Digital Futures 2022 – Speakers

Jan Burchhardt, Director of Digital Transformation, Porsche AG

Jan is co-leading Porsche’s digital transformation activities and is a key driver in sparking excitement for digital technologies inside and outside Porsche. With his aim to bring the Porsche experience into the digital era, he’s fostering Porsche’s efforts to become a digitally enabled carmaker’ embedded into an ecosystem around its iconic cars. With his background in information systems, Jan worked in IT Consulting and holds more than 20 years of experience in the automotive and mobility industry for topics such as IT Strategy, Strategic Agility, Digital Sales, and IT Program Management. 

Kathryn Brohman, Director of Master of Digital Product Management, Associate Professor and Distinguished Faculty Fellow in Digital Technology, Smith School of Business, Queen’s University, Canada  

 

Kathryn is the founding Director of the Master of Digital Product Management at the Smith School of Business, Queen’s University in Canada. As an Associate Professor and Distinguished Faculty Fellow in Digital Technology, she is a thought leader in technology-induced organizational change and has co-authored two books and dozens of articles based on work with hundreds of organizations in North America. Her work has been influential in helping companies of all sizes improve productivity and performance by enhancing digital leadership, innovation, and management practices that uncover new opportunities and bring digital initiatives to scale.   Kathryn is also the co-founder of the Association of Information Systems (AIS) special interest group in Digital Innovation, Transformation and Entrepreneurship, an international academic community that helps to shape research and thought leadership in this area of study.   

Rochelle L. Williams, PhD, Chief Programs Officer, National Society of Black Engineers  

(She/her) 

Rochelle L. Williams, Ph.D. is an engineer, educator, and advocate for equitable work environments in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professions. Dr. Williams is the Chief Programs Officer at the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), whose mission is to increase the number of Black engineers who excel academically, succeed professionally, and positively impact the community. In this role, she serves as the chief programs officer responsible for achieving the strategic outcomes of the society and for the logistical planning and implementation of the programs from the Pre-Collegiate, Collegiate and Professional demographics. 

Prior to joining NSBE, Dr. Rochelle served as Project Director and Co-Principal Investigator for the ADVANCE Resource Coordination (ARC) Network with the Association for Women in Science (AWIS) and Research Scientist in the Office for Academic Affairs at Prairie View A&M University. In 2016, Rochelle was selected as a Christine Mirzayan Science and Technology Policy Fellow with the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine in Washington, DC. As a fellow, she supported the Committee on Women in Science, Engineering, and Medicine on the initial phases of the study that led to the Sexual Harassment of Women: Climate, Culture, and Consequences in Academic Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report. 

Dr. Williams frequently delivers workshops and presentations to professional societies, industry, and academia centered on mitigating systemic barriers that prevents the full participation of traditionally marginalized persons. Since 2012, she has worked as a subject-matter expert for the National Science Foundation on issues regarding cultures of inclusion, broadening participation, and university education programs.  

Having received her Bachelor of Science in physics from Spelman College and both her Master of Engineering in Mechanical Engineering and Ph.D. in Science and Mathematics Education from Southern University and A&M College, Dr. Williams intentionally works to promote the excellence and innovation at Historically Black Colleges and Universities.  

Fiona Jamison, CEO, Spring International

Fiona brings 25 years of experience conducting research and providing solutions to organizations with specific expertise in employee engagement, employee relations, diversity, and people analytics.  She is a sought after speaker and well known for her ability to translate complex data into easy-to-understand insights that promote action and can improve business performance. 

Her women-owned business, Spring International provides custom research and analytics for Fortune 500 companies across the United States and internationally. She is the author of numerous articles on people analytics, change management and engagement. Fiona’s Ph.D. is in Human Resource Management from the University of Bristol and was an Honorary Research Fellow for the University of Wolverhampton (U.K.).  In the USA, she has been an adjunct professor at Villanova & Temple University and is involved with leading HR think tank organizations such as the Wharton Research Advisory Group, University of Pennsylvania and the Philadelphia Society for People and Strategy HCA Group.  She currently sits on the Diversity Committee for NAWBO and the Board of POWER, a women’s leadership development association. She is also is a mum of two teenagers!

