TransamericaAVP, Innovation
May. 2013 - Mar. 2017Baltimore, Maryland AreaSelected to co-found innovation center, building function from ground up. Mapped out center’s objectives, staffing structure, methodologies, and reporting. Drove cultural transformation surrounding innovation, focusing on engaging all employees across all business units to foster true innovation and develop clear operational path for innovation initiatives. • Guided strategy to accelerate innovation by leading challenging cultural shift, doubling organization’s independently measured Innovation Readiness Score over 4 years. • Created and facilitated all-employee roadshow of Innovation Cafes across 9 corporate locations in U.S. and Canada, educating nearly 10K employees on innovation. • Recruited teams of Innovation Ambassadors at all locations to prioritize efforts of Innovation Center and ensure company-wide focus on initiative. • Instituted LEAN start-up methodologies to institutionalize customer-centric, data-driven decision making and intelligent risk taking. • Introduced BrightIdea software to manage intake, idea evolution, and reporting of innovation initiatives which was adopted by parent company. • Served as guest speaker at Process Driven Innovation Conference, attaining high ratings for information delivery.