SPEAKERS
Amir Ariely
EVP, Global Head of Initiatives, Creative Work, Google
Amir Ariely is the Global Head of Initiatives at Google's Creative Works. In this role, he is leading Dream Ads, an initiative to develop new and innovative ad products and experiences with Google's engineering Ads teams and Google's top global advertisers.
Amir is a seasoned advertising professional with over 20 years of experience in the industry. He is passionate about brand building as well as performance-driven marketing.
Before joining Google 8 years ago, Amir was leading creative teams as VP creative director at Saatchi & Saatchi DDB and Grey. He has a proven track record of success in developing and executing award-winning advertising campaigns for a wide range of global clients.
Amir is married to Yael, has 3 kids and currently lives in Brooklyn NY.
David Berne
EVP, Chief Strategy Officer, RPA
David Berne is Executive Vice-President, Chief Strategy Officer at RPA in Santa Monica, California. In this capacity. Berne oversees Strategic Planning. Analytics & Insights and Behavioral Science in addition to RPA’s Integrated Strategy Teams. Berne has played a leading role in development of RPA’s most successful campaigns for Honda, Farmers Insurance, Apartments.com and more. In 2018, he oversaw the team winning a Gold Jay Chiat Award for Nonprofit with a campaign for the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation. The campaign was rooted in kidspeak as opposed to hospital speak. Berne is a winner of multiple Jay Chiat and Effie awards throughout his career.
Berne began in advertising working in the mailroom of W.B. Doner in Southfield Michigan. Yes, literally in the mailroom! He also produced tv/radio commercials for four years before turning to account planning. Currently, he is a member of the ANA DEIB Ethics Code Steering Committee. He has taught and judged AAAA Institute of Advanced Advertising Studies for over 10 years and has participated in various outreach programs to HBCUs and other educational institutions. Berne is a graduate of Boston University where he won the Philosophy Prize as outstanding undergraduate student.
Brian Bonilla
Senior Agency Reporter, AdAge
Brian Bonilla is a senior reporter for AdAge, covering ad agencies, including creative and media shops, experiential, health care agencies, technology, finance, politics, entertainment and more. He previously covered the private equity industry as a reporter for PEI Media. He also has experience as a video editor and marketing.
Brendan Brown
VP, Head of Strategy, GPJ
Brendan Brown is the Head of Strategy for the global experience marketing agency, George P. Johnson (GPJ). At GPJ, Brendan has helped design award-winning experiences for brands such as; American Express, Google, and IBM. As an agency leader, Brendan brings a passion for organizational learning, designing for change, and the transformational power of play.
Prior to GPJ, Brendan was a brand strategist, on the founding team of a VC-funded tech startup, a social media agency owner, and a door-to-door vacuum salesman. Before that, he spent the better part of a decade as a professional recording artist/touring musician.
He now lives outside of Boston, MA with his wife, Chrissy and their five kids. He likes running in the woods, doodling with sharpies, and making music with ideas.
Nick Childs
CMO, DIRT
Nick Childs is a co-founder and head of growth at DIRT, a consumer analytics company whose technology measures the critical changes in our bodies and brains that drive attention, relevance, and behavior to help clients place their most significant investments for growth.
Previously, as a creative leader seeking to bridge marketing silos -- advertising (Grey), PR (FleishmanHillard), and media (Initiative, Reprise) -- Childs made everything from Super Bowl spots to micro-campaigns across digital, experiential, mobile, search and more, and worked with some of the most notable brands in the world.
Beyond the ad world, Childs is an award-winning director, writer & producer of narrative and documentary films. And he has launched ground-breaking interactive, AR, and AI projects at Tribeca, Sundance and NYFF.
Martyn Clarkson
EVP Global Head of Strategy, Jack Morton Worldwide
Martyn Clarkson is Jack Morton’s EVP, Global Head of Strategy. Based in New York, he is responsible for driving the agency’s strategic vision as well as its products and processes across the network. He works closely with the agency’s teams of strategists and creative leadership to infuse insight, innovation, and ideas into extraordinary work for clients.
Prior to joining Jack Morton as Global Head of Strategy in September 2021, Clarkson was SVP, Head of Strategy for George P. Johnson. He also served as VP, Strategic Planning at Momentum Worldwide, and as SVP, Strategy and Account Planning at Leo Burnett.