Marco Costa, Chief Executive Officer, Americas Serviços Médicos, UnitedHealth Group Brasil 

A senior executive with over 20 years’ experience leading large healthcare organizations to achieve superlative results across multiple business units, physician groups, and hospital operations. A world-renowned physician-scientist, led innovation, and service line strategy across an 18-hospital integrated health system in Cleveland, Ohio. Currently serves as CEO of UnitedHealthcare’s premium national health system in Brazil, overseeing 17k employees, 27k physicians serving 60K patients daily at 16 hospitals and 41 outpatient centers. Expertise in biomedical research, system integration, data analytics, human-centered design, strategy-execution, and healthcare delivery. A dynamic, visionary, and principled leader with demonstrated ability to build trusting relationships, reconcile competing priorities, design system strategies, align people and purpose, and execute within complex organizations and competitive markets. 

Americas Oversees 17k employees and 27k physicians serving 60K patients daily at 16 hospitals and 41 outpatient centers across 6 States in Brazil. 

Minjun Kim, Robert C. Womack Endowed Chair Professor of Engineering at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Southern Methodist University

Dr. MinJun Kim is presently the Robert C. Womack Endowed Chair Professor of En-gineering at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Southern Methodist Universi-ty. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Yonsei University in Korea and Texas A&M University, respectively. Dr. Kim completed his Ph.D. degree in Engineering at Brown University, where he held the prestigious Si-mon Ostrach Fellowship. Following his graduate studies, Dr. Kim was a postdoctoral research fellow at the Rowland Institute in Harvard University. He joined Drexel University in 2006 as Assistant Professor and was later promoted to Professor of Me-chanical Engineering and Mechanics. Dr. Kim has been exploring biologically inspired sensing and actuation to develop new types of nano/micro robotics. His notable awards include the National Science Foundation CAREER Award (2008), Drexel Ca-reer Development Award (2008), Human Frontier Science Program Young Investiga-tor Award (2009), Army Research Office Young Investigator Award (2010), Alexan-der von Humboldt Fellowship (2011), KOFST Brain Pool Fellowship (2013 & 2015), Bionic Engineering Outstanding Contribution Award (2013), Louis & Bessie Stein Fellowship (2008 & 2014), ISBE Fellow (2014), ASME Fellow (2014), Top10 UNESCO-Netexplo Award (2016), KSEA & KOFST Engineer of the Year Award (2016), IEEE Senior Member (2017), Sam Taylor Fellowship (2018), Gerald J. Ford Research Fellowship (2018), and Protégé of the Academy of Medicine, Engineering and Science of Texas (2019). 

Youngjin Yoo, Elizabeth M. and William C. Treuhaft Professor in Entrepreneurship and Professor of Information Systems, Department of Design & Innovation, Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University

Youngjin Yoo is the Elizabeth M. and William C. Treuhaft Professor in Entrepreneurship and Professor of Information Systems at the department of Design & Innovation at the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University. An Association of Information Systems Fellow, he is also WBS Distinguished Research Environment Professor at Warwick Business School, UK. and a Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics, UK.  He is the founding faculty director of xLab at Case Western Reserve University. He has taught digital innovation strategy around the globe at business schools such as London School of Economics, Warwick Business School, Indian School of Business, Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich, Hitotsubashi University, Aalto University, and Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology.  He is an expert on digital innovation. His 2010 Information Systems Research article is the most influential paper in digital innovation according to Google Scholar. He has received over $4.5 million in research grant from National Science Foundation, NASA, James S. and John L. Knight Foundation, the Department of Commerce, National Research Foundation of Korea, and Samsung Electronics. His work was published at leading academic journals such as MIS Quarterly, Information Systems Research, Organization Science, the Communications of the ACM, and the Academy of Management Journal among others. He has worked with leading companies including Samsung Electronics, Samsung Economic Research Institute, American Greetings, Progressive Insurance, Goodyear Tire, Sotera Health, Bendix, Moen, Intel, Ford Motor Company, Andersen Consulting, IDEO, Gehry and Partners, University Hospitals in Cleveland, American Management Systems, Lotus, NASA, Parker Hannifin, PolyOne and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Beth Dawson, Director of Strategic Initiatives, Mars Wrigley US

