Spencer Burke is a girl dad to two young daughters, an experience that has helped him hone the patience and listening skills he needs as the senior vice president of growth at Braze. Spencer got his master's degree in information systems from the London School of Economics and started his career at PwC as a management consultant before joining Braze in 2011. Back then, it was still a small company in the early days of the mobile ecosystem. Over the past 12 and a half years, Spencer has held...

Mauro Porcini is a widely known design thought leader, author, and first-ever Chief Design Officer at PepsiCo. He is also a presenter and judge on the TV shows New York by Design and America by Design on CBS and Amazon Prime Video. Mauro is from Italy, where he studied design in Milan and did his thesis on wearable technology with Philips Design. After opening and closing an agency with music artist Claudio Cecchetto, he spent 10 years at 3M, then was hired at PepsiCo as Chief Design Officer...

On the show today, Alan and Michelle talk about her career journey, the ETS rebrand, the uniqueness of her current role, and why more organizations should be thinking of a similar structure at the leadership level. ETS's focus on people and mission of driving human progress forward is what drew Michelle to the company. As Chief Marketing and Innovation Officer, she is responsible for internal and external communications, customer insights and analytics, branding and marketing, e-commerce,...

In this episode, Alan and Jessica talk about Bubble Goods, who it serves, and how they are helping emerging food brands and unique consumers alike.  Jessica Young is a fan of Fufu and the founder and CEO of Bubble Goods. With 10+ years in the food and wellness industry, Jessica saw a gap in the market: food brands were innovating (specifically in the health foods sector), but they didn’t have the digital know-how or right platform to launch and scale on. It was becoming harder and harder for...

In this episode, Alan and Jessica talk about the evolution of Calendly from serving solopreneurs to enterprise organizations, the success factors that have made that shift possible, how she thinks about the RIO and effectiveness of marketing spend, and balancing the need to drive results and be creative through “creative destruction.”.    Jessica Gilmartin is an amateur baker, an ex-yogurt mogul, and the new Chief Revenue Officer at the scheduling automation platform Calendly. She took her...

Jacqueline Woods is the Chief Marketing Officer for Teradata, the cloud analytics and data platform for AI, headquartered in San Diego, California. Jacqueline joined Teradata from NielsenIQ, where she was a member of the executive leadership team and Global Chief Marketing and Communications Officer. She also spent nearly 10 years as CMO of the IBM Global Partner Ecosystem Division, where she focused on building cloud, data, AI, and SaaS strategies. Before that, she was Global Head of...

In this episode, Alan and Robin discuss his path from Wall Street to citizenM, their focus on affordable luxury, the innovations they are bringing to the hospitality industry, and who they are working to serve. Robin also tells us about their unique citizensOf campaign and how it is helping them integrate into communities, as well as their partnership with World Bicycle Relief and how they encourage their guests to participate in impactful ESG initiatives.  Robin Chadha is the Amsterdam-based...

In this episode, Alan and Andy discuss his path to creating Circle, how to build community, best practices and takeaways for community builders, how to build a great member experience, how to find the right members for your community, and much more! Andy Guttormsen is the co-founder and chief revenue officer of Circle, an all-in-one community platform for professional creators and brands. He started his career on Wall Street, but quickly found that it wasn't the place for him. He attempted to...

Lee Thompson is the co-founder and CMO of Flash Pack, a travel brand dedicated to small group adventures rooted in friendship that he founded with his now wife and CEO, Radha Vyas. Lee’s career merged with his passion for adventure as a self-employed photojournalist. He met Radha on a chance first date between gigs, and they immediately started planning what became Flash Pack. By 2016, they were married, had both quit their jobs, and were starting their new adventure as business owners....

Kelly Cook does it all! She is a mother of five who plays the drums AND serves as President of Marketing, IT, and Finance at David’s Bridal. Her love of learning and trying new things can be seen in her impressive and varied work history. From Continental Airlines, to Waste Management, Inc. to DSW, Pier One, Sears, Kmart, and now David’s Bridal, Kelly tells us she learned a lot about herself and her craft by challenging herself in new industries and encourages other marketers to try the...

Regina Lawless is an inspiration. She is a recent empty nester, founder of Bossy & Blissful, a community for black women executives and business owners, and author of Do You: A Journey of Success, Loss and Learning to Live a More MeaningFULL Life. After graduating with her BA in communications from California State University-Sacramento, Regina got her first job in human resources at Target. After about 8 years in retail HR, she did a stint in banking, then moved to the airline industry,...

Paul Stonick is a punk. Like, an “opened for Red Hot Chili Peppers before they were cool” kind of punk. He started in web design in the mid-90s, then pivoted to UX in 2012. With 18 years in e-commerce, fashion, beauty, home improvement, and automotive, as well as 15 years in executive design leadership roles, he has over two decades of “tra-digital” experience in brand creative, visual, and UX design. Now, in the third act of his career as Vice President of SCADpro at Savannah College of Art...