Clarkson's career has taken him all from New Zealand to the world, working in APAC, EMEA and the U.S. In addition to his expertise in brand development, integrated marketing, experiential, and change management, Martyn has a strong background in the study of human behavior – in particular, exploring the science of individual and group decision making, heuristics and the complexity of hard-to-reach audiences.
Clarkson believes that great strategy is overwhelmingly compelling and wincingly simple. When done with bravery and fearlessness, it's called honeybadgering.
Joan Colletta
Sr. Director, Global Marketing Transformation, McDonald's
Joan Colletta is an award-winning integrated marketing leader who has led transformational results for some of the world’s most iconic brands. Currently charged with leading Global Marketing Transformation for McDonald’s, Joan is unleashing the power of creativity, personally relevant connections and the brand’s role in culture to chart the next chapter of the world’s most famous restaurant. Under her leadership of the McDonald’s Global Creative Effectiveness Program, the Golden Arches were recognized as the Most Effective Global Brand four years in a row by WARC and was just named Effie’s Most Effective Global Brand for the second year in a row.
Prior to McDonald’s, Joan was Managing Partner, Communications Planning Lead for Mindshare North America, and held leadership positions at Miller Brewing Company, Cramer-Krasselt and Leo Burnett. Over the course of her career, she’s created meaningful, culturally relevant connections between people and an impressive roster of leading brands including Heinz, Miller, General Mills, Kellogg’s, The Gap, Allstate, Hallmark among many others. Of note, it was her strategic leadership behind Corona’s “Find Your Beach” platform, which broke the brand out of its “beach” occasion typecast (without breaking the brand), contributed to double digit sales increases, and sustained its position as America’s number one selling import for over a decade.
Joan has served on numerous awards panels, including Jury President for the AdAge Creativity Awards, and finalist juror for the North American Effies, the Jay Chiat awards and the Gerety Awards while leading McDonald’s own global Feel-Good Marketing Awards. Her own work and leadership skills have been broadly recognized from the Clios to the Effie Awards to the N.A. WeQual Awards. Joan resides in Chicago and is a graduate of Northwestern University.
Marcus Collins
Marketing Professor, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan
Dr. Marcus Collins is an award-winning marketer and cultural translator. He is the former chief strategy officer at Wieden+Kennedy, NYC, a marketing professor at the University of Michigan, and the author of the best-selling book, For The Culture. Collins is a recipient of Advertising Age's 40 Under 40 award and an inductee into the AAF’s Advertising Hall of Achievement. Most recently, he was recognized by the Thinkers50's 2023 Radar List of 30 thinkers with the ideas most likely to shape the future. Before his advertising tenure, Marcus worked at Apple and ran digital strategy for Beyoncé.
Jon Cunningham
Head of Strategic Planning, Weber Shandwick
Jon Cunningham wanted to be a pilot, until his sister said he’d just watched Top Gun too many times. Instead, his first PR gig was handling paparazzi for a Princess Dianna appearance. He’s been flying by the seat of his pants ever since.
He now leads strategic planning at Weber Shandwick New York, having worked with some of the world’s best-known companies and brands, including AB InBev, Microsoft, Nike, P&G, Unilever, and Xbox.
Previously he was with MSL and Edelman in New York, and The Red Consultancy in London, which sent him across the Atlantic in 2007. He flew economy, not in the cockpit.
Francesco D'Orazio
Founder and CEO, Pulsar Platform
Francesco D’Orazio is a researcher, product strategist and entrepreneur specialised in online audiences and Internet culture.
He is the Co-Founder and CEO of Pulsar, an award-winning audience intelligence platform that helps brands and organizations make data-inspired decisions, in step with their audience. He holds a PhD in immersive media and the evolution of online audiences and has been working in the field of big data, AI and audience research for over a decade, advising a range of global organizations, including the United Nations, World Health Organization, Meta, Twitter, and Google.
Prior to Pulsar Francesco was ResearchDirector at innovation consultancy Face where he specialized in co-creation programs designed to involve audiences in the creation of brands and products, and Director of the Visual Social Media Lab, an industry-academia think tank specialized on studying the impact of social media images on society and culture.
He’s a regular speaker at research, innovation, and technology conferences such as SXSW, Strata, DMWF, The Next Web, International Journalism Festival, TEDx, TMRE, IIEXand others.