Beth Dawson is the Director of Strategic Initiatives for Mars Wrigley US. In this role she leads a team of internal consultants that drive strategy execution through holistic program management, change management and process improvement solutions.  

Beth is also an adjunct instructor at Temple University Fox School of Business where she teaches Organizational Communications and Change Leadership. Her focus is teaching undergraduate students and MBA candidates how to develop high-performing teams and lead change through creative and inclusive communication strategies.  

Charlene O’Hanlon, VP and Managing Editor, Activate Marketing Services

Charlene O’Hanlon is an award-winning journalist and content professional serving the technology sector for more than 20 years as director, executive editor and managing editor for numerous technology-focused sites. As VP and Managing Editor at Activate Marketing Services, she leads a team of writers and editors who create client-focused content for marketing programs in the B2B tech sector. In her former position as Chief Operating Officer at Techstrong Group, Charlene led the direction and management of Techstrong Learning and Techstrong Live! webinars and events divisions. Charlene also served as co-host and anchor of the Techstrong TV streaming broadcast. 
 
Charlene is co-author of “The Lifecycle of Fashion Technology” and is a frequent speaker at industry events and conferences. In her spare time, she is an avid drummer and is working toward achieving a Level 4 Diploma in Wines from the Wine & Spirit Education Trust (WSET). 

Jerry Grunewald, Vice President, Operations, INVISTA

Jerry is currently the Vice President of Operations at INVISTA which is part of Koch Industries, one of the largest privately held companies in the United States.  Jerry leads INVISTA’s Operations Transformation effort, which is focused on delivering value from the Digital Plant of the Future.  He and his team are focused on four workstreams:

  • Process Control
  • Connected Worker
  • Material Flow Automation
  • Asset Performance Management

Jerry’s team focuses on unlocking the underlying data in each area to convert data to knowledge, knowledge to action, and action to value.  Prior to this role, Jerry led INVISTA’s global R&D team.  His group developed several breakthough technologies in Nylon 66 intermediates and polymer products and processes that have recently been or are currently being commercialized.

Jerry has worked for INVISTA and its predecessor company (DuPont) since 1989, after graduating with a BA in Chemistry degree from La Salle University (USA), and a Ph.D. in Organometallic Chemistry from the University of Florida (USA).  Over his career, Jerry has had a variety of roles in R&D and Operations and has worked at or led teams at all of INVISTA’s 11 global operations sites.  Jerry is a certified Six Sigma Black Belt and Master Black Belt.

Gerald C. (Jerry) Kane, Professor of Information Systems, University of Georgia Terry College of Business 

Dr. Gerald C. (Jerry) Kane is a Professor and the C. Herman and Mary Virginia Terry Chair in Business Administration at the Terry College of Business at the University of Georgia.  He researches and teaches about how companies can understand and respond to digital disruption to undergraduate, graduate, and executive education students worldwide; and he has published over 100 papers, articles, and reports on these topics. He has written two books for MIT Press: The Technology Fallacy: How People are the Real Key to Digital Transformation and the The Transformation Myth: Leading Your Organization Through Uncertain Times. 

John Wright, Senior Director, Associate Experience, Global IT, The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company

John Wright has been with the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company for over 17 years in a variety of roles with increasing scope and responsibility focusing on digital delivery, advanced analytics and data-driven insights. 

