MO. Ms.Griffin has responsibility for the planning and implementation of Adaptive Design, a problem-solving process based on the Toyota Production System. Ms. Griffin also oversees all patient experience activities including their Planetree initiatives, Emotional/Social/Spiritual Intelligence training for all associates, and the design and implementation of their real time closed-loop feedback.
Mary Ellen has over 25 years of health-care experience in for-profit, governmental and faith-based hospitals. She earned a bachelor's degree in Journalism from Oakland University in Rochester, MI and an MBA from the University of Dallas.
John Griggs
Director, Customer Experience, Digital Tax Solutions Group
H&R Block
John Griggs is responsible for driving critical "Voice of the Customer" initiatives through multiple communication and learning programs that foster interaction between the teams responsible for designing, developing and marketing the company's digital tax products and the end user. For the past 15 years, Mr. Griggs has turned the Voice of the Customer into financial, software, insurance and distribution products and processes.
Prior to joining H&R Block in July 2006, he worked with General Electric for 7 years in multiple roles. During his career, he has conducted customer research and developed solutions for clients such as Pepsi, PNC Bank, Ingram Micro, Dell, and IBM. His quality and change management skills have earned him a Six-Sigma Black Belt certification from General Electric. Mr. Griggs holds a bachelors degree in marketing and management from the University of Cincinnati and resides in Kansas City, Missouri.
David Hankin
Director, Business Consulting
Satmetrix
David Hankin brings 30 years of experience as a general manager and strategy consultant. He is an expert practitioner of a full suite of analytical and intuitive problem solving techniques and has extensive consulting experience in strategy development, market dynamics, competitive analysis, disruptive technologies, forecasting, and customer loyalty and satisfaction.
Prior to joining Satmetrix, Mr. Hankin was a Senior Vice President for Gartner, where he served in various roles including General Manager of the Primary Research division, General Manager of Dataquest, and Managing Vice President of the Consulting division. Before Gartner, Mr. Hankin was a Vice President with SRI International where he was responsible for the Manufacturing and Services Consulting divisions. He holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School and a B.S. Econ. from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.
Marina Hannaford
Consumer Insights Manager
LEGO Corporation
Marina Hannaford started her career at LEGO in October 2000 as Global Business Development Manager, responsible for managing the relationship and communication with internal stakeholders and external partners. She also headed a project formalizing the process of integrating Consumer Feedback into product development.
Now part of the Consumer Insights teams, Ms. Hannaford is responsible for gathering feedback from different consumer touch points and turning this feedback into actionable insights for multiple stakeholders. Analysis and synthesis of key learnings are shared with the organization in a monthly Consumer Feedback newsletter. Ms. Hannaford also serves as the Online Communication and LEGO Education Insights Liaison. She maintains the process for collecting insights from LEGO.com visitors and parents through tracking and ad hoc research and recommends actions based on the findings. She holds bachelor’s degrees in both Economics and Modern Languages.
Reid Hislop
Vice President of Corporate Marketing
Pitney Bowes MapInfo
Reid Hislop brings over 20 years of technology marketing experience and a long history of developing successful and innovative marketing programs to his role. He leads the company's corporate marketing team and directs the company's branding efforts, working directly with MapInfo's executive team to grow and strengthen the company's overall marketing strategy.
Prior to joining MapInfo, Mr. Hislop served as Vice President of Corporate Marketing at McData Corporation, where he spearheaded global public relations and marketing communications activities and increased market share with the launch of new global branding, market positioning, and messaging. Prior to this, he served as Vice President of Marketing for eSoft, Inc., an internet security solutions provider. He holds a B.Sc. from the University of Alberta (Canada).
Larry Hyett
Vice President, Retail Sales & Customer Experience
TD Canada Trust
Larry Hyett was appointed Vice President, Retail Sales & Customer Experience for TD Canada Trust in October 2006. In this position, he focuses on providing a comfortable banking experience for TD Canada Trust's 10 million customers. Mr. Hyett joined TD Bank Financial Group as a Credit Officer in 1986. Over a 21-year career with TD Bank Financial Group, he has held positions in a variety of areas, including the inspection division, retail banking, and core banking. In November of 2000, he was appointed Associate Vice President, Term Products, Retail Product Group. Most recently, Mr. Hyett was Vice President, Core Banking Products. He graduated with a Bachelor in Business Administration from York University in 1986.
Kip Knight
Vice President of Marketing
eBay
Kip Knight has worked at eBay, the world’s largest online shopping site with over 200 million users and sites in 33 countries, since 2002, holding various marketing and general management roles on both the U.S. and international businesses, including regional Vice President and the Head of International Marketing and Category Management.
Over the past 25 years, Mr. Knight has worked in over 80 countries around the world. He spent 10 years in Brand Management at Procter and Gamble in charge of brands such as Ivory Soap as well as working on the development and launch of new food and beverage brands such as Olestra. He also worked in PepsiCo's international restaurant division where he served as General Manager of North Latin America, head of marketing for KFC International, and Chief Marketing Officer for Taco Bell. He earned his B.S. degree from LSU in marketing and his MBA from the University of Cincinnati.
Peggy Kurusz
Director of Research & Development
Ascension Health
Peggy Kurusz is responsible for leading the work to define and deliver the exceptional Patient Experience in a consistent and sustainable way in support of the Call to Action. Ms. Kurusz joined Ascension Health after spending 15 years with BJC, the largest regional Healthcare provider in the St. Louis market. During that tenure, she held a variety of roles including Director of Master Planning of the largest community hospital and Assistant Administrator at "Greenfield" Hospital. In addition to the planning and management of each of these major capital expansion projects, Ms. Kurusz was operationally responsible for Ancillary and Support Services.
