Driving Intrapreneurship
Yearbook 2020
Our IA community includes participants from more than 20 industry organizations and dozens of departments and skillsets. What these people all have in common is the desire to make a difference in their organizations – to drive change and add value. Please check out our yearbook to see which of your peers has earned the label intrapreneur! We hope to see you in future classes.
August – October 2020
- Eric Adkins
Senior Director of NGAN Deployment
Comcast
- Monique Barash
VP People and Capabilities
Crunchyroll
- Daksha Bhasker
Principal Cybersecurity Architect
Comcast NBCU
- Chris Brooks
Data Engineering Manager
GCI
- Katie Collins
Senior Director of Product Management
Charter Communications
- Christophany Creed
Senior Design Director, UX Research
Charter Communications
- Ryan Dulaney
Director, MDU WiFi Products
Charter Communications
- James Hosley
Sr. Director Information Security
Comcast
- Tom Hurley
Head of Events & Creative
Liberty Global
- Robbert Krijger
Director of People
Liberty Global
- Tyler Lie
Sr. Program Manager
Charter Communications
- Ryan Mitchell
Sr. Director, Network Products and Services Engineering
WOW! Internet, Cable, Phone
- Jennifer Page
Senior Manager, Legal Services – Employment Law
Charter Communications
- Erika Powell
Head of L&D
Crunchyroll
- Cindy Shoemaker
Events and IA Outreach Manager
The Cable Center
- Sally Tait
Director of Digital Strategy and Operations
Charter Communications
- Rachel Vanderploeg
Manager, Satellite Distribution
Comcast
- Kevin Yount
Manager of Learning Technology
Charter Communications
Eric Adkins
Senior Director of NGAN Deployment
Comcast
Eric is currently responsible for the implementation of the overall technical vision and direction of the NGAN Engineering department. Today that main focus is program managing a technology shift which involves the virilization of the legacy CMT platform to VCMT.
Prior to his current role he has worn many hats and has had a variety of jobs with Comcast throughout his 17-year tenure. He ran the National Warehouse and Staging Lab through a job rotation. He deployed the first Comcast Digital Voice trial, launched one of the first regionally based National Data Centers, and has been part of every cable acquisition in the last 15 years with a focus on CMTS. Eric ran and supported Commercial Services cell backhaul deployment efforts.
Eric is married with two kids, both in college.
Monique Barash
VP People and Capabilities
Crunchyroll
Monique Barash currently oversees recruiters and HR Business Partners who execute on talent acquisition and mobility, performance management, manager coaching, compensation, and other people/HR programs.
Monique started her career in PR/Communications and made a transition to the Human Resources field after completing graduate school. She has worked in tech, media and construction/engineering industries.
Monique received a bachelor’s degree in Communication Studies from California Polytechnic State University, and an MBA from San Francisco State University. She enjoys traveling, gardening, puzzling and organizing.
Daksha Bhasker
Principal Cybersecurity Architect
Comcast NBCU
Daksha has almost 20 years of experience in the telecommunications service provider industry. She’s held roles in both business management and technology development and is accountable for complex solution architectures and security systems development. Daksha’s security work spans carrier scale voice, video, data, and security solutions.
Prior to joining Comcast, she worked at Bell Canada developing their cyberthreat intelligence platform and securing cloud deployments. Daksha holds an MS in computer systems engineering from Irkutsk State Technical University, Russia, and an MBA in electronic commerce from the University of New Brunswick, Canada.
Daksha has various publications in international security journals and contributes to standards development. She is an advocate for women in cybersecurity.
Chris Brooks
Data Engineering Manager
GCI
After working as an analyst for several years, Chris accepted a management role with the mission of creating a dedicated data engineering team at GCI. He currently leads a team of data engineers who are in the final stages of migrating their big data operations from legacy on-premise systems to a modern cloud infrastructure.
Chris grew up in a military family, moving every couple of years. He had the privilege of living all over the world, including Germany, Japan, Panama, Washington State, and Ohio.
After completing High School, Chris served in the US Army as an Infantryman for several years. He then attended the University of Alaska, Anchorage. After graduating with a degree in Computer Science he joined the data analytics team at GCI, Alaska’s largest telecom provider.
Chris lives in Anchorage with his wife and two boys.
Katie Collins
Senior Director of Product Management
Charter
Katie is responsible for leading the development of Charter’s long-term Roadmap for Spectrum Mobile – at end of Q1 was named the fastest growing Mobile services in the U.S., as well as the fastest Mobile service in terms of speed. Katie has been part of the Charter Product team since 2015 and is responsible for the Spectrum Mobile services and product experience spanning speed leadership, voice, data, roaming, messaging, and advanced mobile features.
