SUMMIT GROUP - Key Persons
Adrian is an international speaker, business strategist, and trusted advisor for chief executives and sales leaders. He speaks on the subjects of corporate strategy, competitive advantage, and sales excellence.
Adrian has achieved the highest distinction in the professional speaking industry. He is a Certified Speaking Professional (CSP).
He is also a certified professional in Business Process Management (P.BPM) and a certified Competitive Intelligence Professional (CIP).
Adrian is the author of Human-to-Human Selling: How to Sell Real and Lasting Value in an Increasingly Digital and Fast-Paced World.
As president of management consulting firm Whetstone Inc., he has worked with organizations such as Suez, Fanuc, ITW, KPMG, Motorola, Dupont, and Merck. He is one of the top trainers at the Strategic Account Management Association (SAMA), where he helps Fortune 500 companies develop their key account skills and processes.
Job Titles:
- VP, Business Development & Delivery
Chris is an expert in developing and executing growth plans, and helping companies transform their go-to-market strategy to create value for customers and their customers. His work draws on his over 20 years of extensive global experience in structuring sales, financing transactions, and driving revenue growth for companies. He has built an understanding of international business by closing on over $6 billion of transactions in more than 20 countries and managing teams on 4 continents.
He started his career at the Royal Bank of Canada in Toronto, worked in New York as an investment banker, and held executive sales and finance roles at both startup and Fortune 500 technology companies in Minneapolis.
Chris's education includes: B.Sc.E Civil Engineering and M.Sc.E Environmental Engineering (Queen's University, Kingston, Canada), MBA Finance (Schulich School of Business, Toronto, Canada), and JD (Osgoode Hall Law School). He was also part of the adjunct faculty at the University of Saint Thomas.
Chris lives in Eden Prairie, Minnesota and serves as the Metropolitan Council Member for District 3.
Job Titles:
- Senior VP, Content and Delivery
Chris Pratt is a seasoned and highly skilled consulting professional with more than 30 years of experience in the sales strategy and sales competence development fields. He has responsibility for the development and delivery of The Summit Group's value generation, executive selling, marketing, management, and leadership/coaching training programs. He has developed and delivered customized sales skills training programs for major firms in a variety of industries.
As a founding member of The Summit Group, Chris has delivered training programs in over 45 countries to a wide variety of firms including HP, Cisco Systems, Tetra Pak, Xerox, Ricoh North America, Ricoh Latin America, World Wide Technology, SBC/AT&T, SC Johnson & Company, Höganäs AB, Motorola, and Marriott International. In addition, he is certified in the Myers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator and the DiSC Personality Profile.
Prior to joining The Summit Group, Chris spent 18 years in a variety of sales, sales management, sales assessment, and sales training positions with AT&T.
Chris holds a B.B.A. in Marketing from Ohio University. He resides in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. He also serves on the Executive Advisory Board to the Marketing Department of the University of Akron.
Claudia is an experienced learning professional who facilitates cultural and behavioral transformations.
Clients that she works with are those companies who have the aspiration to evolve in order to maintain and grow their competitive edge through the engagement and inspiration of a workforce that is more often than not highly diversified, multi-generational, and mobile.
Job Titles:
- Principal
- Advisor at Bain
Dominique brings 30 years of experience leading commercial teams in global pharmaceutical and biotech organizations. Her consultancy work is focused on: commercial excellence; executive leadership; KAM/SAM roadmaps & journeys, skills, and process; and account-based marketing.
She is an accomplished international business leader, recognized as a chief architect of global account program journeys, leading corporate changes and cultural shifts for customer-centric innovation and patient value. Dominique is also a panelist and keynote speaker in Europe and the U.S. in the areas of: Centers of Excellence, customer centricity/engagement, global account management programming, and Pharma Commercial Excellence - as a subject matter expert. She writes and is published in journals such as The International Journal of Sales Transformation, Velocity, and others on these topics.
Dominique is an advisor at Bain and Co., a principal at The Summit Group, and founded her own consultancy firm, Cosawi. Prior to starting Cosawi, she served as a commercial executive within life sciences companies such as Novartis, Pfizer, and UCB, leading global go-to-market transformations, KAM journeys & commercial excellence. She also led global marketing & innovation for big pharma and biotech groups. She brings together the marriage of science, business, and a customer-centric approach as her core focus with leaders and teams.
