2020 Annual Conference Bios
Jill Abbott | Head of Consumer Engagement, PepsiCo, Gatorade
Jill Abbott currently serves as Head of Consumer and Athlete Engagement for Gatorade, where she spearheads the brand’s integrated marketing campaigns and initiatives.
In this role, she leads the team in developing best-in-class 360 marketing campaigns, crafting strategies that marry advertising, digital and social media, E-Commerce, branded content, paid media, as well as experiential marketing.
As a PepsiCo veteran, Jill honed her brand management and marketing acumen by working in a variety of posts including Gatorade’s hydration business and PepsiCo’s Global Nutrition Group. She was the driving force behind brand strategy, media partnerships, branded content campaigns, and delivered on growth expectations.
In between tenures at PepsiCo, Jill was Head of Brand Marketing for Boulder Brands and dove into start-up marketing, serving as Vice President of Marketing for the fashion and footwear start-up Bucketfeet, where she guided the integrated marketing communication efforts, including brand development and positioning, for the venture-backed e-commerce brand.
Jill earned her BA from Washington University in St. Louis in Anthropology and later received an MBA from Georgetown University.
Melissa Brotz | Vice President, Global Marketing and External Affairs, Abbott
Melissa is Abbott’s Vice President, Global Marketing and External Affairs, with responsibility for Corporate marketing, communications, and citizenship and sustainability. Melissa also serves as President of the Abbott Fund, Abbott’s philanthropic foundation.
Melissa was appointed to her current role in September 2018. She joined Abbott in 1996 after several years with leading public relations agencies, and rose through a series of positions in its pharmaceuticals business and corporate office, most recently heading the company’s global communications group.
Having been with the company through more than two decades of continual strategic transformation, she’s gained deep understanding of the importance of corporate identity.
“Identity and reputation are a company’s most important assets,” she says. “They’re our bond with the people we serve. We want the world to know the role we play in it, the contributions we make, and the values we stand for.
Melissa is a member of the Arthur W. Page Society, the Public Relations Society of America and the Medill School of Journalism Board of Advisers at Northwestern University, from which she earned a Bachelor’s Degree.
Walter Faulstroh | Co-founder and CEO, Hum Nutrition
Walter is HUM Nutrition’s co-founder, CEO and top innovator. He loves to connect consumers with products and services that ultimately improve their lives.
Walter has launched 3 health and wellness companies over the past 16 years, with HUM being his latest venture. Prior to HUM, he launched the UK’s first vitamin enhanced water, which was acquired by PepsiCo International, and the UK’s first full service low cost gym chain.
Walter believes that wellness has to be affordable, deliver results, be easy to understand and be fun, which is why at HUM consumers experience the latest scientifically researched nutrients, in pure and potent formulations that deliver on their promises with colourful, witty and engaging brand messaging. Walter sees education as a critical success factor for wellness and has pioneered free RD Nutritionist advice through HUM’s website, www.HumNutrition.com making wellness accessible for all.
Rachael Henke | Director Global Brand Advertising, Content and Customer Storytelling, Dell Technologies
Rachael Henke is the Director of Dell Technologies Global Brand Advertising, Content and Customer Storytelling. Rachael has 20 years of marketing experience across B2B and Consumer brands, both in agency and corporate environments. After spending the past ten years at Dell Technologies in various marketing roles, she is now focused on building the Dell Technologies brand globally, leading a (fantastic) team to drive results with breakthrough creative, data-driven media decisions and ridiculously engaging customer-focused content – at scale.
Rachael lives in Austin, TX. In her personal time, she is the mom of Roblox-obsessed Simone, and Roblox-obsessed Axel (2020 was the year of screens), in normal times, she loves catching live local music, and is always trying to rearrange her schedule to sneak off to do yoga and meditation.
