Robert Bollard
General Manager RIO Program and Business Futures
IP Australia
Rob Bollard is the General Manager of the Rights in One (RIO) Program and Business Futures Group. The group has been tasked with the largest business transformation and information and communication technology Program undertaken by the organisation. It is responsible for developing a new IP Rights management system, simplifying and harmonising our processes, developing a new search solution and providing richer and more timely business intelligence. The group also provides a central hub to strategically manage our customer channels, drive continuous improvement and innovation throughout the agency and support cognitive solution development.
He has extensive experience and track record for success as an Executive and senior manager in undertaking major business transformation, delivering alternative service delivery models and business process re-engineering both within Federal and ACT Government. Recent successful deliveries led by Rob include the implementation of the Designs capability for RIO, a new Trade Mark Search system, an organisational digital transition strategy that now positions IP Australia with over 98 per cent of customers interacting online, establishment of an innovation capability and the Source IP online patent collaboration and licensing marketplace. Rob has a Bachelor of Commerce from ANU.
Pascal Bourgeat
Director of Behavioural and Cognitive Science
Ipsos Australia
Pascal Bourgeat, Ph.D. (Consumer Behaviour) is Director of Behavioural Science at Ipsos in Australia and APAC lead. He designs research and works with private and public sector clients and Ipsos teams in Australia and around the world on a range of behaviour-related issues: CPG consumers and shoppers, customers of service sectors, users of public services like health and transport, environment and resources, social and public services, patients, healthcare professionals and more. Pascal is one of Ipsos global behavioural economics and behavioural science experts and is based in Sydney. He is a regular writer and speaker on all things behaviour.
Brett Burton
Head of CCD and Lean
Westpac
Brett is responsible for building a broader Lean and Customer Centred Design (Design Thinking) capability across Westpac Australian Financial Services. Previously he created the BT Financial Lean team, the cornerstone of BTFG’s productivity improvements..He re-engineered and redeveloped 14 critical end to end revenue streams, reducing overall effort, cycle time and increasing customer conversion.
Mandy Chambers
Head of Retail Marketing
NAB
Mandy heads up the NAB Retail Marketing team, which focuses on delivering end to end strategic marketing programs to NAB’s Retail network of approximately 750 branches. With over 15 years’ experience across FMCG and financial services organisations, from marketing strategy and consumer insights to brand marketing and retail experience, Mandy brings a diverse background to her current role and a unique perspective to problem solving and driving a true customer centric approach.
Tom Champion
Senior Analyst
Forrester
Tom Champion is based in Sydney and serves Customer Experience Professionals across Asia Pacific. His focus is on customer experience strategy and partnerships, experience ecosystems, digital strategy, service transformation, and developing authentic customer-centric cultures.
Before joining Forrester, Tom was a senior management consultant with Deloitte within its customer and digital consultancy practice. He has advised some of Asia Pacific's largest corporations on using customer experience as a means to growing their bottom lines. He has worked across a range of industries, notably in banking, insurance, superannuation, financial advice, telecommunications, and media.
His career started in strategic communications roles with the United Nations in New York City, The World Bank in Paris, and Ericsson in Budapest.
Tom has an M.A. and B.A. from the University of Sydney, where he studied media and languages. This included study at École Normale Supérieure de Cachan in Paris.
Ben Cooper
Managing Director
Tricky Jigsaw
Ben Cooper is equal parts digital strategist, creative and technologist, a unique skillset honed alongside the evolution of the medium. With 18 years experience across London, Zurich and Sydney, he is regarded internationally as a forward thinker in this space.
Since March 2014, Ben has headed the Digital, Social and Innovation capabilities at M&C Saatchi across the group's ten businesses. In May 2014, the company launched the world-first shark detection system 'Clever Buoy'. The project has gone on to win international innovation accolades that include seven Cannes Lions and the coveted Titanium, SXSW, SPIKES Grand Prix, IAB MIXX Gold 'Can't be contained' category and WARC Grand Prix. The Buoy, most importantly, has been backed in a $16m shark mitigation pledge from the NSW government.
Building on this success, Ben has built Tricky Jigsaw: a product, services and experiments business focused on marketing-led innovation. Ben also runs the Australian arm of the international digital collective Creative Social.
He is inspired by what is achievable with passionate, curious people unbound by convention.
Christophe Eymery
Head of Digital and Media
L’Oréal Australia & New Zealand
Christophe Eymery is an MBA graduate from ESCP Paris, AIT Bangkok and Monash University Melbourne.
He started his career with an internship at L’Oreal Group as Skincare Brand Manager Assistant for Lancome in 2001. Post graduating, he joined Renault to look after the car manufacturer’s Marketing Operations in Australia & New Zealand. After four years, he moved agency side to run the Digital Media Business of ZenithOptimedia in Melbourne, servicing clients such as nab, Honda, Nestle, Victoria Government and University of Melbourne for five years.