His work on virality, fandoms, social influence, public opinion, and misinformation has been featured in the likes of BBC, Guardian, CNN, Forbes, The Independent, Daily Mail, Mashable, Gigaom, and Business Insider.
Karen Faith
Founder and CEO, Others Unlimited
Karen is an ethnographer, strategist and CEO of Others Unlimited, an empathy training company specialized in the advanced skills of curiosity, non-judgment, and self-awareness. Her work has guided teams and initiatives at Google, Amazon, Indeed, The NBA, The ACLU, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and The Federal Reserve Bank, among others. Her TEDx talk, How to talk to the worst parts of yourself, has received over 1M views.
Lynne Field
Head of Strategy, FutureBrand North America, FutureBrand
When Lynne begins a client engagement, she asks herself one question: What is the dream of this brand, and what’s getting in their way?
Lynne believes that to be an effective brand consultant, one must look at a problem from a variety of perspectives—inside-out, outside-in, and a combination of both. Through a career that included the client and agency sides of the business, Lynne had a front row seat to create a holistic approach to brand-building.
As Head of Strategy at FutureBrand, Lynne leads a team of strategists and storytellers who transform brands and businesses for the better for clients like Amazon, GM, American Airlines, Meta, Pfizer, Kohler, Hoka and Heineken. She has worked extensively with both B2B and B2C brands in verticals from telecom to healthcare, and from financial services to consumer and packaged goods. She began her career as a part of AT&T’s global marcom group, helping to grow the company into a global brand, then moving on to advertising at JWT and Publicis before ultimately finding her home in branding.
Tomas Gonsorcik
Chief Strategy Officer, DDB Worldwide
Tomas Gonsorcik is the Chief Strategy Officer at DDB Worldwide, the 2023 Cannes Network Agency of the Year, 2022 and 2023 US Effie Network of the Year and the #2 WARC Global Creative and Effectiveness Network of the Year. Tomas sets out the global narrative for the agency and coordinates the strategic practice across our global network of creative agencies. Previously, Tomas was the Chief Strategy Officer at VMLY&R. Tomas is the co-chair of the 4A’s Strategy Committee and sits on the WARC Global Effectiveness Council. Tomas believes that creativity is the most powerful force in business.
Pierrah Hilaire
Content Creator
Based in NYC, Pierrah Hilaire is a content creator, model, brand strategist, and filmmaker. She is passionate about uplifting and highlighting emerging brands, especially brands that are Black, POC, queer, PwD, and women-owned because there is so much talent that isn’t being noticed within the fashion industry. Pierrah believes that style can be achieved through accessible and sustainable consumption. She has amassed over 70K followers on TikTok, where she shares styling videos, educational content on Black brands, and fashion history. She has also been featured in NYLON and has done campaigns for Valentino, Olay, and Alexander McQueen, among many others. Pierrah's mission is to empower creatives while also championing the value of creativity.
Melissa Hochman
Group Strategy Director, Experience, DDB
Melissa Hochman is Group Director of Experience Strategy & Innovation at DDB, where she takes a multi-disciplinary approach to create audience-first, brand-building experiences. Prior, Hochman was VP, Digital Director at Saatchi, digital strategist at Ogilvy and communications planner/buyer at Optimedia. With 13 years of experience, she has helped create award-winning work for Goldfish, IBM, Pizza Hut, Women in Film, Invisalign and National Down syndrome Society. She’s passionate about finding overlap insights across brand, cultural and audience truths and using advertising to change perceptions.
Steffon Isaac
Founder, The CLU Studio
Steffon Isaac, the Founder of The CLU Studio, is a dynamic speaker and diversity & inclusion expert who has dedicated his career to empowering organizations to create more inclusive and equitable workplaces. The CLU Studio develops trainings and innovative games that address unconscious bias in organizations, helping individuals to recognize and overcome their own biases in a fun and interactive way. With a focus on unconscious bias, Steffon uses his extensive knowledge and research-backed insights to educate and inspire audiences on the impact of bias in the workplace and the steps individuals and organizations can take to create a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment.
Kumar Kanagasabapathy
Global Chief Strategy Officer, Rufus, Initiative
Kumar Kanagasabapathy is the Global Chief Strategy Officer at Rufus, the team dedicated to the Amazon account at Initiative over 1000+ people strong.
At Rufus, Kumar has been vital in helping establish Strategy as an indispensable craft. He crafts tailor-made strategic solutions for over 10+ Amazon lines of business, ensuring their unique needs are met while pushing the boundaries of creative output.
