[podcast flashvars="titles: 'Mark Sebell',animation: 'no',initialvolume: '100'"]http://www.brandfasttrackers.com/podcasts/brand_fast_trackers_mark_sebell.mp3[/podcast]
Imagine sitting in on a strategy session with a senior executive advising a CEO of one of the world’s largest, most influential brands as they discuss their views on innovation and brand marketing. In this episode, guest host Carl Johnson speaks with Mark Sebell to identify the key drivers of innovation.
Mark Sebell has been a business innovationist his whole life. It just took awhile for him to see it. He has had an unusual multi-dimensional career in innovation, starting in advertising in 1970. After an MBA from The University of Michigan he worked for me at Colgate-Palmolive, where he quickly gravitated to new products, because in his word, “I love to make order out of chaos.”
As a member of Colgate’s first-ever corporate new ventures group he was trained as a brainstorming facilitator, which he loved so much that he returned home to Boston in 1982, where he became a managing partner at the creative facilitation company that had trained him. In 1988 he co-founded Creative Realities because he wanted to be in the innovation business, not the creativity business. Creative Realities is an innovation management-consulting firm specializing in innovation process. Since 1988 they have worked with clients in over 35 different industries, helping internal teams strategize, create, and implement new products, new services, as well as new manufacturing, distribution, sales, cost management and operating processes and new business models. Mark is the author of a book on innovation called Ban the Humorous Bazooka. In his Forward to the book, the late C.K. Prahalad described it as “…an innovation practitioner’s guide for leaders & managers.” He is a frequent guest at Harvard Business School, Babson College’s graduate program in entrepreneurship, Yale School of Management, and Tufts University among others. He speaks often on the subject of innovation and has been the keynote presenter at several domestic and international innovation symposia, the last two in Norway and Austria.
Carl Johnson was named Senior Vice President and Senior Advisor to the CEO in October 2010. He reports to Douglas R. Conant, President and Chief Executive Officer. Carl joined Campbell in April 2001 as Senior Vice President and Chief Strategy Officer. He was directly responsible for corporate strategy, Research & Development and Quality, corporate marketing services, licensing, and e-Business. Carl joined Campbell from Kraft Foods, where he ran three successively larger business divisions. He joined Kraft in 1992 as Vice President, Strategy, for Kraft Foods, USA. In 1993, he became Executive Vice President, Kraft USA and General Manager of Kraft’s Specialty Products Division. In 1995, he was made Executive Vice President of Kraft Foods, N.A., General Manager of the Meals Division and member of the Kraft Foods N.A. Operating Committee. 1997, Carl was named President of the $2.5 billion New Meals Division when the former Meals and Enhancers divisions were consolidated. In this capacity through early 2001, he led the division’s three-year transformation, restoring sales and earnings momentum and achieving record-high operating income growth. Prior to Kraft, Carl was a senior partner and director of the consumer goods consulting practice at Marketing Corporation of America, where his key clients included among others, Kraft, Con Agra, Cadbury Schweppes, Readers’ Digest and NYNEX. Before that, he was Vice President of Worldwide Advertising at Polaroid Corporation. He began his career with a 10-year tenure at Colgate-Palmolive in marketing management on both personal care and household products. Carl earned his B.A. degree in government and economics from Wesleyan University, and his M.B.A. degree from the University of Chicago. Carl is an Advisory Board Member of the Agricultural Sustainability Institute, University of California, Davis. He serves as a Trustee of the Adelphic Educational Fund at Alpha Delta Phi, Wesleyan University. He also serves as a member of the board of directors of Nautilus, Inc., leader in fitness equipment, and Avedro, Inc., a pioneer in vision correction technology.
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