Katie is a 20+ year veteran of the telecommunications industry. Prior to joining Charter, Katie spent 10 years with Level 3 Communications where she led strategic development for some the world’s largest companies. Katie’s history of developing new services for the cable industry began with the deployment of the first ever cable telephony technology for TCI/AT&T Broadband/Comcast.
Katie holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and Master of Business Administration from the University of Colorado, Denver.
Christophany Creed
Senior Design Director
UX Research at Charter
Christophany currently leads a team of wildly smart and collaborative UX researchers who fiercely advocate for the voice of customer. She has positioned her team as client partners throughout the end-to-end product design journey including strategy and alignment, discovery, and empathy building, uncovering high-value problems, exploring and ideating on solutions, and testing and improving experiences.
At Charter, Christophany garnered executive buy-in to build two teams from the ground up: UX Design and User Research. Her diverse background, which includes contributions spanning visual design, UX design, and user research has supported her success in building relationships with organizations including product, CX, enterprise, operations, marketing, and technology.
Ryan Dulaney
Director, MDU WiFi Products
Charter Communications
Ryan started his professional career in telecom where he learned how to do training development and training delivery in Verizon’s SMB Credit and Collections organization. From there his role evolved into writing requirements for agent tools, testing those tools, and launching them. As he matured in his career, he started contracting with various consulting firms on a project basis, and fell into business analyst and project management roles across various industries and competencies, including insurance, brokerage, healthcare, and telecom. In these industries, he worked in data management, software development, and product management.
Currently, at Spectrum (almost 4 years now), he supports WiFi products geared toward multi-dwelling/ multi-family owners and their residents.
Ryan is a midwest native who moved to the Greater Denver, Colorado area about four years ago. Ryan earned a BS in Public Relations/Speech Communication and an MA in Communication. He also holds certifications as a PMP (Project Management Professional) and a PMI-ACP (Agile Certified Practitioner). In his free time, he loves to read, game, ski, hike, camp, and play volleyball. He and his husband currently have two dog children, Shorty and Elsa.
James Hosley
Sr. Director Information Security
Comcast
Jim is a seasoned information security executive, strategist, and leader. He is an expert in information security management, operations, strategic planning, program direction, risk management and process engineering.
As an information security leader, Jim has designed and led global organizations across both the finance and retail sectors, protecting diverse lines of business operating in more than 160 countries from cyber threats, fraud and franchise risk.
During his career, Jim has a developed a diverse background that includes developer, integrator, architect, team lead, manager, and strategist. As a result, he has demonstrated a unique ability to manage multi-disciplinary teams and to navigate complex challenges.
Tom Hurley
Head of Events & Creative
Liberty Global
Tom has a background of internal and external communications, creative services and executive support experience. He has worked in the retail, financial services and telecom sectors in the UK and he now leads a shared services team across Liberty Global and Virgin Media.
The Events and Creative Services team is responsible for creating, producing and delivering a wide range of branded content; including print, film and digital, events and experiential moments.
Robbert Krijger
Director of People
Liberty Global
Robbert is currently working as a Director of People Systems, where he’s responsible for all global HR systems. In Liberty Global this primarily means looking after Workday, which we have implemented for our 10 Operating Companies since October 2018. He leads a diverse team that maintains and improves the system.
After completing his masters degree in Strategic Management, he started his career in HR Operations, and more specifically in a Business Process Outsourcing delivery center in Czech Republic, providing services to a large Dutch FMCG. From there he joined IBM to start his consulting career in Enterprise Resource Planning systems (SAP), after which he eventually combined his prior experience (HR) with systems by becoming a Workday implementation consultant.
On a personal level, Robbert’s preparing myself to become a (first time) dad from early September onwards and together with his partner he is looking forward to welcome a girl into the world. Hobbies are sports-related; playing soccer and road cycling.
Kathy Lawn
Program Director
Charter Communications
Kathy is currently the Program Director for large scale network programs and products at Comcast in Philadelphia.
In her current role at Comcast, she owns all facets of nationwide implementation of Fiber (EPON) network, managing think tank engineers, customer focus teams, and division feedback to execute delivery, and leadership for all points in the customer journey from exploration to trial to deployment, simultaneously identifying risks and critical paths, ensuring program scopes, schedules and budgets.
She supervises ongoing team units of 25-50 people as Program Delivery Lead, SME. Cross-functional teams include executive leadership, customer support, legal, marketing, sales, field technicians, and product architect teams. Kathy directs 15 different work streams under each program to support highly efficient teams; refocusing and redirecting to meet project deadlines for successful implementation of market trials, national deployment, and program execution.
Kathy graduated with undergraduate degree and an MBA with a focus on International Business. On a personal note, Kathy was involved with Big Brothers and Big Sister and having a “little” from Center City, Philadelphia to guide and mentor. Also, she is a board director to Peace To The Planets.