Beyond Amazon, Kumar's experience spans a wide range of categories and renowned brands such as Adidas, Disney Channels Worldwide, NBC Universal, Target and EA Sports. His strategic work has not only had a business impact but has also won several awards such as Festival of Media, Creative Media Awards, Effies, Digiday and Webby awards.
Adjacent to his day job, Kumar is also deeply passionate about mentoring up-and-coming strategists, so as to diversify and strengthen the craft. He's also an active participant across several programs such as ARF and 4As and is always open to an exchange.
Marla Kaplowitz
President & CEO, 4A’s
Bringing 30 years of industry experience in marketing and communications, Marla joined the 4A's in May 2017 to help define and shape the future focus for the association. Under her leadership, the 4A’s helps empower members to drive commerce, spark connections, and shape culture through infinite creativity all while moving the industry forward.
As the former CEO of MEC North America, beginning in 2011, Marla drove the agency’s strategic initiatives with a focus on delivering growth for its people, clients and the industry. Marla led MEC to become a major disruptor in the area of talent management with its innovative approaches to attracting, nurturing and retaining the industry’s top talent. MEC NA was cited in Fortune’s "Great Places to Work" feature and was named in Advertising Age’s "Best Places to Work in Advertising and Marketing" in 2015.
Prior to joining MEC, Marla spent 12 years at MediaVest, where she oversaw the Procter & Gamble Communications Planning assignment for North America, and previously managed a multi-client team. Marla began her career at DMB&B before moving to Ammirati Puris Lintas. Marla serves on the Boards of The Ad Council, AEF (ANA Educational Foundation), BBB National Programs, Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), Trustworthy Accountability Group (TAG), and General Assembly’s Marketing Standards.
Elizabeth Kenny
Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer, Truth Initiative
Elizabeth is the Chief Marketing and Strategy Officer for Truth Initiative, the award-winning non-profit dedicated to ending tobacco use and achieving a culture where young people reject smoking, vaping, and nicotine. At Truth Initiative, she leads the truth brand and its holistic suite of products and services that help young people lead tobacco-free lives. This powerful brand includes the award-winning truth public education campaign, as well as free tools and resources designed to protect and empower young people, including This is Quitting from truth, a free text message quit vaping program, and the digital, peer-to-peer curriculum Vaping: Know the truth.
Since joining Truth Initiative in July, 2022, Elizabeth has brought a new focus of reaching young people through social media and influencers to tackle the difficult task of targeting one of the most elusive audiences — young people —with a message they do not want to hear — don’t vape or smoke.
Prior to Truth Initiative, Elizabeth has over 30 years of brand management experience at blue chip organizations like Unilever, Clairol, P&G, Shiseido and Henkel. She transformed many renowned brands — Clairol, Almay, Joico, AGEbeautiful, Dial, and göt2b — with deep insights of target audiences and laser-focused unique selling propositions. Elizabeth is known for her inclusive leadership style and pioneering diversity, equity, and inclusion practices at major organizations like Henkel.
Elizabeth lives between Connecticut and Washington, D.C. and is the proud mother of a 19-year-old son and a whip-smart, 100% mutt dog. Her favorite place to be is in the woods hiking or under water engaging with cuttlefish.
Ann Marie Kerwin
Americas Editor, WARC
Ann Marie Kerwin is the Americas Editor for WARC, a global marketing firm that provides evidence, expertise and education to ensure marketing strategy drives business success. As a WARC editor, she focuses on how marketing can make the business case for creativity. Previously Kerwin was VP-Content for eMarketer, a research firm focused on digital marketing and an editor for Ad Age.
Tim Leake
Founder/CEO, Lightbulb
Tim Leake has been leveraging creativity to solve business problems for over 25 years.
He is the Founder & CEO of Lightbulb, a “business creativity accelerator” that that helps creative business people become more creative, more successful at business, and more fulfilled people.
Before starting Lightbulb, he was the Chief Marketing & Innovation Officer for RPA. Before that, a global innovation, creative and digital transformation consultant and speaker with Hyper Island. And before that, a Creative Director and Copywriter at agencies including Saatchi & Saatchi, Dentsu and TBWA/Chiat/Day.