Ms. Kurusz's 31 years of experience span the full continuum of healthcare settings including both academic and community hospitals, long-term care consulting, and medical information systems and education. She holds a B.S. in Home Economics (Food Systems Management/Dietetics) from the University of Missouri and an MBA from the Olin School of Business at Washington University.
Rob Markey
Partner
Bain & Company
Rob Markey is a Partner and global head of Bain & Company's Customer Strategy and Marketing practice. He is one of the firm's experts in developing customer loyalty, new product development, and customer service strategies. He has published several articles on customer segmentation, customer loyalty, and customer service. He also leads the NPS Loyalty Forum, a quarterly gathering of senior executives from loyalty-leading companies sharing experience implementing Net Promoter and other approaches to building customer loyalty.
Dr. Vince Nowinski
Principal Methodologist
Satmetrix
Dr. Vince Nowinski is Principal Methodologist of Satmetrix. With over 10 years of experience in the areas of customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, employee opinion surveys, and usability, Dr. Nowinski has helped to design global programs focused on strategic growth, profitability, and customer retention for Satmetrix's largest and most strategic accounts. He is responsible for overseeing the content and methodology associated with Satmetrix's suite of Customer Experience Management solutions.
Dr. Nowinski earned a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Stanford University, where he worked with Dr. Hazel Markus. He also holds a B.A. in Psychology from the University of Notre Dame. He is a member of numerous professional organizations, including the American Psychological Association, the Bay Area Special Interest Group on Human-Computer Interaction (BayCHI), and the Usability Professionals Association (UPA).
Richard Owen
CEO
Satmetrix
Richard Owen is responsible for all aspects of strategy and day-to-day operations of Satmetrix. His involvement with loyalty and customer experience began at Dell where he was Vice President of Dell Online Worldwide. Responsible for all aspects of Dell's Internet strategy and online business revenues on a worldwide basis, he built Dell's online business to cover 50 percent of the company's sales volume. At Satmetrix, Owen has worked with over 50 customers, helping the most complex companies understand and use Net Promoter to create profitable growth. He has extensive knowledge of what works and doesn't work in implementing the Net Promoter Discipline for leading B2B companies. He holds a Bachelor's degree from Nottingham University in England, and a Master's degree from MIT Sloan School of Management.
Susan Piotroski
Partner, Marketing & Customer Strategy Practice
Accenture
Susan is a Senior Executive with Accenture's CRM Practice and leads the Marketing & Customer Strategy Practice. She has directed market strategy efforts for leading companies across a wide range of industries including both business-business and business-consumer markets. Susan is highly skilled in the use of advanced customer research/analytic and statistical modeling techniques in support of market/customer strategy development.
Previously Susan was a partner at Mercer Management Consulting and also led a Customer Strategy Group at iXL Enterprises. Susan received her BS from Pennsylvania State University and her MS and Ph.D. in Quantitative Psychology/Applied Statistics from the University of Pittsburgh. She has frequently presented at national conferences and published on the topic of market and customer strategy.
Fred Reichheld
Author of The Ultimate Question
Fred Reichheld is a Bain & Company Fellow and Founder of Bain's Loyalty practice, which helps clients achieve superior results through improvements in customer, employee, partner, and investor loyalty. His pioneering work has quantified the linkage between loyalty, profits, and growth. In the June 2003 edition of Consulting Magazine, Mr. Reichheld was included on their list of the world's top 25 consultants. The "high priest" of loyalty, according to The Economist and the man who "put loyalty economics on the map," according to The New York Times, Mr. Reichheld is the author of three books and eight Harvard Business Review articles on the subject.
Enrique Salem
COO
Symantec
Enrique Salem is responsible for global sales and partner programs, marketing, communications, and branding. Most recently, he was Group President, Consumer Business Unit, responsible for the overall consumer business worldwide, which included oversight over engineering, sales, alliances, marketing, public relations, and customer care. He also guided his team in identifying and developing Symantec's industry-leading consumer solutions and bringing them to market. Other roles with Symantec included Senior Vice President of Security Products and Solutions and leader of the Network and Gateway Security Solutions group.
Prior to joining Symantec, Mr. Salem was President and CEO of Brightmail, the leading anti-spam software (acquired by Symantec); Senior Vice President of Products and Technology at Oblix (acquired by Oracle); and Vice President of Technology and Operations at Ask Jeeves. Before that, he led the security business unit at Symantec, helping grow the unit's revenue from $200 million to $460 million over a three-year period. Mr. Salem received a bachelor's degree in computer science from Dartmouth College.
Scott Zandbergen
Vice President of Product Management
Sage Software
Scott Zandbergen is responsible for the overall product strategy for the Sage Accpac ERP and Simply Accounting product portfolios. A strong customer advocate, he believes in staying connected to both customers and partners in order to develop products that are truly market driven. In his prior role, Mr. Zanbergen was Director of Product Management for Simply Accounting. He joined the former Accpac International in 1997 as an Account Manager and created the Simply Accounting Business Partner Program. By 2001, the program grew to over 2000 members. Prior to Sage, Scott was an Account Manager with Merisel Canada (Synnex), a distributor of computer hardware and software.