Tyler Lie
Sr. Program Manager
Charter Communications
Tyler is currently leading the Enterprise Data Products Portfolio for the Technology Delivery team under Kevin Uyeno/Lori Lemmen. Tyler always strives to make a difference. “I am passionate about working with people with disabilities (I’m disabled myself), and raising money for a good cause (Movember 2019 I raised $2200 for men’s cancer by shaving my head)”.
Tyler lives in Parker, Colorado and was originally from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada. His hobbies include SCUBA, motorcycles (modified), hiking, camping, movies, board games, patios & beer.
Tyler’s favorite quote is “Aspire to Inspire!” Tyler is taking this class because he has developed a mentoring program for students with disabilities and would like to get Spectrum Reach to adopt it. “If I could finagle my way into a position at Charter Communications where I am able to execute my mentoring program and make a real impact on the lives of disabled students, I would LOVE that”.
Ryan Mitchell
Sr. Director, Network Products and Services Engineering
WOW! Internet, Cable, Phone
As a senior technology director at WOW!, Ryan is responsible for the engineering and development of network, data center, and software products ranging from simple internet and voice up to the development of “IOT” systems that collect and process information from all of the devices in our network.
He is passionate about building high performance teams focused on generating significant value to the business through improved process or the efficient use of technology that drives down operating and capital expenditures. Ryan is an Agile evangelist who continues to drive the Agile mindset into our organization to enable teams to deliver value frequently and better adapt to ever-changing organizational priorities.
On a personal level, Ryan lives in southern Indiana with a loving wife, 2 kids, and 2 dogs. He used to be a water sports enthusiast but has recently gotten out of those to take up golf. He’s also an avid cyclist, occasional musician, and a woodworker.
Jennifer Page
Senior Manager, Legal Services – Employment Law
Charter Communications
Jennifer provides oversight of Charter’s Employment Law Team’s operations, including the development and oversight of processes that ensures the Company’s compliance with employment related rules, regulations, and laws, responding to government inquiries, and submission of reports to government agencies, as well as tracking, monitoring, and reporting to business leaders trends of employment-based claims brought against the company.
She also assists attorneys with strategic development and implementation of assigned projects and initiatives to support the team, business leaders, and Human Resources teams. In addition, Jennifer oversees and manages all employment-based immigration within the company.
Prior to her role as Senior Manager, Legal Services, Jennifer worked as paralegal on the employee law team within Charter for several years and prior to coming to Charter, she worked at various law firms providing paralegal support.
Jennifer holds a Master’s degree in Human Resources Management and her undergrad in Legal Studies. In her free time, Jennifer enjoys doing Pilates and traveling.
Erika Powell
Head of L&D
Crunchyroll
Fostering transformation at the personal and professional levels as well as creating workplaces and cultures where employees thrive are at the heart of Dr. Erika Powell's work. For the past 15+ years, she has partnered with leaders and organizations to design and facilitate training, employee engagement, and teambuilding solutions.
Over the course of her career, she has led and consulted for a number of initiatives related to leadership development, diversity and inclusion, effective communication, emotional intelligence, customer service, and technical and product/software training in a variety of industries, including corporate, higher education, and non-profit sectors, both nationally and globally. In her current role, she leads employee development, engagement, and diversity and inclusion efforts for Crunchyroll, a Warner Media company.
She is bilingual in Spanish and holds a doctorate in Instructional Technology and Design from the University of Virginia, a MS.Ed in Intercultural Communication from the University of Pennsylvania, and a BA in Cultural Anthropology from Haverford College.
Cindy Shoemaker
Events and IA Outreach Manager
The Cable Center
Cindy Shoemaker joined The Cable Center in January 2019 with over 20 years of event management experience in the Denver market with an extensive background in venue management, marketing and outreach, non-profit event planning and development, community event management, and catering and design. She has a strong passion to assist our clients through the various event planning process to provide first in class events at The Cable Center, from corporate events to weddings.
When not managing the event department, Cindy is part of the IA team as Manager of Outreach.
Cindy is proud to be a Colorado native, growing up just blocks from The Cable Center in Washington Park. She has a passion for her family, pets, traveling, photography, and yoga. She is a certified power yoga teacher with Corepower Yoga since 2009 and often travels to Mexico and the Caribbean teaching yoga at resorts.
Sally Tait
Director of Digital Strategy and Operations
Charter Communications
Sally is a versatile business leader with a rich mix of experience in enterprise Agile transformation, organizational change management, portfolio and project management, people leadership, and operations.
She is passionate about solving difficult problems, simplifying complexity, and fostering continuous improvement.
She is a co-founder and organizer of the Denver Agile @ Scale meetup.
Rachel Vanderploeg
Manager, Satellite Distribution
Comcast
Rachel is the manager for the Managed Satellite Distribution (fna HITS) operations team. They are a part of Comcast Technology Solutions (CTS), supporting MVPDs and affiliates and providing cost effective solutions for service delivery and conditional access.