She has held executive leadership and general management (P&L) roles and managed teams in more than 36 countries, leading activities to optimize profitability and effectiveness of field forces, as well as enabling deployment of new commercial and go-to-market business models. Her career provided her with global/varied market experience and diversified culture knowledge.
Dominique has been on many global councils for learning and development/KAM/patient centricity, as well as diversity. She is on the board of SAMA (Strategic Account Management Association) since 2011, was on the HBA (Healthcare Businesswomen's Association) steering committee for international strategy, and also on the CCPE board (Canadian Council for Pharmaceutical Education). Dominique lives between Montréal and Brussels, Belgium to stay close to her global clients. She speaks French and English.
Job Titles:
- President
- the Summit Group As Vice President of Business Development
James brings over 20 years of international and cross-industry experience in consumer products, advertising, manufacturing, and packaging industries.
He leads The Summit Group's business relationship with covenant clients including 3M, Cisco Systems, Cooper Industries, General Mills, Hilton Hotels, Medtronic, Novozymes, Procter & Gamble, Textron, and U.S. Postal Service.
James joined The Summit Group as vice president of business development from Tetra Pak, where he held general management as well as senior sales and marketing roles in Southern Africa, India, Europe and the USA. James championed the company's approach towards the customer by leading the implementation of Tetra Pak's enterprise-wide strategic customer management and customer loyalty programs. He also led global customer teams, re-designed customer-facing business processes, and implemented enterprise and CRM technology solutions.
James' strengths lie in customer-focused business performance improvement, strategic business development, and sales, marketing, and strategic leadership talent development. He has taught at the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, Global Account Management Executive Program and speaks at the Strategic Account Management Association.
James holds a B.Com (Hons) degree from Universities of Natal and South Africa, a Diploma in Financial Management from University of New York, and has participated in Executive Development Programs at IMD, Kellogg, and Carlson Schools of Business. He earned his Doctorate from Middlesex University in London.
James lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
As CEO of The Summit Group, Phil is a recognized thought leader on Value Creation and Relevance and has worked with some of the world's largest companies as a coach, mentor, consultant, and advisor to top leaders across a range of industries in 45 countries.
Phil has served on the Board of Directors for the Strategic Account Management Association and he sits on the boards of a number of companies and non-profits. He is also a co-founder of The International Journal of Sales Transformation, based in London.
He has written for, or been cited in The Wall Street Journal, The National Account Management Journal, The Los Angeles Times, Inc., Fast Company, as well as in several best-selling books including Adversity Quotient and The Power of Purpose.
He is the co-author Relevance: Matter More and is a contributing author for The Crisis of Disengagement: How Apathy, Complacency, and Selfishness Are Destroying Today's Workplace.
Eric Fellman has 30-plus years' experience in executive leadership, particularly in the publishing arena. His practice focuses on strategic planning and growth for organizations, emphasizing leadership development and communications. He is a Certified LCP Executive Coach utilizing the Leadership Capacity System to help individual leaders increase their leadership capabilities. As a Senior Guide of the Paterson Center StratOp Planning System, he helps organizations create Strategic Operating Plans that produce results.
His recent StratOp client list includes: Alliance Materials, a large building supply company in North Texas; DISCO Inc., national supplier of automated manufacturing systems; and the multi-national Achievement Corporation, the largest private training company based in Japan.
Previously, Eric served top leadership roles at three major organizations: Moody Press (Director of Magazine Division), Guideposts, Inc. (Division President), and BL International (President and COO). While at BLI he led a coalition of 11 like-minded groups to navigate the transition from print to electronic delivery of digital content on a global basis. The resulting Digital Content Alliance has produced Digital Libraries in 32 languages containing thousands of study books, audio, and video files.
Beginning in 1997 Fellman was selected to assist with international faith-based initiatives of the U.S. House and Senate National Prayer Breakfast. He helped build collaborations with government and businesses to work on practical needs as diverse as: housing, clean water, basic health care, and education in 27 countries of Africa and Asia. From 2000 to 2018 he was on the NPB Cabinet Council and continues to coordinate the annual gathering of corporate leaders and CEOs at the NPB. In that role he has helped host more than 850 top business executives, including those from Coca-Cola, United Technologies, Toyota, General Mills, Ford Motor Company, 3M, Target Stores, Nordstrom, etc.