Antonio Lucio
Founder and Principal, 5S Diversity
Antonio is the founder of LEAP, the Leadership Empowerment Acceleration Project aimed at advancing marketing practice through transformational leadership skills and Diversity and Inclusion. He is also an Executive Fellow at Yale SOM. Antonio was inducted into the American Advertising Federation Hall of Fame in April 2023; the American Marketing Association Hall of Fame in May 2022, and into the Forbes Most Influential CMOs Hall of Fame in June 2022. He is one of the very few individuals in the world to earn rights to these three prestigious distinctions.
For 40 years, Antonio was a successful global CMO and marketing industry leader who worked with some of the most recognized companies and iconic brands, across multiple categories. He held Global CMO roles for Meta, HP Inc and Visa as well as the role of Chief Innovation and Portfolio Transformation Officer for PepsiCo Inc.
Antonio is a recognized thought leader and global influencer in marketing transformation. He is mentor to some of the world’s most renowned CMOs. Throughout his career, Antonio was successful in driving growth by building businesses, brands and marketing teams that have stood the test of time. He is skilled in developing successful strategies that drive revenue by building high performing teams and marketing ecosystems, infusing deep analytics into effective communication platforms, and driving meaningful innovation throughout the customer’s journey.
Antonio is also known for his inclusive leadership philosophy of driving meaningful results through diversity, inclusion and equity. For Antonio, diversity is a business imperative driven more by bold action than by words and pronouncements. In all his roles, he was able to deliver business results while significantly increasing the representation of women and people of color across senior levels in the entire marketing ecosystem: clients, agencies and production houses. Antonio has been a celebrated and award-winning champion of diversity by organizations like ANA/AIMM, the 3% Conference, FREE THE WORK, Adweek and PRWeek, amongst others. With AdColor he won the lifetime achievement award in 2021.
Antonio earned a B.A. in history from Louisiana State University. He was born in Spain and was raised in Puerto Rico. Son to Spanish father and a Puerto Rican mother, he is a US citizen and currently resides with his wife Ashley in San Francisco. Antonio is the proud father of five daughters. He is fluent in English, Spanish and has working knowledge of Portuguese.
Tim Maleeny
President & Chief Strategy Officer, Havas
Tim Maleeny is the Chief Strategy Officer for Havas North America and President of Havas New York, a global marketing and communications company.
The former Head of Strategy for Ogilvy North America, Tim is a true hybrid, having worked as a creative, account lead and strategist over the course of his agency career. He has worked at R/GA, Publicis, and held a variety of leadership roles at independent agencies, in addition to launching a new agency practice for Deloitte. And with a degree in computer science, he has a longstanding obsession with emerging technology and innovation.
Tim is known for pioneering a narrative approach to building brand platforms, which makes sense since he’s the bestselling author of six novels and multiple award-winning short stories. He’s very active across the marketing community, mentoring and connecting great people wherever he finds them. This is also his sixth year as a business mentor for Women inPower, the cross-sector fellowship sponsored by 92Y.
Tim lives in Tribeca with his wife, two daughters, and far too many books.
Ryan McDaid
Head of Strategy, Mojo Supermarket
Ryan McDaid is Mojo Supermarket’s Head of Strategy where he has built and oversees the agency’s strategy team while leading on key projects and clients including Girls Who Code, Truth Initiative, Match, Death Wish Coffee, Eventbrite, Patreon and more. In the past year, Ryan and his team have received industry-leading accolades including Campaign Strategy Team of the Year 2023 and the prestigious Grand Effie Award for their work with Truth Initiative. Prior to Mojo, Ryan spent time at Samsung USA, helping to build the company’s internal brand studio capabilities. He has also spent time at Droga5 and 360i developing campaigns that not only broke through creatively but delivered measurable business results for iconic brands including IHOP, OREO, and HENNESSY.
Charlie McKittrick
Chief Strategy Officer, Mother
Charlie is CSO and Managing Partner for Mother US, overseeing Mother’s strategy product across all offices, in addition to Mother Ventures and general big hairy client problem solving.
An accidental entrepreneur, Charlie ran his own design studio, produced independent feature films that competed at Sundance, and earned his MBA with summa cum laude honors in Finance and Marketing. Before Mother, Charlie worked at Ogilvy on brands like Motorola, UPS and Coke Zero (to name a few).
He has a wife, two kids, lives in Brooklyn and finds public radio pledge drives immensely calming.