John began his career at Goodyear as a Project Manager in the Enterprise Data Warehouse.   He then took roles with increasing responsibility in the North American Sales & Marketing organization creating Tire Prediction applications, Industry Models, and Business Insights for the Consumer business as leader of the Industry Reporting and Strategic Pricing teams. 

John took over digital and analytics in North American IT, with responsibilities for Retail and Dealer Point of Sale, B2B platforms, and Business Intelligence.  He moved to a corporate leadership role reporting to the CIO with Digital, Collaboration and Analytics as his global responsibility.  Afterwards John reported to the CTO and CIO as Senior Director of Global Technology IT in a functional role embracing a wide range of technologies enabling thousands of engineers globally.

John’s current responsibility is the Senior Director of Associate Experience, ensuring our associates have the technology capabilities to collaborative effectively anywhere in the world, and be productive whether at the office or remote.

John holds a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Akron and lives in Medina with his daughter.  John is also a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom I as a Company Commander and is part of the Goodyear Veteran’s Association.

DeAnna R Hanzel, Organizational Development Professional, The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.

DeAnna has specialized in Organizational Development and related fields for more than 20 years. She began her career with a small community bank where she led learning and change management efforts for several M&As and was integral to the development of talent and performance management programs, leadership development efforts and mentoring and coaching solutions. 

DeAnna joined KeyBank in 2012 where She supported much of the IT function as a business partner and consultant in organizational design, development, and change management.  She stood up a new Lean Six Sigma Project Office and drove a profound cultural shift to continuous improvement & Innovation across Key’s IT function. 

In 2016 DeAnna joined GY as a Talent and OD Partner supporting Quality, Research & Development and Engineering.  She implemented learning and change related solutions for a Green-field Plant, equipment installations, and consulted on the overhaul of a decades old technical ladder and career progressions program. In 2020 DeAnna moved to the IT function and has implemented the Global IT competency architecture and is leading the development of the “Digital Growth Academy”

DeAnna received her bachelor’s degree in Communication and Master’s in Interdisciplinary Studies, concentrated in Business Communication and Industrial/Organizational Psychology, both from Hiram College.  She resides in Newton Falls, Ohio with Her husband of 23 years and has two sons, Trevor, 21 and a 3rd year student at The University of Cincinnati and Holden 18, a senior at Newton Falls High School. She is a lifelong learner, movie buff and enjoys reading.

Farid Bichareh, Connected Plants Solutions Director, TCS

Farid Bichareh, TCS Connected Plants Solutions Director, is an executive, technology expert and entrepreneur with over 22 years’ experience defining solutions strategy for smart manufacturing and digital transformation, IoT/IIoT, and innovative technologies such as Optical Wireless Communication/Li-Fi and AI. He has co-founded several businesses and served as a board member and top executive for several organizations. At the Industrial IoT Consortium, he chairs the Smart Factory Task Group and is a member of the Steering Committee. He is a frequent speaker and author. 

Cliff Tironi, Executive VP of Strategic Accounts, Thinaer

Cliff Tironi is Executive VP of Strategic Accounts for Thinaer, a Platform-as-a-Service that synthesizes millions of physical, digital, and human experience data points every second to create AI-backed business insights. In his role, Cliff oversees the strategic sales efforts by creating trusting, value-driven relationships with Fortune 100 and 500 firms and partner organizations. Acquired by Thinaer in 2020, Cliff is co-creator of Thinaer’s proprietary real-time feedback platform, which is the core tool utilized in driving their digital transformation change management.  

Cliff has a background in data visualization. As an adjunct professor at Florida International University, Cliff teaches Executive MBAs how to be influential communicators, accurately define their business problems, and generate creative solutions to complex challenges, all through the discipline of Data Visualization. 

Kipum (Kip) Lee, Vice President, Innovation & Product Strategy, University Hospitals | UH Ventures

Kip is a designer, scholar, and healthcare executive at UH Ventures, the innovation and commercialization arm of University Hospitals. He manages an innovation portfolio that supports University Hospitals’ strategic initiatives and partnerships through product innovation and human-centered design. In this “living lab” model, the most promising opportunities are cultivated and positioned for system-wide adoption, commercialization support, and investment consideration.