Trained initially as a journalist, Eric has written countless articles and was a regular contributor for 25 years to Daily Guideposts, the nation's largest selling Daily Inspirational Reader with sales in excess of 500,000 copies annually. He is the author of The Power Behind Positive Thinking, published by Harper San Francisco in five languages.
Hannah is a graduate of Augsburg College with a degree in Mass Communications, with an emphasis in marketing and advertising. She has received, and continues to participate in, training in the areas of Web design and production, design software, and video production.
Prior to working with The Summit Group, Hannah worked for a digital photography studio, Stafford Photography, in downtown Minneapolis. Her position as head of pre- and post-production for Target's women's apparel gave her great experience in artistic productions work. Hannah also participated in an internship at Riley Hayes, a full-service marketing communications agency in downtown Minneapolis. There she worked closely with experienced design professionals and learned how to work with clients from different industries to address their specific needs.
Her position on the Summit team brings knowledge and experience in the areas of design, graphics, technology, audio, video, and Web site development and maintenance. Hannah is based out of Eagan, Minnesota.
Job Titles:
- Lead, Digital Learning Practice
Jack Robertson is the Digital Learning Practice Lead for The Summit Group.
Jack is a graduate of The University of St. Thomas with a bachelor's degree in Business Entrepreneurship. He is well-versed in his field, as prior to joining The Summit Group in 2018, he worked at AutoMotion, a small automotive tech company based out of Minneapolis, Minnesota. And before that, at Paxion Capital Partners, a private equity group, where he conducted market research into prospective company investments.
As the Digital Learning Practice Lead, Jack is helping to take Summit's online digital learning capabilities into the future. Enabling anywhere/anytime digital learning, that not only compliments The Summit Groups' existing portfolio, but also amplifies the learning and business impact for our clients.
Jack is located in Denver, Colorado.
Janti is a seasoned global leader with 28 years of experience covering sales, marketing, and strategic account management. His leadership background includes deep knowledge of global markets and cultures within the healthcare business in IVD & Med Tech with Abbott Medical, Abbott Diagnostics, and Roche Diagnostics.
He has worked in global and international marketing in both start-up organizations and large corporations. He has over 10 years of extensive practitioner experience in building SAM & KAM programs across EMEA. His career has seen him act as a trusted advisor to the c-suite in both top client private sector accounts such as SYNLAB International, SONIC healthcare, UNILABS, and ELSAN, as well as prestigious public sector clients including Guys & St. Thomas NHS Trust UK.
Strategic mutual partnerships are both a key capability and a passion for Janti. In his over a decade of building long-term strategic partnerships, he has successfully delivered large, complex, global deals and has managed the entire process from design through to value realization. He has current experience of today's business volatility, so is well-placed to advise clients of the need to balance corporate ambitions with customer centricity. As a credit to his global career, he has worked across diverse markets and business cultures covering over 70 countries.
Janti possesses a developer mindset and a demonstrated ability of recognizing the potential in others, in turn helping them to achieve success through facilitation and coaching. His strengths lie in his ability to drive results from good to great. He is a naturally strategic thinker, curious, creative, and highly enthusiastic and upbeat. He has spent a third of his career forging relationships and winning the trust of c-suite clients, as well as earning the right to give them advice.
Janti is currently based in London and joins The Summit Group as a principal to continue his journey and bring value to our clients.
In her role as Director of Client Care, Jennifer is the epitome of a "passionate, experienced pragmatist". As a graduate with a major in psychology from the University of Minnesota and mother of four gifted and energetic children, Jennifer has a keen ability to read her audience, anticipate the future, grasp the big picture, and innovate practical outcomes that produce creative alternatives for specific situations.
She is an active listener who can quickly grasp the "big idea" and bring customized resources to the table. Her primary mode of leading is by bringing good process and order to multi-functioning teams of co-workers. She functions as an "air-traffic controller" for The Summit Group, coordinating the needs of clients and team members.