Michael McNamara
Managing Director, Health & Wellness, McKinney Health
Before it was called Havas, Michael McNamara started at Lally, McFarland & Pantello in 1998 and rose through the ranks of account services over 24 years at Havas. In 2015, McNamara was named Managing Director at Havas Life New York, overseeing roughly $30M in agency revenue. In 2017, McNamara led the launch of a new Havas agency, Havas Health Plus, focused on the digital experience for physicians and patients.
McNamara was then promoted to President in 2018 and led a renaissance for Havas Life Metro, launching new values and branding, returning the flagship agency to its original name, Havas Life New York, and overseeing sister agency Havas Life Chicago. In 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, McNamara partnered with Pfizer to launch the Pfizer COVID vaccine and Pfizer’s oral antiviral for COVID-19 Paxlovid one year later.
In February 2022, McNamara was hired as Managing Director to launch McKinney Health. The official launch of McKinney Health in June 2022 brought the agency’s culture, world-class creative, and social-first approach to the health and wellness category. McKinney Health drove over $12M in new business in its first six months as a practice and 45 new employees. In January 2023 McNamara was named a winner of the prestigious Medical, Marketing & Media (MM&M) Pinnacle Award. The Pinnacle Awards honor those who have made a significant impact on the health industry over their career and are still actively leading the industry. In March 2023 McNamara was one of the lead panelists at The Ad Age Wellness Revolution speaking about where wellness is going in a post-pandemic world.
Allison Micelli
Creative Agency Partnerships Lead, TikTok
Allison Miceli is a Creative Agency Partnerships (CAP) Lead for North America, where she is privileged to partner with creative agencies across Canada and the US to build community and provide education and resources to drive impact for their brand partners on and off the platform.
Prior to arriving at TikTok Allison spent a decade in the creative advertising industry as a trusted client services partner to a variety of global brands including Canada Goose, lululemon, Sephora Canada, TD Bank, Tim Hortons, Unilever, and Vanguard. Her TikTok ForYouPage includes emerging TikTok trends, top coffee spots, CrossFit and British comedy club comics.
Brendan Murray
Co-Founder & Chief Science Officer, DIRT
Dr. Brendan Murray is the co-founder and Chief Science Officer of DIRT. Brendan holds a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from Boston College, and has been a thought leader in the consumer neuroscience industry for nearly a decade. He has conducted transformative research with businesses across the industry spectrum, from advertising and package design to aerospace, gaming, and health care. He has worked regularly with global Fortune 500 brands, applying neuroscientific principles in carefully-considered ways to help answer those brands’ most challenging business questions.
Above all, Brendan is passionate about teaching, and finds the most joy in his work when he is explaining human cognition to others. Apart from his client work, he is a frequent industry and university lecturer. He has spoken regularly at the Neuromarketing World Forum and Advertising Research Foundation, and has delivered lectures at Darden, Stern, Rutgers, and many other universities. His work has been featured in Forbes, Engadget, and MediaVillage, and he has been a contributing author on several university textbooks (Handbook of Cognition and Emotion, Consumer Neuroscience, and The New Marketing).
Lara O'Shea
Chief Strategy Officer, Hudson Rouge
Lara O’Shea is chief strategy officer at Hudson Rouge, WPP’s integrated boutique luxury agency. Previously, she was Executive Strategy Director at VMLY&R; as part of their global strategic leadership team, she led thought leadership. She has led strategic engagements across wide-ranging clients across most verticals and types of strategy. For the past 12 years, she’s worked across a range of WPP agencies, including Ogilvy, Kantar, and Mindshare.
O’Shea also worked client-side - including brand management at Diageo, and as the first marketer at an award-winning startup. She holds a master’s degree in Geography from Cambridge University, and an MBA from London Business School & Haas, Berkeley.
Elizabeth Paul
Chief Strategy Officer, The Martin Agency
Elizabeth Paul is the chair of the 4A’s Strategy Committee and Chief Strategy Officer of The Martin Agency – Ad Age’s 2023 Agency of the Year. She loves the way strategy can lay the groundwork for counter-intuitive moves, breakthrough campaigns and ambitious business results.
In her role at Martin - best known for representing brands like GEICO, Old Navy, DoorDash, OREO and UPS - she helps shape strategy and guide business development. Paul also authored the Visibility Brief, an open-source tool to check bias, blind spots and illuminate insights in a way that broadens perspectives as marketers. This has helped lead Martin to AOY for three consecutive years and to be named to Fast Company’s 2023 list of Most Innovative Companies.
