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Building the Future has quickly become one of the fastest rising nationally syndicated programs. With a focus on interviewing startups, entrepreneurs, investors, CEOs, and more, the show showcases individuals who are realizing their dreams and helping to make our world a better place through technology and innovation.
Laura Ries is a leading marketing strategist, bestselling author and television personality. In 1994, Laura founded Ries & Ries, a consulting firm with her father and partner Al Ries, the legendary Positioning-pioneer. Together they consult with companies around the world on brand strategy. In addition, they have traveled to over 60 countries from Chile to China and India to Indonesia teaching the fundamental principles of marketing. With Al, Laura is the co-author of five books on branding that have been worldwide bestsellers. Her first solo book, Visual Hammer will be released in March 2012. Visit Ries.com for more info. Laura is a frequent marketing analyst on major news programs from the O’Reilly Factor to Squawk Box. She regularly appears on Fox News, Fox Business, CNBC, CNN, HLN, and is frequently quoted by the Associated Press, Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal and other news outlets. In addition, Laura writes her own popular blog RiesPieces.com. A graduate of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois Laura earned her degree “with highest distinction” from Northwestern’s School of Speech, finishing in the top 2% of her class. Along with her father Al Ries, the two have co-authored five books together: The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding (1998), The 11 Immutable Laws of Internet Branding (2000), The Fall of Advertising & the Rise of PR (2002), The Origin of Brands (2004), and War in the Boardroom (2009). In 2008, the Atlanta Business Chronicle named Laura a top 40 under 40. In 2009, the readers of Advertising Age voted The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding as the third most important marketing book of all time. (The number one book was Positioning written by her father.) In 2002, Business 2.0 magazine named Laura a “management guru” and issued trading cards with her picture and statistics on them. http://www.ries.com https://twitter.com/lauraries https://www.facebook.com/LauraRiesOfficial
Founded in 2002, Valor Partners is a true search firm - our clients are software and technology companies ranging from the innovative startup to the established market leader -who rely on us to find and attract talent that is hidden; the candidates that are too difficult and time consuming to find or recruit without us. We have over 15 years of dedicated technology search expertise focused on building leadership, sales, and marketing teams for our clients; it's all we do. However, we don't view our service as simply providing candidates to our clients; our true value is in the deep insight we can share: about the candidate, the search strategy, the market, about how we can succeed together. http://www.valorpartners.com https://twitter.com/ValorPartners https://www.facebook.com/ValorPartners
I've spent the past 15 years starting and building businesses. With Andrew's Roadmaps, I run intensive educational boot camps for startup founders. We've had more than 200 CEOs come through our program in the past 18 months. *Founder & CEO of sixdegrees: Original social networking site of 3.5 million members. Sold in December 2000. *Founder & CEO of Joltage, Inc: First company to provide operational support system to wireless networks. *Founder & CEO of I Stand For, Inc. Full service technology ASP to political campaigns and non-profits. Sold in March 2006. *Co-Founder & Chairman of Xtify. Location-based services platform that allows any web site to location-enable their service. Acquired by IBM in 2013. *Founder & Chairman of MeetMoi. The first location-based mobile dating service available across all major carriers in the United States that matches users based on preferences and proximity. Acquired by Match.com in 2014. *Co-Founder & Chairman of Indicative. *Founder of Andrew's Roadmaps. A comprehensive crash course for Internet startup founders. *Advisor to Lenddo *Advisor to WayBetter Specialties: Mergers and acquisition; corporate law; investment banking. Now I'm looking for the next generation of experts and startup thought leaders to interview for my tech/business podcast Predicting Our Future. http://www.andrewsroadmaps.com https://twitter.com/andrewsroadmaps https://www.facebook.com/andrewsroadmaps
Bank Labs is a combination of seasoned executives with deep expertise in community banking, bank technology and alternative finance techniques. We have been founders/leaders in banks ranging from $200 Million in assets to $1.5 Billion in assets in addition to leading multi-billion-dollar technology companies. Our principals are local business leaders, board members, founders and technology and real estate investors. We experienced first-hand how traditional community banking has evolved; clients now access accounts, apply for loans and pay bills via the Internet. True mobility tools to make bankers jobs more productive have not kept pace. Bank Labs mission is to change that. We create cloud-based solutions that target noisy, spreadsheet-based processes. Bank Labs helps community bankers become more efficient so that they can get back to banking, improve productivity, and allow more time to build relationships. This includes providing technology-based marketplaces to help our community bank clients gain access to new markets and defend against internet startups going direct to your clients. We hope to have the opportunity to visit and share what we are doing for the best community banks in the country. https://www.banklabs.com https://twitter.com/TheBankLabs https://www.linkedin.com/company/bank-labs
Increasingly, new employees and junior members of any profession are encouraged—sometimes stridently—to “find a mentor!” Four decades of research reveals that the effects of mentorship can be profound and enduring; strong mentoring relationships have the capacity to transform individuals and entire organizations. Organizations that retain and promote top talent—both female and male—are more likely to thrive. But the mentoring landscape is unequal. Evidence consistently shows that women face more barriers in securing mentorships than men, and when they do find a mentor, they may reap a narrower range of both career and psychological benefits. Athena Rising is a book for men about how to mentor women deliberately and effectively. It is a straightforward, no-nonsense manual for helping men of all institutions, organizations, and businesses to become excellent mentors to women. Co-authors W. Brad Johnson, PhD, and David Smith, PhD, draw from extensive research and years of experience as experts in mentoring relationships and gender workplace issues. When a man mentors a woman, they explain, the relationship is often complicated by conventional gender roles and at times hostile external perceptions. Traditional notions of mentoring are often modeled on male-to-male relationships—the sort that begin on the golf course, involve a nearly exclusive focus on career achievement, and include more than a few slaps on the back over drinks after work. But women often report a desire for mentoring that integrates career and family aspects of life. Women want a mentor who not only “gets” this, but truly honors it. Men need to fully appreciate just how crucial their support of promising junior women can be in helping them to persist, promote, and thrive in their vocations and organizations. As women succeed, lean in, and assume leading roles in any organization or work context, that culture will become more egalitarian, effective, and prone to retaining top talent. http://www.davidgsmithphd.com/thebook https://www.amazon.com/Athena-Rising-Should-Mentor-Women/dp/1629561517
