Sreenath “Pendy” Pendyala is currently the Vice President of Americas Consumer Support Delivery. He leads an organization that addresses the support needs of over 100 million HP consumers who use over 5000 consumer products marketed by HP in the US. In addition he has functional leadership for the Americas region including Canada and Latin America. A robust network of contact center and hardware service partners located across the world are part of the extended organization that provides such support. Previously, he was the Vice President of Americas Partner Operations at Hewlett Packard Company. In that role his organization was responsible for all the processes and systems that enabled sales of HP products through enterprise, commercial and consumer channels, and supported all HP business units. Pre HP-Compaq merger, he was the General Manager of the Wireless & Internet Solutions Organization at Hewlett Packard Company. His Division was responsible for worldwide partnerships with Internet Service Providers in order to offer their services to consumers of HP appliances, PC’s and peripherals and for providing mobile solutions involving Smart Handhelds, software and services to businesses.
Prior to joining HP in early 2000, he was guiding early stage start–ups in the mobile computing products space and e-commerce space. Before that, he was the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Mobility Electronics, Inc., the leading independent provider of notebook docking solutions and power accessories. Pendy joined Mobility from Adaptec Inc., where he was the General Manager of the Portable Products Group. Prior to that, he was the Vice President and General Manager of the Compact Convenience Products Division at Seiko Instruments USA Inc. He is credited with founding that Division and establishing it as a global industry leader through introduction of consumer friendly, innovative computer peripherals and software in combination with innovative management practices. Before working in the US, he held various management positions with Metal Box India Limited a subsidiary of the World’s leading packaging firm, Carnaud-Metal Box.
Pendy has a Bachelor of Engineering degree from the Indian Institute of technology, Madras, a Masters in Business Administration from Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta and a Masters in Business Administration with emphasis on International Business from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles.
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Gary Gibbs is AAA Arizona’s Senior Vice-President for Service Delivery. His responsibilities are centered on where, when, and how AAA members come into contact with the organization, ensuring they receive quality service. This includes Automotive Services, especially Emergency Road Service, as well as much of the Club’s call center operations.
Additionally, Gary oversees the Club’s Public Relations and Government Affairs efforts. He has been with AAA Arizona for 17 years.
A former U. S. Marine and Vietnam veteran, Gary is a graduate of Florida International University in Miami. At the conclusion of his military service, he began a decade-long career in journalism as a newspaper reporter, initially with Knight Ridder’s suburban newspaper division in Miami and later with The Miami News and The Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Prior to joining AAA Arizona, he gained his business experience as state manager for a regional inventory service in Seattle and Phoenix.
Gary resides with his wife, Rebecca, in Goodyear, Arizona.
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Jon Blum is the Sr. Manager of R&D for Best Buy Enterprise Customer Care. Jon has 15 years experience in implementing and reinventing call center sales and support programs in the retail, financial services, global insurance, retail banking and hospitality industries.
Jon’s talents include a combination of business process innovator, sales strategist, report architect and customer advocate.
He has designed and developed enterprise reporting and incentive processes and systems for a major hospitality company in the U.S. This enabled the company to quickly expand its service offerings, provide value as well as reduce operating costs by over 40% within its first year. He also created CRM system-wide reporting for a global financial services provider which included restructuring front and back office brokerage business units, identifying a new systems total cost of ownership model, and consolidating redundant processes.
Recently, Jon was responsible for developing and scaling Geek Squad sales and support for nationwide market penetration through service delivery in the phone channel. Service revenue over the phone from the Geek Squad brand is on track for a 15 fold increase in this fiscal year.
Jon Blum attended the University of Minnesota and the University of Akron with degree focus in Chemistry and Mathematics. He is an active participant in Best Buy and Geek Squad innovation strategies, and is providing key contact center pilot options for major growth areas to support incoming multi-channel value propositions.
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Brad Pitt, Senior Director of Field Services and Sales joined Choice Hotels International in April 2004. During the past year, Mr. Pitt's organization has driven over $80M in sales through both a field based sales organization, and a newly created inside sales team and call center. Mr. Pitt was instrumental in converting an e-procurement help desk function into an Inside Sales organization handling both in-bound sales and outbound telemarketing capabilities. Prior to joining Choice Hotels, Mr. Pitt was the Worldwide Director of Sales for Custom, IVR and Call Center Products for Inter-Tel, Inc in Washington, DC. In this capacity Mr. Pitt managed a team of sales executives and sales engineers focused on call center solutions, while also managing sales through 61 branch offices, and a dealer/VAR distribution channel of over 200 business partners. In addition, Mr. Pitt was the Director of Eastern Region Sales at Lucent Technologies managing programmable switch sales, and establishing a Customer Needs Assessment program to identify top product feature priorities based on revenue opportunities. Mr. Pitt also assisted in the launch of two successful technology business ventures and formerly served on the Board of Directors for Synapsys, Inc. Earlier in his career, Mr. Pitt held various sales and technical positions in the PC software industry. Mr. Pitt graduated from the University of Maryland in College Park, Maryland with a BS degree in Computer Science. He currently resides in Woodbine, Maryland.
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Steve Rooks is Vice President, Contact Simplification and Expertise Center (CSEC) at Bell Canada. Steve has spent the majority of his time over the last 18 months driving a major simplification program in Consumer Markets. With his current assignment, he is focused on simplification initiatives that specifically impact Bell’s Consumer Contact Centres, as well as leading the assessment, planning and implementation of all major Marketing and technology projects across the contact centres. Under Steve’s leadership, the CSEC’s overarching objective and guiding principle is to ensure that all projects result in a positive and improved experience for Bell’s customers and its agents
Prior to joining Bell, Steve worked at the global management consulting firm, Bain & Company, for many years, helping to drive growth and improvement programs across many different industries, including telecom, high technology, auto manufacturing, retail, and forest products. Prior to that, Steve worked at IBM Manufacturing for several years.
Steve attended University of Toronto where he earned both an Honours B.A.Sc. and an Honours M.A.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering. Steve also attended Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business where he earned an M.B.A. and was an Arjay Miller Scholar. In his spare time, Steve is passionate about having a lot of fun with his children, whether it is skiing, canoeing, golfing or playing baseball.
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Remus Siclovan is a Senior System Analyst in the Call Center Group at Health Net. Remus is responsible for the Integration of Speech Enabled Interactive Voice and Customer Service Interface applications for all Health Net Contact Center Sites. Remus recently launched SpicTec a speech technology integration consulting enterprise.