Previously Paul enjoyed a four-year stint with MullenLowe U.S. where she became one the of the youngest CSOs in the industry. While there she was recognized by Creativity as “Strategist of the Year,” Ad Age’s “40 Under 40” and Women of the A-List.” A three-time winner of the Jay Chiat Award, Elizabeth is also proud to serve as chair of the 4A’s Strategy Committee.
Elizabeth resides in Richmond with her husband, three amazing kids and a 180-pound Great Dane, Oliver.
Becca Peel
Lead Strategist, Contagious
Becca Peel is a Lead Strategist on the advisory team at Contagious, a creative and strategic consultancy that helps ad agencies and brands deliver more creative and effective marketing. In her role, she helps marketing organisations build more progressive creative cultures and drive more effective creative outputs through creative transformation programmes, in-depth strategic reports, trend briefings, and more. She is also a contributor to Contagious Quarterly magazine and Contagious IQ, an intelligence platform known as a global benchmark for advertising excellence.
Ivan Perez-Armendariz
EVP/Head of Digital Experience, Deutsch LA
As the Head of Digital Experience at Deutsch LA, Ivan leads a team of over 50, merging strategy, creativity, and technology to build category-leading digital experiences that drive business growth. He's an Entrepreneur Magazine’s Top 100 award winner who sold his agency to Crispin Porter + Bogusky (CP+B). As CP+B's Global Chief Digital Officer for nine years, he innovated Domino’s Pizza ecommerce, including emoji ordering. At Deutsch LA, he led a transformational redesign of the Taco Bell ordering app. Ivan is also a key leader in AI initiatives, leading projects like Snapple's ChatGPT-powered "fAIct Generator" and the internal "Crafted by AI Create-a-thon." Additionally, he oversees Deutsch LA's LatinX ERG group, nurturing LatinX talent. A Stanford alum, he now enjoys beach life in Los Angeles.
Ericka Podesta-McCoy
Chief Marketing Officer, Resonate
Ericka McCoy, Chief Marketing Officer, is a global marketing executive experienced in building brands, facilitating growth and driving revenue in the high-tech, telecom, manufacturing, energy and hospitality sectors across North America, Europe and Asia.
Shane Quinn
Senior Director, Strategy, George P. Johnson
Shane Quinn is a strategist with over a decade of experience in brand, content and experiential. He’s spent the past five years at George P. Johnson (GPJ) leading experience strategy for some of the world’s biggest brands, including Google, State Farm and PwC—and his programs have won a variety of awards from Event Marketer, Hermes, Stevie Awards, Communicator and more. Shane specializes in designing experiences and audience journeys that are story-driven, and built from a foundation of purpose and intent.
Shane’s experience working with B2C and B2B brands across industries give him a unique perspective, and a wealth of tools and tactics to pull from. Shane also co-leads GPJ’s Trends Practice, a group of strategists and marketers responsible for monitoring market and industry trends, and synthesizing them into reports, POVs and guidance. Prior to the agency world, Shane was a core member of the iHeartRadio team responsible for evolving iHeart from a small, web-based streaming service into a globally recognized brand.
Kate Rush Sheehy
SVP, Strategy + Insights, GSD&M
Kate leads the strategy department at GSD&M — a group of thinkers, makers and “great question!”-askers who build First & Only brands like Southwest Airlines, Tyson, and Stanley. Kate joined GSD&M from Expedia Group where she led global brand strategy and advertising for Vrbo. Prior to that, she helped open R/GA Austin, where she led strategy and helped make Crocs cool again and launched Fossil into the wearables space. After college, Kate also spent time in Austin’s start-up world before getting back to using the Advertising degree she earned from the University of Texas at Austin.
Todd Sussman
CSO, FCB
Todd steers the strategic vision at FCB New York for its full range of clients, including AB InBev, FDA Center for Tobacco Products, Haleon, MorningStar Farms and Spotify.
He began his career learning the value of 1:1 engagement by writing telemarketing scripts for brands like Sony and Xerox. He then “grew up” into digital strategy for brands like Intel and Diageo and eventually expanded into brand strategy with award-winning, creative-driven accounts like Canon and the NFL. All that is to say, Todd values the power of data to drive performance while simultaneously holding the strong belief that strategy is an outdoor sport – which means you have to get out into culture to truly understand why the world works the way it does. At the intersection of this evidence-based approach and empathetic cultural insights is the energy that unleashes the power of creativity.