Earlier in his career, he was part of the team at frog design that produced a mobile service around HIV awareness and self-testing in South Africa that was hailed by The Economist as “the world’s largest field trial in mobile health technology.” At Marriott International, he led the design of Marriott Mobile, which debuted at number four in the iTunes App Store and went on to become the third largest in mobile commerce revenue after Amazon and Apple. 

Kip graduated with a Bachelor of Applied Science in biomedical science from the University of Pennsylvania, master’s degree in interaction design from Carnegie Mellon University, and a PhD in management from Case Western Reserve University. He serves on the editorial board of the design and innovation journal, Design Issues, published by MIT Press.

Diana Bilimoria, KeyBank Professor and Chair of Organizational Behavior at the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University

Diana Bilimoria, Ph.D. is KeyBank Professor and Chair of Organizational Behavior at the Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University. Her research interests focus on gender, diversity, equity and inclusion in governance and leadership, and organizational transformation. Her studies have helped corporate, educational, and nonprofit organizations reinvent themselves and establish practices that attract and retain a high-performance, diverse workforce. She has written 4 books and over 135 academic journal articles and book chapters. Dr. Bilimoria was elected to serve on the Board of Governors of the Academy of Management, and served as the editor of the Journal of Management Education. Awards she has received include the Scholarly Contributions to Educational Practice Advancing Women in Leadership Award and the Janet Chusmir Distinguished Service Award from the Gender and Diversity in Organizations Division of the Academy of Management, the Weatherhead School of Management Enduring Research Impact Award, the Weatherhead School of Management Teaching Excellence Award, and the Weatherhead School of Management’s Doctoral Teaching Excellence Award. More detailed information is available at: http://faculty.weatherhead.case.edu/bilimoria.

Michael Lalich, Director, Technology, Team NEO

Michael leads Team NEO’s business expansion and attraction efforts with companies in the technology and financial services sectors in Northeast Ohio.  In his role, he works collaboratively with business executives and economic development partners to help companies overcome obstacles to growth they are facing and take advantage of resources in the local support ecosystem.  He leverages JobsOhio financial and talent programs to incentivize the growth of companies throughout the region.  Prior to his current role at Team NEO, Michael worked on business expansion and tech talent initiatives at Greater Cleveland Partnership, led business attraction efforts at Cleveland Health-Tech Corridor, and was an economic and workforce research analyst at Team NEO.  Michael is a graduate of Case Western Reserve University with a bachelor’s degree in political science and received a master’s degree in urban planning, design, and development from Cleveland State University.  He currently resides with his wife and daughter in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. 

Rebecca Scina, Cloud Delivery Manager, Hyland Software

My name is Rebecca Scina. My pronouns are she/her. I am a Cloud Delivery Manager and the President of the Hyland Pride Alliance (HPA) Employee Resource Group (ERG) at Hyland Software. I have been with Hyland for 14 years. In my role as a Cloud Delivery Manager, I work on multi-million-dollar OnBase software upgrade and migration projects to the Hyland Cloud. 

As HPA President, I have successfully established the annual Hyland sponsorship of Plexus, brought the Human Rights Campaign – Corporate Equality Index to Hyland, and have close to two hundred Hyland employee ERG members. My current focus is expanding HPA globally. We have twice a month virtual HPA social networking meetings with our employees in the Asia Pacific region. In 2023, I will be extending HPA meetings to our Europe, Africa, Middle East, and Latin America regions. I am a 2020 LeadDIVERISTY alum and the recipient of the 2021 PwC LeadDIVERISTY Alumni of the Year award. 