Rachel has been in the cable industry for 22 years and lives in the greater Denver area.
Kevin Yount
Manager of Learning Technology
Charter Communications
Over the last three years as Manager of Learning Technology, his team develops and supports custom and hosted learning applications focused on improving employee performance, connecting and enhancing the learning ecosystem, and learning data consolidation.
Kevin earned his Bachelor of Science in Business Education from Ball State University and went on to teach high school students for four years. During this time he also earned his Masters of Education in Instructional Design from UNC Charlotte and worked as an instructional designer and senior instructional designer for 10 years. Along the way he completed NC State’s Computer Programming Certification program and went on to develop custom Learning and Development applications.
Kevin, his wife (Ashely) and two children (Caroline and Dylan) live in Fort Mill, South Carolina just south of Charlotte, North Carolina. He and his family enjoy outdoor activities, such as tennis and hiking, as well as indoor activities, such as board games and video games.
June – August 2020
- Patty Bullington
Director of Accessibility
Charter Communications
- Eric Burger
Senior Director of Product Management
Charter Communications
- Jacqueline Clary
Senior Director, Program Network Policy
NCTA
- Paul Edmondson
People Director
Liberty Global
- Asad Haque
Senior Director of Security Architecture
Comcast
- Nicholas Lawson
Program Manager of Sustainability
Comcast NBCUniversal
- Shane Martin
Director of Accessibility
Charter Communications
- Jill May
Product Manager
Comcast Technology Solutions
- Stephen Rementer
Director of Data Platforms
Charter Communications
- Carl Rhoades
L&D Systems Admin
WOW! Internet Cable and Phone
- Somaskandan Santhanam
Director, Data Engineering
Comcast
- LaShaun Solomon
Regional Sales Effectiveness Leader
Comcast
- Ferhan Ture
Director
Comcast Technology
- Tara Young
Media Marketing Manager
Comcast
Patty Bullington
Director of Accessibility
Charter Communications
As Director of Accessibility for Charter Communications, Patty focuses on outreach, training and communications. In 2019, Patty transitioned to accessibility after spending the past 15 years in ad sales with Spectrum Reach as head of marketing, and later leading the brand team.
Patty has received eight Cable Advertising Bureau awards in addition to receiving their top sales achievement award for strategic positioning of cable advertising in 2010 for the Business Ambition television campaign. She was honored as a Woman to Watch in 2011 from the WICT Rocky Mountain chapter. Additionally, Patty successfully created a single brand voice upon the merger of Charter, Time Warner and Bright House Networks in 2016. Patty has championed and supported Adaptive Spirit for almost 20 years. She is currently the silent auction co-chair and has proudly held this position since 2003.
Patty Bullington is a graduate of Spring Hill College with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Business Marketing and a Minor in Philosophy. She resides in Denver, Colorado.
Eric Burger
Senior Director of Product Management
Charter Communications
Eric Burger is a native of St. Louis, but has lived in various locations and now resides in Colorado. He enjoys quality time with family and friends doing the typical Colorado activities such as skiing, mountain biking and paddle boarding. As well as traveling, attending concerts and exploring museums.
Professionally, Eric is fortunate to still enjoy a career in Mobile that has provided a wealth of experiences from field to corporate roles, from retail design to leveraging sponsorships and from business development to product development. He is adept at product lifecycle management with significant experience managing product roadmaps, budgets and partnerships. Currently, leveraging strategic planning, consumer and market trends, and analytical skills to create successful device portfolios brings him satisfaction. Jacqueline Clary, Senior Director, Program Network Policy at NCTA
Jacqueline Clary
Senior Director, Program Network Policy
NCTA
Jacqui Clary is an experienced communications and policy professional. Her current role is senior director of program network policy at NCTA – The Internet & Television Association.
Prior to joining NCTA, Jacqueline worked with a nonprofit organization conducting advocacy on civil rights issues in the media, telecommunications, and broadband industries.
Jacqueline earned her B.A. from John Carroll University, her J.D. from Syracuse University College of Law, and is a member of the New York State Bar.
Paul Edmondson
People Director
Liberty Global
Based in London, Paul has worked within the people function across a number of industries: Oil & Gas, Food and for the last 4.5 years, telecommunications. His experience also spans a variety of settings, from chemical refineries to manufacturing facilities and corporate head offices.
Paul’s role is to work with senior leaders to help them create and execute their people strategies and ensure they are developing and nurturing the next generation of talent. Paul has also started looking into how the nature of work may change permanently as a result of the pandemic and the impact this could have on working practices and locations. Paul thrives when given new challenges, given his passion for learning; building relationships; and understanding commercial context.
Outside of work, Paul loves to go walking with his wife and son, especially watching the deer in his local park. Conforming to most English stereotypes, Paul is a huge football (soccer) fan and you are highly likely to see him drinking a cup of tea on webcam during the classes.