Frank Connolly is a senior editor at MindEdge Learning, an innovative online education firm based in Waltham, Mass. Before joining MindEdge, Connolly worked as a journalist, covering politics, government, religion, and sports for several alternative media outlets, including Worcester Magazine and the Boston Phoenix. He later spent 25 years as a political consultant and pollster, advising candidates for local, state, and federal office. A graduate of Harvard College, he lives with his wife and two children in Medford, Mass. http://mindedge.com/ https://twitter.com/mindedgeonline https://www.facebook.com/MindEdgeOnline/
We are changing the way that the world collects business information. We use crowdsourcing to gain access to our client's shoppers who then utilize the latest in smart phone technology to deliver near real time access to business information. Field Agent provides better coverage in less time and in a more cost effective solution than current providers of research, retail auditing, data collection and mystery shopping services. Jicco offers instant answers to pressing retail questions. The first platform of its kind, Jicco combines the speed and simplicity of a search engine interface with Field Agent’s mobile crowdsourcing system to generate on-demand photos, information, and shopper feedback from stores across the country. www.fieldagent.net info.gojicco.com/ twitter.com/fieldagentapp http://www.buildingthefutureshow.com/tv-episodes/2017/7/17/rick-west http://www.buildingthefutureshow.com/past-shows/2017/6/29/rick-west http://www.buildingthefutureshow.com/past-shows/2015/11/3/7/rick-west
PLAYLiveEvents on the Play Entertainment Network, joins the wildly successful PLAYDiscover feature along with our popular PLAYAllAccess service, solidifying the Play Network as the best end-to-end solution for all event goers and organizers. PLAYLiveEvents is a powerful tool that uses geofencing technology to connect all event attendees as they arrive at an event inviting them to interact with each other, with the event and with the event organizer on a live social platform. Watch for the fourth and most exciting PLAYEN feature coming soon, PLAYSocial. https://playen.co https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/playen-discover-your-city/id898624004?mt=8 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.playentertainment.android.Play
I have been challenging the status quo for as long as I can remember. From being labeled a devil’s advocate in high school to a contrarian in college, I refuse to go with the flow or accept things as they are. Delving into and exploring what others take for granted, I thrive when creating innovative, logical, and elegant solutions. I consider myself a visionary. Growing up in a family of entrepreneurs, it was only a matter of time before I started my own company. As a trained architect with over ten years of experience, I’ve worked internationally on projects in countries including Japan and France, as well as with Hillier, the award-winning firm in Princeton, New Jersey. I have also worked in the health care industry, housing, and urban design. As a teaching assistant at the University of Pennsylvania, I led seminars on planning urban infrastructure systems. While there, I noticed that available methods unnecessarily restricted users’ ability to gain knowledge to make better decisions—too much of the answer is already baked into the question, and there is little room for discovery. I envision a customizable planning solution that’s able to evaluate many infrastructure systems across geographic boundaries. At the same time, it must take spatial relationships into account, ultimately giving users across different disciplines the information and knowledge they need to make better decisions for themselves, their companies, and their clients. That is why I created Spatially, a tech startup that provides location-based services. As founder and CEO of Spatially, I oversee the company and ensure that it furthers my vision to be the leading geospatial analytics and solutions provider. I develop and implement overall growth strategies for the company, conduct research, and establish client relationships. https://www.spatially.com https://www.facebook.com/Spatially https://twitter.com/Think_Spatially
Louise, voted “Baltimore’s Best” Mediator by Baltimore Magazine 2002 and named one of “Maryland’s Top 100 Women” for the years 2004, 2007 and 2009 by The Daily Record, founded Baltimore Mediation in 1993, the first transformative mediation firm in Maryland. The firm offers mediation, facilitation, negotiation, and conflict resolution training. Louise, nationally known for her elicitive design and conflict resolution and transformation skills training and mediation, is one of the originators of “marital mediation” for couples in conflict wishing to preserve their marriages and for “team mediation” for business executives and managers wishing to maintain productivity while working through difficulties. An adjunct Law Professor at the University of Maryland (since 1998), she designed and continues to teach what was the first certificated mediation training course offered by a Maryland law school. At Harvard Law School’s Program on Negotiation, she taught conflict transformation theory, personal reactivity and self-awareness practices. She was an early elected Associate of the Institute for the Study of Conflict Transformation, is a nationally Certified Transformative Mediator™, has been certified by the Maryland Council on Dispute Resolution, and is the architect for Maryland’s Performance Based Assessment for Transformative Mediators, part of the statewide Maryland Mediator Excellence Program. Best known nationally for their trainings on conflict transformation and their offerings of certificated training courses in Basic, Advanced, Domestic and Workplace Mediation, the firm's training courses have been the trainings of choice for the Maryland Judiciary and the ABA. Louise tailors these trainings for professionals, families, and court, agency, and non-profit employees. http://www.baltimoremediation.com https://www.facebook.com/baltimoremediation https://twitter.com/QualityDialogue
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