With a firm grasp of Digital Marketing, he shifted back to the client side in 2013, returning to his initial roots at L’Oreal and oversee digital development for the Leader in Beauty’s portfolio of 27 brands in Australia and New Zealand.
Julie Fedele
General Manager, Experience Design - Retail X Innovation Lab
Bupa
As a leader in the Sales & Growth team at Bupa Australia, Julie plays a critical role in ensuring that the customer’s voice is heard at the decision making table.
She is responsible for the end to end experience design across the Retail channel and leading rapid experiments in the Retail X Innovation Lab.
Julie has over 13 years experience in a variety of industries developing corporate strategies and consulting on large Transformation programs. In 2013 she completed her MBA at AGSM and more recently a User Experience Design course through General Assembly.
Brandon Gien
Chief Executive Officer
Good Design Australia
Sean Hall
Senior Principal - Inclusive Design, Infosys Consulting
Founder and CEO, energx and diversityX
Sean is on a mission to bring more energy and empathy to the world. An awarded marketer, innovator and strategist he has a passion for the role technology plays in addressing matters of social inequality.
As Senior Principal at Infosys Consulting, Sean is the driving force behind their global Inclusive Design product offering - a human-centred approach to strategic change that builds the innovation capability of organisations enabling them to transform both their customer and employee experiences.
In addition to this, Sean is the inventor of energx, a unique approach to employee engagement and productivity that helps individuals and businesses increase their energy to become ‘fit for change’ by linking human performance and wellness to business performance. His first book, BOOM! 4 Steps To A More Energised Life, details how energyx came to be and is due to be published in the near future.
He is also the Founder and CEO of technology startup diversityX - a coaching platform that helps people with disabilities understand their strengths and connect with inclusive employers.
Katrina Harrison
National Manager, Customer Focused Design
NBNCo
Katrina Harrison leads the Customer Focused Design practice at NBN Co, the organisation tasked with connecting every home and business in Australia to the National Broadband Network. As the lead customer advocate for the product team, she works with telecommunications providers and their customers to understand end-to-end experiences, and translate customer needs into insights and product solutions.
Katrina has worked across a broad range of industries and roles, including marketing, product management, business development and system innovation before discovering design thinking and building a passion for customer centered design.
Catrin Hobart
Director Customer Engagement and Online Services
TAFE NSW
Jacqui Jordan
Strategic Options Lead
Suncorp
For over ten years Jacqui has been applying principles and tools of design and innovation in leading business and customer strategy development. Jacqui is currently Strategic Options Lead at Suncorp, exploring application of design and experimentation methods in the context of strategic risk and business model renewal. Prior to commencing this role Jacqui was Head of Customer Strategy at Suncorp.
Munib Karavdic 
Founder, WAVE Design
and Former Director, AMP Design & Innovation
Dr Munib Karavdic is the former Director of Design & Innovation at AMP Financial Services. He has been championing an innovation program at AMP that is underpinned by human centred design as a key engine for organic growth. Apart from building human centred design capabilities to transform AMP, his team is a key driver of building and introducing a portfolio of minimum viable offers (MVOs) based on customer insights. He is also a founder of the Innovation centre and MVOs incubator which introduce a new way of working and delivering offers to the market. Prior to AMP he worked as a growth strategy consultant in several Australian and overseas companies.
Munib is also a Conjoint Professor in Creativity and Innovation at UNSW Business School. There he teaches innovation in the Master of Marketing and MBA programs. He published one of the first books in e-commerce area as well as several articles in reputable academic journals. Munib holds a PhD in Marketing focusing on innovation in e-commerce.
Christian Lafrance
Customer Driven Innovation & Experience - CX Director
M&C Saatchi
I lead customer driven innovation and customer experience at Tricky Jigsaw, M&C Saatchi’s product & service innovation arm. I bring to projects and talks insights from 15 years across most parts of the product lifecycle with a focus on customer strategy and innovation across digital, media, banking, insurance, retail and consumer electronics. Prior to M&C Saatchi, I held senior customer experience roles at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, at digital & service design consultancies and launched several product innovations.
I’m passionate about how design thinking brings better business outcomes and founded the Sydney Jobs-To-Be-Done meetup to evangelise effective customer centricity.
Davina McCormick
Manager, Customer Experience Strategy
Queensland Urban Utilities
Davina McCormick is the Manager, Customer Experience Strategy at Queensland Urban Utilities where she holds organisational-wide responsibility for increasing customer focus and delivering positive experiences for over 1.3 million customers and community members. She is also a sessional academic with QUT’s Science and Engineering faculty.