Asad Haque
Senior Director of Security Architecture
Comcast
Asad has over 25 years in Information Security Technology specializing in Enterprise Technology Architecture with a focus on Networks and Application Security including Single Sign on (SAML) and Identity Management, API security, IoT firmware and ecosystem.
Currently leading a large-scale design and deployment of @scale PKI systems for IoT devices integrated with an innovative Blockchain backend for IoT, apps and smartphone devices. As a board member of Zigbee Alliance, focusing on protocol resiliency, security and strategy.
Asad possesses extensive hands-on experience as a chief application and network architect, including experience in systems management, information security, software development, large secure network (TCP/IP) design and deployment, departmental oversight and management.
Nicholas Lawson
Program Manager of Sustainability
Comcast NBCUniversal
Nick was one of the foundational members of the Sustainability team when it formed five years ago. In his current role, he serves in both a financial and operational capacity. He handles day-to-day management of a portfolio of vendors through the NRP as well Comcast’s largest municipal solid waste hauler. Prior to joining the sustainability team, Nick spent ten years in the finance and accounting function, and he holds a CPA.
He has experience in variety of industries including telecommunications, health care, and consulting.
Outside of work, he enjoys spending time with family, including toddler, Tommy, and working on home renovation projects.
Shane Martin
Director of Accessibility
Charter Communications
Shane started his career in Accessibility right out of college, working as an intern (before transitioning to an employee) at Integration Technologies Group. Here he strived to learn Accessibility technology quickly as his main duties were to deliver, install, and train government (IRS, SSA) employees on their newly purchased Accessibility technology. This work gave Shane first-hand experience to the difficulties people with disabilities face every day due to a widespread lack of digital Accessibility compliance.
Shane’s next role with Level Access was a natural one, focused on learning technical Accessibility compliance and supporting client development teams remediating their digital (web, mobile, and video) assets. In this role he worked with many clients in the financial and telecommunications spaces but spent extensive time with Comcast on the Accessible development and launch of Xfinity Mobile. He came to Charter in 2018 as an Accessibility Architect contracted through Level Access, before transitioning to Senior Manager leading the web and mobile Accessibility efforts. He currently serves as Director of Technical Operations focused on ensuring the Accessibility of all Charter’s digital assets in the web, mobile, and video platforms.
Jill May
Product Manager
Comcast Technology Solutions
Recently celebrating her 20-year anniversary with Comcast, her areas of expertise include broadcast origination, transmission, cable headend conditional access platforms, and content distribution. In her current position as Product Manager at Comcast Technology Solution, she is responsible for Managed Satellite Distribution and Conditional Access products (aka HITS).
She has been an active member of WICT Rocky Mountain for over 15 years, and currently sits on the WICT Board of Directors, as Director of Sponsorship. She is also a member of PMI Mile Hi and PMP certified.
Originally from Michigan, Jill has lived in Colorado for almost 40 years. She lives in Littleton with husband of 24 years, with her two sons, who are 19 and 15 years old. They enjoy the Colorado outdoors, both boys have a passion for mountain biking and skiing, which has them traveling to many Colorado mountain towns, Crested Butte being one of her favorites. She also enjoys gardening, cooking and yoga. Her family recently took up paddle boarding, which she says is a blast.
Stephen Rementer
Director of Data Platforms
Charter Communications
Steve is currently a Director at Charter Communications where he and his team own the underlying infrastructure for product data insights.
His career so far has taken him from Washington, D.C. to Atlanta, GA and finally to Denver, CO. He has a B.S. in mathematics from Penn State University and considers himself a die-hard Penn State and Philadelphia sports fan. Outside of work, he enjoys hiking, fishing, golfing, grilling, and playing guitar.
Carl Rhoades
L&D Systems Admin
WOW! Internet Cable and Phone
Carl has worked at WOW! for over 12 years in many roles, starting on the phones as a customer support Tier 2, a short time in QA and Call Center Application Development, and most recently moving to System Resource Administrator for WOW’s Learning & Development department.
In his current role, Carl maintains the knowledge base for all call center agents, dispatch, L&D, and is currently working to integrate company knowledge bases and learning resources for all departments. Outside of work, Carl is the owner of a small graphics design company. He likes to explore Colorado, go biking, and sit down to a good online video game to connect with friends.
Somaskandan Santhanam
Director, Data Engineering
Comcast
Somaskandan Santhanam (Somas) has been working in Comcast since April 2018. He is currently a Director in Data Organization of Comcast leading a Data Engineering team.
Prior to Joining Comcast, Somas has been working in Tata Group on leadership roles for multiple customers like Comcast, NBCU, and British Telecom. He has been playing customer engagement roles for past eight years. Somas currently serves on the Board of Directors in WICT Rocky Mountain and Rocky Mountain Cable association (RMCA).
