Pat Bodin
Pat Bodin is a globally recognized leader in the IT Data Center world. Pat has been working with customers, manufacturers and system integrators for almost 30 years developing synergies between business needs and the technology levers available to drive desired business outcomes. He has worked in professional services (E&Y), DoD Aerospace (Lockheed Martin), Entertainment (CNN), High-tech manufacturing (Cisco) and in 2003 founded his own global company (Firefly) which specializes in data center technology consulting and education.
As a CPA and accomplished architect in IT infrastructure, Pat has been able to show many customers over the years how to use technology in unique ways to create strong and measurable financial returns. With his creative approach to driving behavioral change among sales teams, Firefly has been able to demonstrate partner and customer returns on their investment of over 30:1. Similar results have never been attained by an educational enablement company, which was recognized by Cisco in 2012 when Firefly was named Global Partner of the Year. Firefly has grown from humble roots to a global company that now operates in 82 countries and conducts sessions in 22 languages. In September 2012, Pat sold his company to a European consortium, took a few months off to spend time with his family, and is now returning with renewed vigor to leverage his experience helping sales teams learn to elevate their game and deliver business value to their clients through technology. Pat serves as the worldwide converged infrastructure evangelist for NetApp, focused on developing the channel community that has been so instrumental in the success of FlexPod.
Adam Braunstein
Mr. Braunstein, Principal Analyst and Research Director, brings 15 years of business leadership and IT consulting services experience to Robert Frances Group, where he helps clients address business needs with self-funding technologies and growth optimization strategies. He was most recently CEO of Media Lantern, a custom Web application and custom implementation business, where he tripled revenue and led a team in building industry-specific Web publishing solutions atop open source applications. Mr. Braunstein was with Robert Frances Group for more than a decade prior to that, where he authored research in the areas of application service providers, computer pricing and negotiation strategies, environmental issues and corporate social responsibility (CSR), financial models (ROI and TCO), leasing strategies, resource optimization, smartphones, and software as a service (SaaS) strategies.
He is a recognized author, speaker, and presenter, and has been consulted by top 100 vendors and IT executives at Fortune 1000 and Global 2000 firms. Areas of expertise include funding optimization, strategic and tactical assistance for marketing development, market analyses, product positioning, and sales methods and training.
Maria DeGiglio, M.A.
Maria DeGiglio, M.A., Principal Analyst, has over 25 years as an IT executive, professional, and industry analyst with broad industry experience and expertise in business process design and improvement, continuous improvement, business/IT alignment, business case development, and contingency planning. Ms. DeGiglio has been president and principal of Maria DeGiglio Consulting Group since 2005 working with clients in both higher education and health care as an education/health care specialist, online and classroom instructional designer and developer, and adjunct faculty. She has comprehensive knowledge of both the business and IT issues affecting higher education and health care and has legal and policy expertise in privacy and regulatory compliance. Ms. DeGiglio was previously employed as Principal Business Analyst and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Practice Leader by the Robert Frances Group. She advised C-suite executives on best practices in project/program management, IT governance, and risk management. She published extensively on service level agreements (SLAs) and talent management, conducted contract review and analysis, and performed vendor evaluations/comparisons.
Stuart Selip
Stuart Selip is an RFG Principal Analyst and owns and operates Principal Consulting, LLC, (PCLLC), a consulting resource for analyst firms, services and software vendors, and end-user organizations. Stuart's technology coverage areas include IT Governance, Data Quality, Software Development, Model-Driven Architecture, and Offshore Outsourcing. Recent IT research focus has been on negative business outcomes due to poor data quality. Prior, as the Chief Executive Officer of Luxoft’s Consulting Strategies unit, he managed delivery of IT Strategy consulting to Fortune 500/Global 2000 firms in the Financial Services and Banking, Insurance, Media industries, and U.S. Department of Energy.Before his employment at Luxoft, Stuart spent several years at Burton Group, an IT Research and Advisory firm now owned by Gartner Research. Stuart held a number of roles including Vice President of Consulting Services, and Vice President and Service Director of the Application Platform Strategies research service, where he also served as a senior IT industry analyst.