Since taking on the role of CSO in 2018 — while he has played an integral role in FCB NY’s growth, helping the agency achieve an unprecedented YOY increase in revenue — Todd is most proud of the team he has built. A diverse group of smart, relentless, curious, lateral thinkers that bring unique perspectives and strategic solutions to their clients’ challenges.
Monica Tailor
Chief Social Marketing Officer, McCann
Monica Tailor, Chief Social Marketing Officer at McCann. With over 20 years of experience in the sector, Tailor was appointed to lead McCann’s global social media practice, McCann LIVE in 2022. Having spent years building and operationalizing the practice she leads the development of the practice through our global network and offices, working with clients to develop and elevate brands social media presence and creative to deliver business impact. Tailor is a regular contributer to industry awards, speaking on top stages and writing thought leadership pieces around digital advertising, social media, talent development and DE&I.
Jeff Tan
TEDx Speaker, 7 Continents Marathoner
Jeff Tan, a renowned global ultramarathoner, motivational speaker, and visionary innovation leader in Los Angeles, is dedicated to helping people overcome their inherited limiting beliefs, unlocking their full potential in all areas of life.
Notably, he achieved a remarkable feat by completing the Antarctic Ice Marathon in the harsh frozen conditions, conquering a marathon on each of the seven continents. This extraordinary journey has shaped Jeff's perspective on unleashing the human spirit and serves as a powerful example of what can be achieved with a determined mindset and commitment to an idea that scares you.
Jeff serves as Director of Co-Innovation at Microsoft, collaborating with Fortune 500 companies to envision and architect transformative solutions to solve their critical business challenges.
As the President of the L.A. Leggers, a prominent running club in America, he witnesses the transformative impact of helping individuals overcome limitations, leading to healthier, happier, and more fulfilling lives.
With his dynamic approach and diverse experiences, Jeff Tan inspires audiences to embrace their inner champions and reach new heights in their personal and professional journeys.
For more info, visit www.JeffroTan.com.
Dylan Viner
Chief Strategy Officer, TRIPTK
As CSO of TRIPTK, Dylan combines his experiences leading teams at innovation consultancies, ad agencies and digital studios to help brands create positive connections with people and contributions to culture.
Over the last fifteen years, Dylan has worked on everything from Supreme and Google to Nike and Rolex, fintech and fluffed marshmallow vodka to autonomous driving and cannabis. Some of his most impactful work involves helping companies to envision and bring to market category-subverting new products, as well as designing and embedding flexible innovation processes that stick.
Dylan is a native Londoner, living in Brooklyn with his wife, two kids and dog. He is a passionate photographer and an aspiring boxer. He holds a first class degree in Philosophy from the University of Bristol. His poison of choice is a negroni.
Timanni Walker
Strategy Director, BBH USA
Timanni Walker is an award-winning strategy director based in NYC working at BBH USA. She is responsible for highly effective campaigns for brands like Google Shopping, WNBA, Royal Caribbean,Samsung, Knorr, CVS, BCBS and more. Whatever room or Zoom she’s in, from CMOs to coworkers, you can always expect Walker to encourage you to be more brave, inclusive, and kind. Her work has been recognized by most prestigious award shows - Cannes Lions, The One Show, D&AD,Clio Awards, The International Andy Awards, and The Webbys. Her favorite part of being a director is nurturing junior talent into the strategic powerhouses they were destined to be.
In addition to being client whisperer and creative cheerleader, she’s a contributing writer to Adweek, offers her strategic prowess to other Black-owned businesses in her neighborhood, and owns a women suiting business called Always in Pursuit.
Krystle Watler
Head of Creative Agency Partnerships, North America, TikTok
Krystle Watler is the Head of Creative Agency Partnerships, N.A. at TikTok responsible for building relationships and platform adoption amongst the creative agency community. Prior to this, Krystle was the Managing Director at Virtue, the full-service creative agency born from VICE, in the Americas. There, Krystle was responsible for the regional P&L and leading teams across all departments.
Krystle is a proud alumna of Spelman College and member of the 2020 Adweek 50 List of top media, marketing, and technology leaders, Ad Age's 2019 class of Women to Watch in the U.S., and 2019 nominee of AdColor’s Rock Star Award.