Graduating from QUT's MBA Programme in 2013, Davina was selected as QUT's inaugural Global AMBAssador and was awarded the 2013 MBA Medallion for highest academic performance. She also holds a Bachelor of Business (Distinction) with majors in Marketing and Management.
With over 14 years of professional experience, Davina has a diverse range of marketing, customer and stakeholder engagement, project management and strategy skills. Her experience spans new venture start-ups, global companies and government corporations in a range of sectors including financial services, energy, education and utilities.
In her spare time, she enjoys running and spending time with family and friends in the beautiful Australian outdoors.
Yvette Mihelic
General Manager Customer Experience
Sydney Trains
Transport for NSW
Yvette has built a career centred on improving customer experience, service and sales across private and public sectors.
She is currently General Manager, Customer Experience for Sydney Trains where she is responsible for Revenue Protection for all Public Transport modes for NSW, as well as delivery of Opal to Sydney Trains and NSW Trains. She is also accountable for the design, development and implementation of customer centric strategy and supporting initiatives across Sydney Trains.
Previously, she was leading the Customer Channel Transformation Program for Transport for NSW which is focussed on developing a strategy for improving customer experience and uplifting outcomes for Public Transport and Roads customers of NSW. Additionally, she developed the Future Transport Program aimed at using innovation and community sourcing to guide and develop the future state of transport in NSW.
Prior to joining the NSW Government, Yvette has led many teams within Retail Banking and Premium Banking across Westpac, St George and NAB and has worked on many programs of work aimed at uplifting customer experience and sales.
She is passionate about using innovation in design and leadership to generate real step change for all business outcomes with a focus on customer experience.
Dori Miller
Business Design Manager, Business Design Practice
Telstra
Dori Miller is the Business Design Manager in Telstra’s Design Practice, a team of talented individuals who are passionate about elevating the quality of design and customer experience. She has 15 years experience in design and design research. In her current position she is exploring how design thinking can make a difference in large organizations by re-imagining the way we innovate and solve complex problems in collaboration with customers and staff.
Before coming to Australia, Dori worked in the US for companies like IBM and Microsoft doing customer research and designing software and applications.
Dori has a passion for problem solving and loves big challenges. Being an avid swimmer she has crossed the English Channel 5 times and recently became the 27th person to complete a two-way English Channel swim. She is looking for the next big challenge!
Lenaig Musson
Head of Customer Experience Design
Australia Post
Steve Nuttall
Research Director
Fifth Quadrant
Dr Steve Nuttall heads up Fifth Quadrant’s customer experience research and insights team, and has more than 25 years senior executive and consulting experience working at a strategic and tactical level with many clients across Europe, Asia and Australia. Steve uses research and insight tools and methodologies techniques to provide clients with commercially ready solutions.
Steve looks to inspire Customer Experience Professionals by helping to form the business case for customer experience research investments, advising on how to implement different research techniques to create better experiences, and demonstrating the ROI from customer experience programs.
Robbie Robertson
Founder
MashUp
and Partner, Spatial & Brand Experience, Deloitte Australia
Robbie Robertson is a global, award-winning strategist connecting retail, brand and customer experiences to tangible business solutions.
With 18+ years experience in New York, London, Australia and Asia, he is also an industry commentator and speaker (ADMA Forum, Good Design Australia’s Design as Strategy Forum, AIMIA and POPAI events, Talaris and others
Robbie’s expertise in retail has helped brands such as Apple, BlackBerry, Coca-Cola, Caltex, Ford, IBM, Shell, Vodafone, and Bupa develop winning consumer strategies, overhaul brand identities and create innovative and immersive customer experiences.
With both a Masters in Urban Design and a MBA, Robbie represents a new and distinctive multi-disciplinary voice in the creative industry. His unique skill set brings together strong lateral thinking and analytical skills with profound commercial acumen, ensuring his clients results that are in tune with commercial realities and focused on profit performance.
Paul Tuffin
Head of Customer Experience and Customer Insights
Water Corporation
Paul Tuffin is a customer experience and marketing professional, having held senior positions with some of Australia’s leading companies, both on the West and East Coast of Australia. At the Water Corporation, Paul was charged with delivery of the Customer Experience Program of work as well as delivery of the Customer Insights portfolio of work.
Prior to arriving at the Water Corporation, Paul had a strong focus on driving customer service improvement within the Banking, Insurance and Funds Management industries. This experience included holding the Position of Executive Manager, Service Quality at the Commonwealth Bank, which held accountability for driving customer service improvement programs nationally.
