Breakfast Club

Sharon M. Daniels
President and Chief Executive Officer
AchieveGlobal

Sharon Daniels has overall responsibility for managing AchieveGlobal. Daniels first began her tenure with AchieveGlobal in 1991. Since that time she also served as chief operating officer and chief executive officer of two other training companies in the industry during an absence from AchieveGlobal. During her four-year absence from AchieveGlobal, Daniels served as president and CEO of Communispond. Daniels’ career prior to her work in the training industry was in the field of banking. In her 15 years at Southeast Bank, she held numerous roles in operations, mergers and acquisitions, branch management, and training and consulting. She holds a bachelor’s in education from the University of Florida and a master’s in training and organizational development from the University of South Florida. She has more than 25 years of experience in general management and sales leadership roles.

Michael E. Echols, Ph.D.
Executive Vice President, Strategic Initiatives
Bellevue University and Bellevue University's Human Capital Lab

An internationally known thought leader on evaluating and improving ROI on human capital, Dr. Michael E. Echols' three books on the subject are must-reads in CEO, COO and CLO suites around the globe. Named one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals” in the United States by Training Industry Inc., Echols earned his bachelor's degree in physics from Carnegie Mellon University, his MBA from the University of Pittsburgh and his Ph.D. from the College of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. His thesis was in operations research and information process.

Dan Heffernan
Head, Learning Products
Element K

Dan Heffernan has more than 20 years of experience leading internal learning organizations and business units for companies in HR outsourcing, insurance and business services. Prior to joining Element K, he was responsible for the leadership development and e-learning teams at Paychex, a payroll and HR outsourcing company. In his last role at Paychex, Heffernan left the learning organization to help launch a health insurance and employee benefits product for the small and medium business market as director of sales. Heffernan has published articles on leadership development and e-learning in the Journal of Organizational Excellence and ASTD's Learning Circuits. He is a graduate of Colgate University.

Norm Kamikow
President and Editor in Chief
MediaTec Publishing Inc.

Norm Kamikow is president and editor in chief of MediaTec Publishing Inc., which publishes Chief Learning Officer magazine,Talent Management magazine, Diversity Executive magazine and Certification magazine, along with targeted supplements, special reports and electronic newsletters for each publication. Chief Learning Officer was named "Best New Publication" by the American Society of Business Publication Editors (ASBPE). Norm also received the 2005 Innovation Award from Media Business Magazine, which honored him as Top Publisher of the Year.

Norm has more than 30 years of magazine and direct marketing publishing experience. Since beginning his career with Seventeen magazine, Norm has worked either directly or as a consultant to many consumer and business-to-business magazines. With a specialty in new magazine development, he has played a key role in the launch of OMNI magazine, SPIN magazine, Game Players magazine, CD-ROM Today, Internet World and Web Week. He contributed to the redesign of such magazines as Financial World and CD-ROM World. As president/CEO of Decks Inc., he worked with several major publishing companies to develop revenue resources from alternative media. This client base included BusinessWeek, Fortune, Money Magazine, Sports Illustrated, Esquire, The Journal of the American Dental Association and Dun & Bradstreet reports. Norm is a recipient of the Tempo Award from the Direct Marketing Association and is a biographee of Marquis Who's Who in the Midwest and Who's Who in Advertising and the Media.

Sundar Nagarathnam
Vice President
NetApp University

Sundar Nagarathnam has been in the training business for more than 15 years. At NetApp, he oversees customer, partner and employee education. Prior to this, Nagarathnam held similar positions at Cognos Inc. and Hyperion Solutions. He was the chief operating officer at Medsn Inc. Before Medsn, Nagarathnam focused exclusively on high-tech at Oracle and Sun Microsystems, with extensive experience in managing curriculum planning and development. He was responsible for spearheading the launch of Oracle’s learning management system and pioneered efforts on Web-based training at Oracle University. Nagarathnam has a master’s degree in computer engineering from Syracuse University and holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras.

ESI International Director, eContent Strategy
01/14/2010
The Director, eContent Strategy is responsible for providing ESI’s executive team with strategic-level direction to implement alternative blended learning delivery formats to our worldwide client base.

Senior Manager, Global Learning & Talent Development
11/19/2009
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu (DTT) is an organization of member firms devoted to excellence in providing professional services and advice. We are focused on client service through a global strategy executed locally in nearly 150 countries.

Director, Leadership & Organizational Development Parkland Health & Hospital System
10/26/2009
Parkland Health & Hospital System (www.parklandhospital.com) located in Dallas, Texas has been voted one of "America's Best Hospitals" by U.S. News & World Report for 16 consecutive years and recently named one of the "Top 100 Hospitals to Work For" by Nursing Professionals Magazine.