Victoria Morrissey | Global Marketing & Brand Director, Caterpillar
Victoria Morrissey is Global Marketing & Brand Director for Caterpillar. Victoria is responsible for constantly evolving the impact of one of the world’s greatest brands, leading Caterpillar’s end-to-end enterprise marketing capabilities, brand identity, global licensing business, global brand sponsorships and the Cat Industrial Design team. Upon joining Caterpillar in April 2017, Victoria brought with her a rare combination of a Brand and Marketing professional with 20+ years of B2B and B2C experience spanning clients, industries and marketing disciplines. Putting the customer at the center of all efforts, her leadership and passionate drive make her a highly effective marketing leader and cross functional collaborator.
Prior to Caterpillar, Victoria served as the Marketing Director at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Chicago. Before that, Victoria was Director of Brand, Content and Private Label Marketing at Grainger where she launched a brand platform that delivered double-digit growth in key market segments and successfully grew multiples brands, all while building high-performing, cross-functional teams.
Victoria’s broad and extensive career is grounded in nearly 20 years leading marketing efforts across industries at numerous global ad agencies.
Victoria holds a Master degree in Advertising and Bachelors in Marketing from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Fluent in German, Victoria spends her free time writing, cooking and doing pro-bono marketing work for causes that are very near and dear to her.
Russ Findlay | Operating Partner, H.I. G. Capital
Russell Findlay is a sales and marketing executive currently serving as a Senior Executive Director and Operating Partner for H.I.G Capital. Most recently, he served as the Global Chief Marketing Officer for the international insurer Hiscox, as well as CMO of their Asian subsidiary, Direct Asia. While at Hiscox, Findlay grew the Hiscox Direct to Consumer business from $23M to over $350M. Previously, he held executive marketing roles at IHOP, Major League Soccer and PepsiCo, where he launched the Sierra Mist and PepsiMax brands. Russell spent his first 11 years of his career at Unilever with roles in e-commerce, sales and brand management.
An award-winning marketer, Findlay volunteers his time giving back to the marketing community. He is on the following Boards: Board of Directors of ANA Business Marketing NYC and The National Advertising Review Board – Americas arbiter for companies disputing competitors advertising and claims.
Paul Hirsch | President and CCO, Doremus
Paul is a creative leader with a history of producing beautifully crafted work for some of the world’s most interesting brands. Guided by the belief that good design is good business, Paul’s experience includes leading global agencies and starting an award-winning, independent one. Among his honors are an Emmy, an Amazon charting book, and awards of all shapes and sizes from Cannes, The One Show, the Effies and D&AD. None of which his kids admire as much as his trophy for “Best Dancer” from Elaine Grossman’s Bat Mitzvah.
Nicole Huynh | Head of Enterprise Growth Marketing, BNY Mellon
Nicole Huynh is the Head of Enterprise Growth Marketing at BNY Mellon, where she is responsible for developing go-to-market strategies and campaigns to accelerate growth of key segments and regions for the Bank. Previously, she was the head of marketing for Digital and Data Solutions, and Securities Services & Digital. An experienced B2B and B2C marketer, Nicole has held leadership positions at MSCI, Neuberger Berman, and J.P. Morgan. She has built her career around developing transformative brand and client engagement programs to help businesses grow in a competitive marketplace. Nicole is a proud graduate of Bryn Mawr College. She currently serves as a member of the College’s President’s Advisory Council.
Etienne Katz | SVP, Event Partnerships & Strategic Growth, CNBC | NBCUniversal
Etienne Katz is the SVP, Event Partnerships & Strategic Growth at CNBC | NBCUniversal, responsible for leading the team that drives experiential impact for advertisers through event sponsorships. With over three decades in the world of advertising, Etienne’s career has spanned sales leadership positions at Ziff-Davis, Time Inc., Dow Jones / The Wall Street Journal, Twitter, and how, in his current role that brings the power of the CNBC newsroom to in-person and virtual event experiences. He takes pride in giving back to the industry via long standing posts on the Board of ANA Business Marketing NYC and The Financial Communications Society, along with dedicating time to a robust group of mentees.