Phil heads up the MYOB UX team, which focuses on making intelligent and intuitive product experiences for ANZ businesses. With significant experience in creating tools for sectors as diverse as broadcast, banking and publishing Phil now champions customer experience and user centricity across MYOB.
Emma Williamson
Director, Customer Experience
L'Oreal Australia & New Zealand
Based in Melbourne, Emma Williamson is the Director of Customer Experience, L’Oréal Australia and New Zealand (ANZ).
She is a veteran Customer Experience professional with over 15 years of experience in traditional customer care and now in the emerging digital environment.
Emma joined L’Oréal in 2010 to head up the transformation of their ANZ consumer affairs environment with a primary focus on taking customer experience to the next level. Prior to this she was the National Manager, Sales Compliance at Singtel Optus. In this role at Optus she worked closely with Australian industry regulators to improve customer retention, sales transparency and ethics. This regulatory and customer advocacy experience has been more than beneficial and has led to significant improvements in the L’Oréal customer service offering cover all aspects of consumer interaction on and offline.
Shortly after joining L’Oréal, Emma was instrumental in the implementation of industry best practice social media compliance programs with the customer at its core. With the growth of the company’s care requirements, Emma lead the outsourcing project of the customer care call centre as well as the set-up of the L’Oréal ANZ Hub for this workflow. This program was key to ensuring a consistent approach to consumer insights capture across both Australia and New Zealand markets.
In addition, Emma is responsible for ongoing staff updates to ensure all marketing and communications teams are across current trends that relate to the effective use of social media analytic tools. She is an advocate for customer experience and a strong believer in having access to timely consumer insight data to help drive brand love, quality products and services.
Her passion and expertise has led to guest speaking opportunities including the 2015 Leadership in Digital Marketing Forum held in New York, and Monash University Victoria. Emma has also featured in Customer Care and social media publications such as; Social Media Knowledge Brand Insights, Consumer Directions Magazine - Society of Consumer Affairs Professionals Australia, Social Media Today – Big Brand Theory.
Jennifer Vandekreeke
Vice President & General Manager
Carnival Australia
As Vice President Australasia for the world’s largest cruise line, Carnival Cruise Line, Jennifer Vandekreeke led the successful introduction of the brand into the Australasian market, drawing on her strong marketing knowledge and passion for exceptional customer experience.
Jennifer moved from Carnival’s Miami HQ to Australia in 2011 to take on the new role of Vice President Australasia. Carnival Spirit arrived as the cruise line’s first ship to be based year-round outside the US in October 2012. With Aussie holidaymakers soon clamouring to get onboard, Carnival Legend followed on a seasonal basis in 2014.
Over the following five years, Jennifer’s scope expanded to include responsibility for the entire Australasian business unit for Carnival, including the P+L. Her focus on product delivery and understanding of exceptional customer experience helped the cruise line quickly develop a loyal and growing base of customers in Australia, with the local ships regularly receiving some of the highest passenger feedback scores in the fleet. Rather than imposing an American product on the market, Jennifer and her team worked hard to maintain Carnival’s core product difference – free-spirited, family-friendly fun - while celebrating key elements of the local culture such as Australians’ love of good coffee.
Jennifer’s key driving principle is maintaining a compelling and differentiating brand positioning rooted in a product truth that is communicated at every touchpoint. This strategy has delivered well, as Carnival has grown to be the number two cruise brand in the market based on brand consideration and Google searches. The cruise line recently welcomed its 500,000th guest onboard its cruises from Australia, after just three and a half years in the market.
Prior to launching Carnival Cruise Line in Australia, Jennifer lived and worked in some of the world’s most inviting destinations including Italy, France, Colombia and Mexico, with past roles including Strategic Planning Director at Young and Rubicam in Colombia and Miami and Marketing Director at Club Med North America. She holds a BA from Colgate University and an MBA from ASU’s Thunderbird School of Global Management.
Speaking opportunities are still available!
Present your company, showcase your expertise and demonstrate how you can help by speaking to this gathering of leaders in the field of customer experience. Use this unique forum to voice your opinions on the most important issues facing customer centric organisations today. Speakers will assert themselves as facilitators of the future success of the sector.
In addition to keynote sessions, panel participation, or hosting a post-conference in-depth learning session, CX Design and Implementation 2016 will also provide you with the opportunity to host one of four key industry roundtables.
Your role would be to co-facilitate discussion and serve as a subject expert. The discussions are 45 minute rotations, meaning, after 45 minutes, all the attendees switch tables and select a new table to sit at for the second 45 minutes. The roundtable topics are explained in further depth.
Contact Luke Griffin on +61 (0)2 8188 7536 or 0481 353 550 or email lukeg@questevents.com.au to find out more about speaking opportunities and the roundtable topics.
You can also download a copy of the partnership prospectus here.