Symposium Panelists: Women First

Wendy McGinnis (OCLC's Director of Communications and Public Relations) and I put our heads together and come up with a list of people we'd like to have as speakers for the symposia OCLC holds at the ALA conferences. And then Wendy works her magic and people say yes...my side of the conversation often goes like this: "you're kidding...X said yes??!"

So, this Symposium, two of our four panelists have done consulting work for the likes of Microsoft, Verizon, McDonalds and the American Library Association.

Jennifer Rice is a strategist and evangelist for relationship-centric brands (and wouldn't libraries be a relationship-centric brand?) at her company, Mantra Brand Consulting. She brings 15 years experience in brand strategy, customer insight and marketing communications, and has worked with companies such as Microsoft, Verizon, Alcatel and Corning. Her current passion is exploring how brands are being impacted by blogs and other social technologies. She's a brand strategist who specializes in bringing the voice of the customer into organizations and she's is often hired to revive a stagnating brand. Jennifer has 15 years experience in brand/marketing strategy, market/customer research, integrated marketing communications and channel support.
Her company blog is What's Your Brand Mantra? (Which is how I found her...I like her blog voice) And she also blogs at the Corante group blog Brandshift.

The second panelist I am introducing today is Pat Martin, and Pat sent me a nice picture to use here and I'll be danged if I can get it to load, so I give up and will tell you there's a perfectly good likeness of Pat on her company LitLamp's home page. Here's what Pat writes about herself and her company:

Our communities are built on partnerships and relationships with our clients, funders, suppliers, and colleague organizations. Behind every strong relationship is a clear, win-win proposition. Patricia Martin knows the value libraries represent to potential partners. Prior to founding Litlamp Communications, she created and managed a first-of-its-kind sponsorship marketing division for the American Library Association, where she worked with Fortune 100 companies on national campaigns, generating over $6M in new revenues in 18 months. In 1994, she partnered with Microsoft to build the blueprint for what is now the Gates Library Foundation. Martin's firm has been featured in Fast Company as a Purple Cow--firms that help their clients be remarkable, and was selected by GE to be a preferred provider of marketing services to their clients. She is author of the book, Made Possible By: Succeeding With Sponsorship, Wiley 2002. She explores the key elements needed to attract partners and creative ideas for generating revenue to help support innovative library programs.

Pat's blog is here.

We're most fortunate to have Jennifer and Pat as half of the symposium panelists. The registration for the Symposium is here.

I really like this little squib Pat has on her home page...says a lot to me about the ideal position of librarians and libraries in the infosphere.

The knowledge economy is not a parallel universe from which people depart to go shopping.
The knowledge economy exists as part of a knowledge society—a broader milieu of social and cultural expressions. The organizations that will hold sway in the knowledge society will be led by people who seek to strengthen the social fabric—with products, ideas, and experiences that help people feel they are achieving something greater than a simple transaction.