Jennifer is located in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Job Titles:
- Executive Partner, Managing Director APAC
After a successful 16-year career serving as a senior executive with Ricoh Company Ltd., including having worked with The Summit Group as a client, Joji joined our team and leads our business in the Asia Pacific region.
Joji has led business transformations, operational turnarounds, multibillion-dollar acquisitions, and post-merger integrations. He consistently positioned organizations for strong and sustainable revenue and profit growth and brought a strategic vision to all areas-from human resources to finance, legal, IT, sales, marketing, and more-to drive business aggressively in an increasingly fast-paced and consumer-driven world.
Joji most recently was president & CEO of Ricoh Asia Pacific & Latin America, holding P&L accountability for the Ricoh APACLA region, with 10,000 employees in operating companies spreading in 23 countries and 3 continents. He grew the whole region's operating profit by 38%, even exceeding pre-COVID level through organization-wide transformation efforts - transforming the operation from a legacy hardware distribution model to an independent services integration company, launching new corporate branding, refreshing entire service portfolios, and re-engineering customer engagement process for COVID-influenced customers.
Prior to that he served as CEO of Ricoh Americas, a 18,000-employee region - the largest region in Ricoh Company, Ltd. There he fueled transformational change, launched a customer engagement model, and improved financial performance 400%.
Joji leads with a belief that a business must be profitable, that profit must be sustainable, and that to achieve both, you must have an engaged team committed to delivering an exceptional customer experience.
He has held multiple industry leadership and board positions. Joji earned his BA in Agricultural Engineering from the University of Delaware and his master's from the Institute of Strategic Leadership in Tokyo. During his time with Ricoh Americas, he was recognized by the Philadelphia Business Journal's Most Admired CEO Awards program.
Joji is based between Delaware in the U.S. and Tokyo, Japan. He can be contacted at: jt@summitvalue.com.
Job Titles:
- B2B Sales and Marketing Expert
- Senior Vice - President Global Accounts
Joshua is a B2B sales and marketing expert and thought leader with over 15 years of experience facilitating and accelerating strategic transformation in Canada and globally.
Karlheinz has 25 years of experience in sales and service. Building on his vast expertise in several industries, he designs and facilitates transformative training programs around the world. A special passion of his is the development of leaders and helping organization to change.
In his former role as a Director of Leadership Development in the IT industry, he supported award-winning programs (e.g. Brandon Hall Award: Gold for Excellence in Sales Performance, Association for Training and Development: Citation Award for Coaching and Mentoring).
A learning experience with Karlheinz will never be boring. His coaching-like facilitation is interactive and very pragmatic. He will always try to keep things close to the "daily reality" of his participants. To unlock the potential of the team he creates an atmosphere of psychological safety so that everyone feels motivated to contribute to a workable solution. Achieving tangible results is key for him, reflected by his motto "doing is the new knowing".
Karlheinz holds advanced degrees in industrial engineering and business administration. His mother language is German; he lives close to Heidelberg, Germany
Kersten brings experience and knowledge to The Summit Group in areas including marketing, branding, PR, writing and editing, design collaboration, Web site development and management, internal and external communications, technology and database implementation and management, and event coordination. Prior to joining the Summit team, she worked for: an award-winning, full-service communications and PR firm; a leading remote access and online collaboration company; and a start-up technology firm.
She works closely with Summit team members, partners, associations, vendors, and clients to ensure quality materials, presentations, and communication. She helps in carefully creating and delivering Summit's messages to various audiences, as well as managing important business relationships.
Kersten earned her degree in Economics and Business from Westmont College, where she was a Presidential Scholar. Her home base is in Santa Barbara, California.
With over 27 years of experience in sales and management, Kirk brings strategic insight and innovative, growth-oriented thinking from engagements with Fortune 1000 companies across high tech, healthcare, pharmaceutical, and education. He is well-versed in multiple disciplines including global/key account strategy, meeting facilitation, workshop delivery, learning program development and execution, sales operations, and leadership development.
In his current role with The Summit Group, Kirk specializes in stakeholder/account management, developing and facilitating training programs, coaching, and facilitated account management and business alignment sessions with strategic account teams and their customers.