Outside of work, Somas like to travel and spend time with his twin daughters. They spend most of the weekend hiking and exploring Colorado.
LaShaun Solomon
Regional Sales Effectiveness Leader
Comcast
In her current role at Comcast, LaShaun is responsible for the development and execution of sales effectiveness initiatives that educate and build selling skills of advertising sales teams across the Southeast Region and enterprise.
LaShaun has 12 years of experience in the telecommunications industry, with a track record of growing new and existing businesses. LaShaun recently served as President of the Women in Cable Telecommunications (WICT) Southeast chapter. She led one of WICT’s largest chapters supporting over 1,000 members across AL, GA, and TN with professional development programming to elevate women in the telecom and media industry.
LaShaun has a bachelor’s degree in marketing and attained her MBA from Kennesaw State University.
Ferhan Ture
Director
Comcast Technology
Ferhan Ture leads the Natural Language Processing team at the Comcast Applied AI Lab, where he blends latest advancements in the field into a suite of voice-activated Xfinity products used by millions every day.
Prior to that, he was a scientist at BBN Technologies, developing novel algorithms for multilingual question answering as part of the DARPA BOLT program. From 2008 to 2013, he worked on search and language translation problems under the supervision of Jimmy Lin, as part of his doctorate studies at the Department of Computer Science at University of Maryland.
Tara Young
Media Marketing Manager
Comcast
Tara Young is a 20-year veteran of the cable industry establishing herself as a respected sales and marketing leader within the Comcast organization. In her current role as Manager of Media Marketing Strategy she is responsible for managing Comcast’s media investment to generate consumer demand, grow profitable relationships and build brand consideration and affinity.
Tara was recognized with the prestigious Elite award for Innovation in 2015 for developing a breakthrough sales tool providing a one-stop resource for all frontline facing employees.
She currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Rocky Mountain Cable Association where she is active in marketing the organization and its programs.
Tara holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Broadcast Journalism from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and is a graduate of the Professional Marketer Program at Seattle Pacific University. Tara is passionate about movies, travel, and lifelong learning. She enjoys watching her favorite sports teams with her husband, Gary, and taking their Alaskan Klee Kai, Budda, for long walks outside in the Colorado sunshine.
February – April 2020
- Kofi Addaquay
Senior Manager Web Development
Charter Communications
- Marshall Carter
Director Strategic Development
Charter Communications
- Noah Dempewolf
Lead Designer, Design Systems
Charter Communications
- Jeremy Harrison
Director of Content Operations
Comcast
- Abigail Holmberg
Senior Manager Product Management
Charter Communications
- Scott Ingram
Product Manager
Charter Communications
- Alex Kaney
Internal Communications & Employee Experience Senior Specialist
Comcast Technology Solutions (CTS)
- Soundari Krishnan
Senior Manager Direct Marketing
Charter Communications
- Steve Luiting
Design and Development Manager
The Cable Center
- Michael Millington
Director in the Customer Experience
Strategy and Operations Group
Comcast
- Barbara Nelms
Program Manager, Mobile
Charter Communications
- Gia Roe
Director of Service Assurance
Charter Communications
- Ashley Ross
Senior Manager Finance
Liberty Global
- Stephanie Thibodeau
Affiliate Marketing Manager
Outdoor Sportsman Group Networks
- Ian Wheelock
Engineering Fellow
CommScope
Kofi Addaquay
Senior Manager Web Development
Charter Communications
Kofi Addaquay, also known as Konstantin, is a fullstack software engineer and architect. He currently works at Charter Communications (Spectrum) as a senior software engineering manager in digital marketing, where he leads a mid-sized software engineering team, providing technical guidance and mentorship. Some of his other roles include collaborating and assisting product owners, project managers, directors and VP’s in identifying scope, as well as systems, subsystems, and interfaces, for upcoming projects and company initiatives.
Kofi has an insatiable thirst for knowledge and is constantly training himself to further his mental and physical capabilities. His current passion for blockchain technology and machine learning, has aspired him get a master’s degree in data science (Artificial Intelligence) in the upcoming future. In the meantime, he is involved in startup initiatives, where he leads technology aspects such as how to integrate machine learning and blockchain technology into the business model, etc.
Outside of work, you will find him in many activities. Learning a new classical piano piece, teaching and doing martial arts, writing poetry or self-help notes (on the nature of life and reality), reading philosophy books, doing yoga, studying math, playing ping pong, etc. Fun fact: Kofi has not had a warm bath or shower in 3 years. He now takes only cold showers! You may or may not find him in the morning shivering, with teeth chattering.
Marshall Carter
Director Strategic Development
Charter Communications
Marshall currently works in Charter’s business development team focused on executing transactions to enable the emerging consumer and enterprise wireless products.