Jon Miller | CMO, Demandbase
Jon Miller is the CMO of Demandbase. Most recently, Miller was the co-founder and CEO of Engagio, which merged with Demandbase in June 2020. Earlier, Miller was co-founder and CMO for Marketo (acquired by Adobe). He is the author of many books including Demandbase’s Clear and Complete Guide to Account Based Experience (ABX) and Marketo’s Definitive Guide to Marketing Automation. He was named ‘Most Influential Marketing CEO of the Year’ by the Corporate Excellence Awards, one of the ‘10 Most Influential Tech Marketers’ in the world by B2B Marketing, and a Top 10 CMO for companies under $250M the CMO Institute.
Ray Oram | VP, Account Based Marketing, IBM
Ray has held several key executive positions at IBM in communications, sales enablement, and marketing. Ray currently leads account-based marketing for 300 top clients globally. Ray is known for building outcomes focused, intensely collaborative and inspired teams. Ray reinvented the sales enablement profession company-wide, launching a centralized enablement platform with over 150,000 users. Ray has led strategic communications and brand experience for North America, Southwest Europe, and Global Sales – resulting in increased brand consideration, improved employee engagement and higher client relationship NPS. Ray has been recognized by IT Services Marketing Association, Direct Marketing Association and American Marketing Association.
Tom Stein | Chairman and Chief Growth Officer, Stein IAS
Tom is Chairman and Chief Growth Officer of Stein IAS. He’s been a B2B marketing leader, thought leader and innovator for more than 35 years. Tom is part of the leadership team that has propelled Stein IAS to global B2B Agency of the Year designation by ANA for an unprecedented nine times over the past 12 years. In 2021, Stein IAS earned the distinction of being named Agency of the Year on four separate occasions in a single year and received the first-ever WARC Effectiveness Award for B2B (gold) in association with LIONS. In 2022, Stein IAS became the first agency to win the WARC Effectiveness Award for B2B (gold) at Cannes two consecutive years.
Long an advocate for creativity in B2B, Tom was a significant influence in the decision by Cannes Lions to launch a Creative B2B Lions at the 2022 Festival. Tom in turn was invited to join the inaugural B2B Lions jury. In 2017, Tom was among the first inductees into the ANA B-to-B Hall of Fame.
Allison Knapp Womack | Chief Operating Officer, Effie Worldwide
Allison Knapp Womack is a Chief Operating Officer at Effie Worldwide, the global organization that leads, inspires, and champions the practice and practitioners of marketing effectiveness. As COO, she oversees key worldwide programs including the Effie Awards, the development of Effie’s global network, and broader operations for Effie Worldwide.
Allison brings over two decades of agency and marketing experience, most recently as SVP and Chief Marketing Officer at Enterprise Community Partners, a national affordable housing nonprofit. She has also held multiple leadership roles at Omnicom’s B2B agency Doremus, including President of the flagship New York office. Prior to joining Doremus, Allison held senior positions at Ogilvy, Young & Rubicam and Wunderman.
Heather Keets Wright | Co-Founder and CEO, Wright Creative
Heather is a creative and thought leader in the agency and branded content space, having led work for large, complex clients for over a decade. In 2015 she co-founded Wright Creative with her husband, documentary filmmaker Mark W. Wright. Wright Creative’s clients include TIAA, Sunbelt Rentals, Trane, Parkdale, and Kellogg.
A winner of the Women in Content Marketing Award 2020 – General Excellence, Heather is a graduate of Syracuse University—she and Wright Creative blend journalism and brand storytelling to bring diverse thought to content where there is none. Heather recently served as Supervising Producer for Milestone Generations, an HBOMax documentary about the first and only Black superhero universe. Upcoming documentaries from Wright Creative include The Bison Project and Can’t Retire from This.