Before joining The Summit Group, Kirk held key leadership roles for more than 11 years within Cisco System's Global Accounts and Client Director Programs. In various capacities, he led critical elements in the establishment of each program, while driving key initiatives such as the Global Customer Advisory Board, Global Resourcing and Coverage Models, and Voice of the Customer initiatives.
Kirk is a regular SAMA speaker on topics of value creation and accelerating joint solutions. Kirk holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from the University of Pennsylvania at Kutztown.
Kirk is based in Raleigh, North Carolina.
Melissa has the overall responsibility for The Summit Group's accounting. She has years of experience in accounting services, payroll, and budgeting for corporations and partnerships, which allows her to focus on services that meet each client's unique objectives.
She has a BS degree in Accounting. Melissa resides in Minneapolis, Minnesota with her husband.
Job Titles:
- Management Consultant
- Senior Vice President
- Head of the Leadership
Shakeel Bharmal is an experienced business leader, management consultant, facilitator, and leadership coach. He has driven revenue growth by aligning customer-focused strategy with operational execution. His experience includes leading start-ups, process and organization transformations, product launches and turn-arounds.
Shakeel is the head of the leadership coaching, and strategic alignment practice at The Summit Group, a global sales and marketing transformation firm with a thirty-year history helping Fortune 1000 firms grow revenue and create value for their largest clients. He is also the founder of OceanBlue Strategic, a leadership coaching, facilitation, and consulting firm focused on helping leaders, entrepreneurs, and leadership teams embrace the challenges and opportunities in rapidly changing business environments. He is a practicing leadership coach with the Ivey Academy at the Ivey Business School and an ICF accredited Certified Leadership Coach.
His leadership experience includes 7 years as chief operating officer for the Canadian unit of a global NGO. In the corporate sector he served as general manager of global logistics, and director of marketing and sales effectiveness at Purolator. Other experiences include: management roles in the retail and wholesale oil & gas sector; teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in management at the University of British Columbia and Gold Platinum Institute in Russia; and as a strategy consultant to clients in aerospace, automotive, aviation, energy, internet, and transportation industries.
Shakeel holds an MBA from the Ivey Business School, where he graduated as Class Valedictorian. He emigrated with his family from Tanzania as a child, grew up in Vancouver, BC, and is currently based in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
Job Titles:
- VP, Business Development & Delivery
An inspirational leader, Victoria brings dynamism and passion to every engagement, be it public speaking, strategic planning, coaching, consulting or training. As an experienced leadership consultant and coach, Victoria's acute understanding of the value of strong relationships forms the bedrock of her practice. This is what sets her apart: a genuine interest in people and the power of growth.
Victoria is a two-time breast cancer survivor, competitive endurance mountain bike racer, & author of the book Living Life Loudly - How Will You Face Your Speed Bump. She is sought after for her humorous, practical approach to being a warrior and having the warrior mindset. Her talks combine her decades of experience leading global transformations and the strategies necessary to execute flawlessly and her experiences in being a winning athlete, juggling twins, and battling cancer as if it was just a minor hiccup in life. Her infectious approach leaves audiences feeling motivated to achieve at completely new levels.
Victoria's background covers global, regional, and local sales leadership; strategic planning; communication strategies; strategic account management; revenue management strategies; hotel operations; hotel openings (321); project management; training; workshop design and delivery; and employee engagement and development. Her track record includes driving revenue for both start-ups and established brands. She has worked with Marriott International, Choice Hotels, Abbott Labs, Microsoft, Cisco Systems, First Solar, and several start up and nonprofit organizations.
Victoria's education is in Communication and she studied at the University of Arizona. Additionally, she received a Level 3 Trainer Certification from Marriott University. She holds an Advanced Certification in Strategic Planning & Leadership, as well as Coaching from the London School of Business & Finance. She is a board member of the not-for-profit organization Kids Need Bikes, past president of the not-for-profit San Tan Racing team, inaugural equity partner for CXO Collective, past Rotary Club president, and past captain for a triathlon racing team sponsored by Luna Products.
Victoria and her husband, Mike, reside in the Phoenix, Arizona area and are both avid competitive cyclists raising twin daughters and volunteering their time to organizations like The Hawes Trail Alliance, Bag It! (a cancer support organization), and the Salt River Wild Horses (SRWG) organization.