Nicholas Berente, Professor of IT, Analytics, & Operations at University of Notre Dame, Mendoza College of Business

Nicholas Berente is the Viola D. Hank Associate Professor of IT, Analytics, and Operations at the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business. He received his Ph.D. from Case Western Reserve University, conducted his postdoctoral studies at the University of Michigan, and was formerly faculty with the University of Georgia. His research interests include digital innovation, transformation, and entrepreneurship, artificial intelligence, and institutional change. Dr. Berente is an experienced entrepreneur, the principal investigator for a number of U.S. National Science Foundation projects, and has authored more than one hundred and fifty peer-reviewed scholarly articles. His work has been published in top journals, including Organization Science, Information Systems Research, MIS Quarterly, Research Policy, and Nature. He is Senior Editor at Information and Organization, Associate Editor for MIS Quarterly and Visiting Fellow at the University of Liechtenstein.  

Mark Dangelo

Mark Dangelo currently serves as innovation practitioner and advisor to private equity and VC funded firms spearheading digital fabrics, data sovereignty, MAD data sciences, and decentralized finance.  Mark has led diverse digital restructurings, MAD, and transformations in over 20 countries advising hundreds of firms ranging from the Fortune 50 to startups.  He is also an adjunct graduate professor of innovation and entrepreneurship, the author of five books on transformative innovation, and an 18-year columnist for the national Mortgage Bankers Association out of Washington D.C.

Jagdip Singh, AT&T Professor of Marketing, Weatherhead School of Management, Case Western Reserve University

Jagdip Singh is AT&T Professor of Marketing, and has an undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering.  He is an internationally recognized scholar of organizational frontline effectiveness. Jagdip’s expertise involves designing, managing and sustaining effective and enduring customer connections at the frontlines of organizations.  Jagdip is twice recipient of the Weatherhead School of Management’s Research Recognition Award for outstanding contributions to research in 1997 and again in 2018.  In 2019, Jagdip received the University’s Faculty Distinguished Research award, the highest honor for enduring and significant research impact.  Also in 2019, Jagdip received the Lifetime Achievement award from the American Marketing Association’s SIG-Sales.  In 1992, Jagdip received the Case Western Reserve University’s John S. Diekhoff award for excellence in graduate teaching, and the Excellence in Doctoral Teaching and Mentoring award in 2007 and again in 2017.  Jagdip co-founded the interdisciplinary “Organizational Frontlines Research” initiative including an annual symposium (since 2015) sponsored by the Marketing Science Institute, Sheth Foundation and several leading Sales and Service centers.  Dr Singh has received the “Excellence in Reviewing” awards from the Journal of Marketing, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Retailing, and the Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management.  Jagdip serves as an Associate Editor for the Journal of Service Research (2021-Present), and serves on the review boards of several journals including the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Journal of Retailing, and the Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management.

Vipin Chaudhary, Kevin J. Kranzusch Professor and Chair, Department of Computer and Data Sciences, Case Western Reserve University

Vipin Chaudhary is the Kevin J. Kranzusch Professor and Chair of the Department of Computer and Data Sciences at Case Western Reserve University. Most recently, he was a Program Director at the National Science Foundation where he was involved in many national initiatives and the Empire Innovation Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at SUNY Buffalo. He cofounded Scalable Informatics, a leading provider of pragmatic, high performance software-defined storage and compute solutions to a wide range of markets, from financial and scientific computing to research and big data analytics. From 2010 to 2013, Dr. Chaudhary was the Chief Executive Officer of Computational Research Laboratories (CRL), a wholly owned Tata Sons company, where he grew the company globally to be an HPC cloud and solutions leader before selling it to Tata Consulting Services. Prior to this, as Senior Director of Advanced Development at Cradle Technologies, Inc., he was responsible for advanced programming tools for multi-processor chips. He was also the Chief Architect at Corio Inc., which had a successful IPO in July, 2000. Dr. Chaudhary was awarded the prestigious President of India Gold Medal in 1986 at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur where he received the B.Tech. (Hons.) degree in Computer Science and Engineering and a Ph.D. degree from The University of Texas at Austin.