Partners in Business

3520 Old Main Hill
Logan, UT 84322-3520

Phone: 435.797.2279
Fax: 435.797.3440
Email: partners@usu.edu

Information Technology Speakers: 2008-2009

Kent Erickson

Vice President and General Manager, Workgroup Solutions Business Unit, Novell Inc.

CreativITy Needed Now!

Kent Erickson serves as the Senior Vice President and General Manager for the Workgroup Solutions business unit at Novell. He is responsible for the development for all products that make up Novell's collaboration solutions, including Novell Open Enterprise Server, Novell GroupWise and Novell Teaming + Conferencing. Mr. Erickson joined Novell in 1991, has served in a number of key engineering and business unit leadership roles, and is a member of the Novell Worldwide Management Committee. 


Richard Walje

President, Rocky Mountain Power

Powering IT in a "Greener" World 

Richard Walje has worked in the electric utility industry since 1972, starting as a journeyman lineman and later working as an electrical engineer. Since joining Rocky Mountain Power’s predecessor company, Utah Power & Light, in 1984, he has held senior management positions in transmission and distribution network operations, community relations, customer services and information technology. In 2000, Mr. Walje was named Chief Information Officer of ScottishPower. He was appointed president of Rocky Mountain Power in March 2006, when MidAmerican Energy Holdings Company completed the purchase of PacifiCorp from ScottishPower. 

 

Steve Bell

President of Steady Improvement, Inc.

Lean IT - Applying Lean to Business Process Improvement and IT Operations

Steve Bell, CFPIM is a graduate of the University of Michigan, with over 20 years experience in information technology and the continuous improvement of business processes. He is the author of Lean Enterprise Systems, Using IT for Continuous Improvement, published by Wiley in 2006. 



Mike Orzen

CEO of Steady Improvement, Inc.

Lean IT - Applying Lean to Business Process Improvement and IT Operations 

Mike Orzen, CMA, CFPIM, PMP is a graduate of Stanford University, with an MBA from University of Oregon. He delivers a unique blend of Lean, Six Sigma, IT and operations management experience, and has been consulting and coaching for over 20 years. 



Danette McGilvray

President and Principal Consultant, Granite Falls Consulting Inc.

Data Quality - Critical for IT Project Success 

Danette McGilvray is president and principal consultant of Granite Falls Consulting, Inc., a firm specializing in information quality management and data governance. She helps clients in many industries by providing consulting and training to address their information and data quality challenges. Past projects include enterprise data integration programs, data warehousing strategies and best practices for large-scale Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) data migrations for Fortune 500 organizations. 



Josh Coates

Chief Technology Officer, Advanced Development Program and Mozy founder, Mozy/EMC

How Web 2.0 and SaaS are Changing Data Backup

Josh Coates serves as Chief Technology Officer for EMC’s Advanced Development Program, and also continues to manage the Mozy online backup service that EMC absorbed with its acquisition of Berkeley Data Systems in 2007. 



BJ Vander Linden

Vice President of Information Technology, O'Currance, Inc. (OCI)

Using Project Management to Bridge the Gap

BJ Vander Linden is currently the VP of Information Technology with O’Currance, Inc. (OCI). OCI is an inbound call center handling inbound sales and service calls for a wide range of clients. BJ is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) with over ten years of experience in Information Technology Management and Project Implementation. Prior to joining OCI, he has experience building and managing a Project Management Office, where he cultivated and developed talented Project Managers. He also recently completed a project to deploy a hosted contact center solution comprised of a call routing solution, CRM system, Data Warehouse, customer survey tool, online knowledge base, and agent decision tree. 


 

David Ibarra

President & CEO, eLeaderTech Inc.

Find the Key to Your Lock - Executing the Cycle of Success

David Ibarra is a well-known leadership consultant, and entrepreneur. Mr. Ibarra is the founder of eLeaderTech, the Ibarra-Brito Group and David Ibarra Enterprises. In his business dealing Mr. Ibarra recognized the great need for a system to bridge the management gap between “Planning” and “Execution.” To accomplish this goal, Mr. Ibarra developed Executing the Standards® a software program that measures, tracks and ultimately improves human performance. 


Chris Henley

Information Technology Professional Evangelist, Microsoft Corporation

The Future of Information Technology

Chris Henley is a fun and energetic representative of Microsoft. He has extensive experience in the world of computer networks. He is passionate about the way that technology helps people. He has an entertaining and insightful style of communicating technical information and of making difficult concepts easy to understand. He loves to push the envelope of what we think about computers, and what software can do. Chris spends his spare time playing XBOX360 with his wife and kids, fly fishing, camping, hiking, and searching for the best chocolate cake on planet earth. 


Marco ten Vaanholt

Vice President, SAP Community Network, SAP Ecosystem and Partner Group

Expert Communities: Collaboration and Co-Innovation Driving Business Value - Building a Culture of Community in Your Business

Marco ten Vaanholt is a Vice President for SAP Community Network responsible for the SAP Business Process Expert Community ( bpx.sap.com); and the SAP BusinessObjects Community (boc.sap.com) strategy and programs. He is also over the Business and Solution Management Organization that focuses on newer and less well-established areas, including product management of the Community platform features and extensions; driving and managing new Community business and innovation programs; Community network revenue-generating activities; and Community expansion in fast-growth and emerging markets. Prior to joining SAP, he led as Global Product Director, Yahoo's web-based banner advertising system landscape. He also held various positions with Oracle. 

 

Michelle Kolbe

Data Architect, Intermountain Healthcare

Driving Business Improvements through Data Warehousing

Michelle Kolbe is a Data Architect in the Enterprise Data Warehouse at Intermountain Healthcare in Salt Lake City, UT. In that capacity, she is currently responsible for the design and maintenance of the radiology data mart and the family history data mart at Intermountain. Since joining Intermountain in 2004, she has been involved in many data warehousing projects including the Human Resources and Payroll data mart, Knowledge Repository data mart, Risk Management data mart, and SQL Server Analysis Services cubes. 


Niel Nickolaisen

CIO and Director of Strategic PLanning, Headwaters, Inc.

4 Things a CIO Can Do to Deliver Immediate Business Value

Niel Nickolaisen is the CIO and Director of Strategic Planning at Headwaters, Inc. He has held technology executive and operations executive positions; typically in turnaround roles. He has developed a strategic and tactical alignment model that significantly improves returns on technology and business initiatives (by both improving the benefits and reducing the costs and risks). 


Will West

Chief Executive Officer, Control4

The Changing Face of Technology

Will West is chief executive officer of Control4. Since co-founding the company in March of 2003, he has led the Company's efforts to create a revolutionary new line of affordable home automation solutions.  Will has raised more than $300 million in private capital to start his last three companies. In 1998, he co-founded STSN (now iBAHN), the worldwide leader in broadband services for business travelers serving millions of customer in thousands of hotels. Prior to founding STSN, Will was CEO, and co-founder of PHAST Corporation. Under his leadership, PHAST became the leading manufacturer of high-end home automation equipment. 


Rob Clyde

Vice President of Technology, Office of the CTO, Symantec Corporation

The Future of Managing and Securing Information

Rob Clyde is the Vice President of Technology for Symantec, responsible for setting the technology vision and strategy for the company. Under his direction he also founded several specialized teams within Symantec’s Office of the CTO, including Symantec Research Labs, a comprehensive assembly of scientists innovating the next generation of technologies, and the Advanced Concepts Team, which creates innovative first generation security products.