Over 20 years of experience creating the strategic Customer Care vision for enterprises along with the data-driven, actionable roadmap to achieve that vision - simultaneously delivering business value to my clients and improved CX to their end-customers
Successfully built consensus among business stakeholders, IT teams, and marketing/branding representatives
Created deliverables that empowered clients to secure funds for multi-million dollar contact center investments
Sample clients include: USAA, Citi, CMS (Medicare), Consumer Cellular, Ameren, CVS, Wells Fargo, and Disney
CAREER
Senior Principal Business Consultant
Nuance Communications (Microsoft), 2001 – 2023
Identified use cases and established a value proposition for the adoption of technologies such as speech recognition, natural language understanding, digital virtual assistants, voice biometrics, machine learning, and large language models (e.g., GPT)
Developed recommendations and ROI for self-service functionality and overall experience design – one engagement allowed a major banking institution to save more than $14 million/year
Leveraged a variety of data inputs (e.g., performance reports, topic modeling) and assessment techniques (e.g., stakeholder interviews, gap analysis, focus groups)
Created assessment materials to evolve traditional engagements from voice-centric to omni-channel, for better alignment with client investment focus (i.e., digital transformation) and increased relevance to end-users
Created a change management program to address adoption challenges for enterprise clients deploying voice biometric authentication (some clients saw more than 2x enrollment rates after participating)
Amassed a vast understanding not just of conversation design best practices, but the underlying dependencies needed to enable them, resulting in the production of compelling and realistic future state plans and depictions
Voice User Interface Designer
Nuance Communications, 1999 – 2001
Participated in the deployment of the earliest speech-enabled IVRs, from planning to optimization
Co-authored the industry's first Voice User Interface Designer certification exam
Identified the need for more substantive dialog between stakeholders and solution designers in the sales process, and co-founded the Nuance Business Consulting practice
Linguistics Consultant
SBC Technology Resources, Inc. (AT&T Labs), 1996 – 1999
Voice user interface design, UX research, speech recognition grammar development, and data analysis
EDUCATION
Master of Arts, Linguistics
The University of Texas at Austin, 1997
Thesis: Effects of Synthesized vs. Pre-recorded Prompts on User Compliance During Human-Computer Interaction
Bachelor of Arts, English & Linguistics
Bryn Mawr College, 1993
Independent major achieved by taking courses at Swarthmore College, Haverford College & University of Pennsylvania
Minored in Russian
Passed the German proficiency exam
SELECTED PRESENTATIONS
Real World Examples: Leveraging AI for better member experiences | Becker’s Hospital Review (webinar)
Designing for Voice: Conversational UI | O’Reilly Media (online training)
Multiple SpeechTEK sessions including Personalization, Privacy, and the Creepy Factor (panelist), An Open and Honest Conversation about Deploying Speech (moderator), and Planning for Cross-Channel Experiences (presentation)