Harold (Hal) Kreitzman
CEO at Experture. Hal is a senior executive with a strong, diverse business & technology background in financial services having worked for several global financial institutions, including The Blackstone Group where he was the Senior Technology Executive for 6 years. He has an extensive background in all aspects of information technology. He has focused career on applying the appropriate mix of people, process and technology to solve business challenges and enhance corporate value. Specifically, Hal audited, reengineered and managed several different types of organizational areas including finance / accounting analytical support, application development, data-center operations, and firm-wide technology. He also managed the development / operation of the technological components of global branch and business integration; established strong partnerships with other operating groups and business units; and managed mission-critical processes/systems and firm-wide initiatives to realize growth/profitability targets.
Larry Bonfante
Larry Bonfante has held executive leadership positions over the past 30 years in the Financial, Pharmaceutical, Not for Profit, Consulting, and Sports and Entertainment industries. He has received numerous industry accolades including being nominated for the CIO Hall of Fame in 2013, being named as one of CIO Magazine’s CIO 100 in 2011 and one of Computerworld’s Premier 100 IT Leaders in 2009. As Chief Information Officer at the United States Tennis Association, Larry’s team is responsible for all information technology related services supporting the US Open, the most highly attended annual sporting event in the world. Larry is the founder of CIO Bench Coach, LLC an executive coaching practice for IT executives and the author of the book “Lessons in IT Transformation” published by John Wiley & Sons. Larry has served as a mentor and executive coach for many IT leaders in various industries. He has served as both President and Chairman of the Fairfield-Westchester chapter of SIM and is a founding member of the CIO Executive Council. Larry has been a guest lecturer for the Masters’ Degree programs at Columbia University, NYU, and Polytechnic Institute. He is an accomplished public speaker who has delivered keynote presentations at many major industry conferences, runs leadership workshops for world class organizations and writes leadership blogs for both CIO Insight magazine and Enterprise Efficiency.
Gary MacFadden
RFG Co-Founder and Principal Research Analyst
Gary's career in the IT industry spans more than 25 years starting in software sales and marketing for IBM partners DAPREX and Ross Data Systems, then moving to the IT Advisory and Consulting industry with META Group, Giga and IDC. He is a co-founder of The Robert Frances Group where his responsibilities have included business development, sales, marketing, senior management and research roles. For the past several years, Gary has been a passionate advocate for the use of analytics and information governance solutions to transform business and customer outcomes, and regularly consults with both end-user and vendor organizations who serve the banking, healthcare, insurance, high tech and utilities industries. Gary is also a frequent contributor to the Wikibon.org research portal and his Parity Research Blog, a sought after speaker for industry events and writes frequently on Healthcare IT (HIT) topics.
Cal Braunstein
Chairman/CEO and Executive Director of Research
Robert Frances Group, Inc. (RFG)
Mr. Braunstein serves as Chairman/CEO and Executive Director of Research at RFG, and Chairman of the GreenWay Collaborative. In addition to his corporate role, he helps his clients wrestle with a range of business, management, regulatory, sustainability, and technology issues.
He has deep and broad experience in business strategy management, cost/benefit analyses, business process management, enterprise systems architecture, financing, mission-critical systems, project and portfolio management, procurement, risk management, sustainability, and vendor management. Cal also chaired a Business Operational Risk Council whose membership consisted of a number of top global financial institutions.
With more than three decades in the business – ranging from programming to marketing and strategy, to industry analyst, and to research executive – Cal focuses on IT optimization, procurement, and transformation issues. He assists with strategic planning, best practices, cost/benefit analyses (primarily ROI and TCO), financing, messaging, people management, cultural roadblocks, and sustainability. His goal is to help users and vendors make the right decisions and communicate their visions and initiatives in the most positive way possible.