Prior to Charter, he worked in product management at Level 3 and CenturyLink, as a management consultant at Bain & Company, and as a financial analyst at Credit Suisse First Boston.
When not working he enjoys snowboarding, hiking, and international travel.
Noah Dempewolf
Lead Designer, Design Systems
Charter Communications
Noah is a multi-disciplinary designer based in Denver, CO. He currently works as a Lead Designer for Spectrum helping to build the organization’s first cross-platform design system.
With over twenty years of experience, Noah has a particular passion for building collaborative communities, shaping design practice and mentoring the next generation of design talent. Noah received his BA in Graphic Design from Colorado State University.
Outside of work Noah enjoys spending time with his family, traveling, collecting mechanical watches and working on his first graphic novel.
Jeremy Harrison
Director of Content Operations
Comcast
With over 17 years’ experience working in the media industry, Jeremy has seen and experienced the ever-changing trends of the industry. His goal has always been to stay out in front of these trends and to ensure we are anticipating the needs of our customers while providing the best possible customer experience at every interaction.
Currently, he works across a wide range of products and teams.
- Media Management – Video operations support for linear origination, Video On Demand, Quality Control and transcode services.
- Video On Demand – Metadata creation/validation, content processing and prep, foot print management, content distribution and tracking, account management.
- Production Services – Closed captioning, editing, versioning, watermarking, graphic creation.
- Ad Delivery – Video Systems engineering technical support, Account Management, Footprint management and Sales support.
- HITS (Headend in the Sky) – MVPD technical support for video distribution services.
- Digital Signage – Content processing, distribution and device health monitoring for 280 retail stores across the US.
- Video Streaming – occasional streaming for live events.
- Sales for VOD, Ad Delivery, Linear Origination and Production Services.
Abigail Holmberg
Senior Manager Product Management
Charter Communications
Abigail is an experienced Product Manager with a demonstrated passion for customer experience design and creating unique solutions. She is responsible for delivering product portfolio roadmaps, market analysis, detailed functional requirements and support for development, testing and design activities.
Abigail graduated from Colorado State University with a Bachelor of Science in Innovation Management and earned certificates in Entrepreneurship and Supply Chain.
Scott Ingram
Product Manager
Charter Communications
Father, Husband, Geek, and occasional producer of awesome hardware.
At work his is responsible for developing Charter (Spectrum) internet equipment from inception to installation in customers’ homes and businesses. He does this by partnering with vendors and internal cross-functional teams to ensure the delivery of the best possible hardware and internet experience for our customers. Essentially, he gets the pleasure of building the things that make the internet go for millions of customers.
At home he loves spending time with my family, watching movies, camping, and traveling.
Alex Kaney
Internal Communications & Employee Experience Senior Specialist
Comcast Technology Solutions (CTS)
In this role, Alex supports the execution of communications plans and employee engagement programs. Alex is responsible for drafting and editing content for CTS newsletters, leading employee recognition programs and managing community impact partnerships including volunteer activities. Previously, she led digital communications for the Western Governors’ Association, a bipartisan regional policy organization, writing blog posts, livestreaming events and managing the organization's website and social media channels.
Alex’s background also includes more than six years in the public and private sectors with LiveWell Colorado, Big City Mountaineers and iQu Strategies. Within these organizations, she managed client accounts, launched a public health-focused outreach program, wrote newsletter articles, built relationships with funders, planned events with elected officials and ensured efficient and streamlined processes for investing in local communities.
Soundari Krishnan
Senior Manager Direct Marketing
Charter Communications
Soundari is an accomplished business technology leader and marketing professional with proven track record of success in project management, business strategy and data analytics.
She is experienced in customer support and success management, product development and solution deployment with expertise in strategy and data analytics. Leveraging 10+ years of online and offline marketing analytics experience, business intelligence, reporting to drive results and create profitable/successful client-customer relationships and customer success.
Steve Luiting
Design and Development Manager
The Cable Center
Steve is responsible for the development, implementation and maintenance of all digital content including websites (design and programming), web servers, print design and the Cable Center Virtual Reality Project.
Steve joined The Cable Center as Web Designer in March of 2009. Previously, Steve was the owner of a small company that specialized in web and print design and in a previous incarnation art director for an ad agency in Madison, Wisconsin. When he discovered the Web in 1991, he became one of the first web masters in the country for WISCTV3, a CBS affiliate and helped develop the web based channel3000 that it became.
An early adapter, Steve started the concept of on-line Hotel Tours for the travel industry long before anyone started thinking about travel online. He also designed the GO logo for GO Automotive (now Auto-Nation). He is constantly updating his design skills and expanding his knowledge base from programming languages, such as WebXR, A-Frame, three.js, Unity3d, PHP, HTML5, CSS3, Joomla and WordPress, responsive/adaptive design as well as block-chain technology.