Llibert Argerich is a hardworking triathlete from Andorra, one of the smallest countries in the world. At 11, Llibert lost his father and learned his work ethic firsthand as he watched his mother raise three children on her own as a waitress. His desire to expand his worldview beyond the valley has led him to live in five different countries on two continents over the last 20 years. After completing his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Toulouse in France, Llibert started...

Adam Vasallo is not only a volunteer for Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, but he is also their Chief Marketing Officer. Since joining the organization in 2018, he has been leading his team in generating awareness for the mission, inspiring volunteerism, and bringing the organization’s brand and commitment to youth equity and empowerment to life on national stages. Prior to joining Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, Adam spent 11 years at HSN, where he held several senior-level...

Alyson Griffin is back! She is a musician, mother, and marketing leader born and raised in Silicon Valley with over 25 years of experience leading marketing, branding, and thought leadership teams. Alyson originally planned on being a pharmacist, but she eventually realized it wasn't the right fit for her. As soon as she walked into her first advertising class, the rest was history. She eventually got her degree in communications and started at a PR agency right after graduation. She went...

Mark Viden is a wine lover with an English degree who never expected to end up in healthcare but always had an interest in marketing and advertising. After graduating from college, working client-side, managing a small marketing team, and moving to San Francisco, Mark had the opportunity to join Dignity Health, part of CommonSpirit Health, where he stayed for 18 years. In 2019, he was hired as Senior Vice President of Brand for CommonSpirit Health, where he now drives brand development,...

Margot started her career as an analyst at Barclays Investment Bank. She wasn't sure exactly what she wanted to do at that time, but she did know having a good financial base would help her no matter what path she chose. She has always had a passion for retail, and in 2014, she joined the family business as a merchandising analyst at Movado Group. Eventually, she moved into sales, then business development, and most recently, she spent 4.5 years as the Vice President of E-Commerce, Digital...

Kari Saitowitz is a baseball fanatic, the founder of Fhitting Room, and currently serves as the Chief Marketing and Creative Officer for the New York Sports Club. She graduated from the Wharton School with a strategic management and marketing focus and got her first job at American Express. From there, she leaned into her passion for marketing and decided to pursue her MBA. After graduating from Harvard Business School, Kari worked at Pepsi until she had her son. After his birth, she started...

In this episode, Alan and Matt discuss having a brush with Shark Tank, the benefits of developing a strong work ethic at a young age, and how Matt is working on being a fast decision-maker without being a prisoner to the moment. They also talk about the different categories within the restaurant category, the unique concept First Watch is creating with experiences, and the culture that makes it all work. Matt wraps up the episode by touching on why the new nature of marketing requires an...

Mayur Gupta grew up in India, got his degree in computer science, and started his career as an engineer in 2000 at HCL Technologies. Since then, Mayur has had quite a diverse and impressive career path. He has held key marketing leadership roles at SapientNitro, Kimberly Clark, Healthgrades, Spotify, Freshly, and most recently, Gannett, part of the USA Today Network. Throughout the years, Mayur has also developed a role as an investor and board director for various organizations. Today, his...

Lauren Sallata is using her 20+ years of experience as a marketing professional and executive leader... to moonlight as a roadie, manager, and webmaster for her son's band, Sunrise Cries? Well, yes, but she is also applying them to her role as Chief Marketing Officer for Ricoh North America and as a member of the Board of Trustees for the Consumer Technology Association. Lauren joined Ricoh in June 2021 after leaving her position as CMO at Panasonic Corporation. Before that, she spent several...

When Stephanie Dobbs Brown graduated from the University of Tennessee, she had two job offers in front of her. Instead of choosing, she did both for several years, which perfectly represents her dedication to her career. Eventually, she came to a fork in the road that led her to PR Newswire in Chicago. After a few years, she moved on to Thomson Reuters, where she had her first role running a P&L. In 2013, she got her first client-side brand role with Dow Jones, then moved over to ICE in...

Jessica Padula graduated from Boston University and always knew she wanted to get into brand marketing. However, getting a foot in the door can be difficult, so she took the advertising route to get there. Jessica started her career at Grey Group in New York, where she worked with brands like Downy, Covergirl, and Pantene. By specializing in the emerging space of social media, she was able to move over to the client side in Colorado, first with WhiteWave Foods, and then with Famous Brands....

Geoff Cottrill has been named one of Forbes’ 50 Most Entrepreneurial CMOs, one of Business Insider’s CMOs to Watch, and currently serves as the Chief Brand Officer for Topgolf. In this role, he leads all aspects of their global marketing, experience design, partnerships, consumer insights, communications, charitable giving, and retail and membership programs. He joined Topgolf in 2021 with a passion for building diverse and talented teams and a reputation for innovative thinking and...