Michael Millington
Director in the Customer Experience
Strategy and Operations Group
Comcast
Michael’s primary role has been expanding and optimizing written communication channels for customer support. He works out of his home office in Port St. Lucie Florida, about 45 minutes North of West Palm Beach. Before Comcast, Michael had several years' experience in the Cable industry at Sand Cherry Associates, a consultancy. His projects included program management of mobile broadband and digital voice products, agile product management for a digital buyflow, project management for employee and customer tools trials and leading a chat platform migration for customer service representatives.
Michael is originally from Trinidad and Tobago. Prior to his career in Telecommunications, Michael worked at British American Tobacco in the Caribbean and Central America for 10 years in Marketing, including two years in Costa Rica as a Brand Manager. In 2010, Michael completed an MBA in Strategic Management and Finance at Wharton Business School in Philadelphia prior to joining Sand Cherry Associates. Michael enjoys reading self-development books, coaching basketball and is an avid soccer fan.
Barbara Nelms
Program Manager, Mobile
Charter Communications
In her role as program manager, mobile for Charter Communications, Barbara oversees project deployment for non-customer facing projects and the release coordination of all the Company’s mobile features and functionality, including customer experience, Mobile App, 5G rate plans, and external and internal communications.
Previously, Barbara served as Lead PM for Wireless Technology Group for the MVP launch of Spectrum Mobile as a new product line for Charter.
She joined Charter in 2017 through its acquisition of Bright House Networks, an MSO provider. There she worked with several teams including Software Development, Billing Operations, Procurement and Network Engineering.
Barbara has a Master’s in Business Administration with a focus on Finance and Marketing strategy as well as an undergraduate degree in Public Communications from the University of South Florida. Barbara is also the current WICT Rocky Mountain Vice President and has been involved with WICT since 2011 in various board positions. She is a wife and mother of four amazing children: 2 girls and 2 boys.
Ashley Ross
Senior Manager Finance
Liberty Global
Currently, in her role as Senior Manager on the Financial Reporting team at Liberty Global, she helps communicate her company’s quarterly and annual results to investors and the public. In the past, she’s worked on the financial reporting team for multiple public companies in various industries after earning my Bachelor of Science in Accounting from Colorado State University.
She’s always considered herself a very “type A” person—she is a planner, “early is on time”, she does everything with purpose and procrastination scares the heck out of her. Over the years, she’s learned to embrace these traits; constantly devouring knowledge while working in various companies has given her skills that have enabled her to be successful and grow in her career. Her personal and professional relationships are also very important to her; outside of the office, she enjoys spending time with her husband, dog, family and friends.
Gia Roe
Director of Service Assurance
Charter Communications
Gia is a seasoned people leader with 15+ years of technical operations management experience and technical project/program management. She has a solid understanding of software development life cycle models as well as knowledge of both Agile and traditional project management principles and practices and the ability to blend them together in the right proportions to fit a project and business environment.
Her skill offerings include a unique combination of skill sets: creativity, technical aptitude and analysis, people leadership and project management.
Stephanie Thibodeau
Affiliate Marketing Manager
Outdoor Sportsman Group Networks
Stephanie Thibodeau has over a decade of experience in the cable television industry and has been managing Affiliate Distribution events and marketing activities at the Outdoor Channel since 2014. Prior to Outdoor, Stephanie spent seven years with Time Warner Cable, where she served in multiple operational roles.
Stephanie is passionate committed to supporting industry and community organizations through a variety of volunteer programs including Ten Thousand Villages, Positively Cable, the Rocky Mountain Cable Association (RMCA), and Adaptative Spirit. She is particularly proud to co-chair the new RMCA non-profit Media & Tech Pathway initiative with DPS in partnership with its founder, industry veteran and strategy consultant Charlotte Bockstahler. Stephanie is entering her 12th year as a volunteer for Adaptive Spirit and 5th year on the Board of Directors for RMCA.
Stephanie is originally from Canada and moved to the United States from the Great White North with her husband, Derek Thibodeau. Denver, CO has been home since 1999. They will be celebrating their 21st wedding anniversary this May and are proud parents to her “mini me,” a fun and energetic 3-year-old named Ella.
Ian Wheelock
Engineering Fellow
CommScope
Ian Wheelock works for CommScope as an Engineering Fellow in the CTO team, with 20 years of experience in the broadband communications and video systems industry both in the US and internationally. He works closely with technical leaders of MSOs and Service Providers from around the globe, providing trusted insight into future technologies relating to Broadband Access, Home Networking, Wi-Fi, IoT, Virtualisation, QoE, etc.
Ian helps guide technology direction across different business units within CommScope, while also engaging in multiple industry standards bodies, most recently with Wi-Fi Alliance CERTIFIEDtm EasyMesh standard.
He works out of the CommScope Cork, Ireland office.