Leadership

Cathy Pickoski has more than 30 years of experience leading high performing sales, marketing and operations teams in environments of rapid growth and change. With Scantron for nearly 10 years, Cathy was recently named Chief Executive Officer of Scantron after successfully driving strategy, execution, and growth during her 2 year tenure as President of Scantron Technology Solutions.

She began her career at Verizon establishing herself in progressive leadership roles within the Consumer, Commercial and Public Sector Markets, which culminated in leading the Field Segment Marketing team for Western Global Accounts with annual revenues in excess of $800M.  She then moved to Lumen running the North Texas/Oklahoma Region and growing revenues more than 400% during her tenure. In late 2005, she joined Edmentum to lead sales teams in the K12, post-secondary, and channel markets as the organization transformed to a Software-as-a-Service business. During this period, her teams exceeded annual revenue goals and secured key contracts at the state level along with winning multiple contracts at the district and post-secondary level.  Prior to her current role at Scantron, over the last eight years, Cathy has lead global sales, marketing, print operations, and customer support within the business.

Professional Highlights:

• More than 30 years of success in transforming sales and marketing organizations.
• Extensive experience in the technology and assessment market segments
• Expertise in global market development and operations

Twitter: @CathyPickoski

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/cathy-pickoski-84a68ba/

Mike has 30 years of experience leading finance, administrative, and investor relations functions in global publicly traded, and private equity owned companies. He has completed over a dozen acquisitions and has expertise in sizing systems, controls, and staffing for companies undergoing rapid growth. He has a unique mix of manufacturing, software, technology, and services industry experience.
Mike has a BBA degree in Accounting from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and an MBA in Finance and Accounting from the University of South Florida, Tampa. He is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA).

Professional Highlights:

• Merging 8 Business Units with revenue over $1 billion into a single company and culture, generating millions of dollars in savings and better serving our customer base
• Scaling companies’ systems, controls, and staffing for rapid growth
• Completed complex acquisitions, integrations, and divestitures
• Leading a public technology company through rapid growth as its share price had the second highest annual return of any stocks on its exchange

Associations and Affiliations:

• American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA)
• Missouri Society of Certified Public Accountants (MOCPA)
• Financial Executives International (FEI)

Jodi Hilton, SPHR, is a culture-focused People executive passionate about leading organizations to success. For over 25 years, she has been committed to improving business outcomes through meaningful people experiences and focusing on processes that give her employees what they need and crave. At Scantron, Jodi is responsible for the People division, which includes all activities related to the company’s People functions, including Payroll, Talent Acquisition, Benefits, Compensation, Training, Culture, and Employee Benefits. She partners with leadership to strategically optimize the biggest and most important company asset.

Her philosophy:

1. Be proud of what you do
2. Connect
3. Learn
4. Have fun

Before serving in her current role, Jodi worked in various People leadership roles in multiple markets, sectors, and industries. Before joining Scantron, Jodi led other Human Resources (HR) departments, performing hands-on work in all areas of HR in the public sector, logistics, IT, manufacturing, and even mining! In her roles, Jodi has worked in union and non-union environments and has extensive experience in Mergers and Acquisitions. Prior to her work in the field of Human Resources, Jodi taught at the college level while obtaining her Master of Science in Industrial Psychology (HR Consulting) at Emporia State University.

Professional Highlights:

• 25 years of hands-on experience leading the People function
• Repeatedly design, develop, lead, and transform all areas of Human Resources to find, retain, and engage employees
• Proactively manage risk for the company and leverage consistent resources to encourage employees to provide extraordinary performance
• Deep expertise in Workforce Planning, Training, Process Transformation, Culture, and Engagement

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jodihilton

Mary Michael Pontzer, PhD is a strategic executive passionate about implementing aggressive growth strategies to diversify revenue and optimize operational excellence. For nearly 20 years, she has been committed to improving business outcomes through meaningful product and service experiences based on thoughtfully crafted strategy and customer-centric transformation initiatives. At Scantron, Mary Michael is responsible for the Data Capture Solutions division, which includes all activities related to the company’s iconic scoring and scanning machines, as well survey and examination products and services across K-12, higher education, corporate, and government markets. These responsibilities include establishing and driving existing and future strategic direction for the division, as well as driving innovation, leveraging market insights to conceptualize new solutions to fill customer needs, and empowering growth through rapid and reliable data capture and a wide range of print and digital survey solutions for clients worldwide

Prior to serving in her current role, Mary Michael was the Vice President of Portfolio Management at Scantron, focusing on digital assessment solutions. Before joining Scantron, Mary Michael served in other senior leadership roles in the education, workforce, and assessment industries, at organizations such as ACT, Inc. as the Vice President of Product, and Learning Ally, Inc. as the Vice President of Professional Learning Solutions. Additionally, she held progressively responsible positions at Stride, Inc., including Director of New Business Planning. Prior to her work in the field of product and portfolio management, Mary Michael taught at community colleges and universities in Northeast Georgia and began her professional career as a high school English teacher in metro-Atlanta. Mary Michael earned a PhD in International and Comparative Education from the University of Georgia.

Professional Highlights:

• Adept at leveraging strong understanding of domestic and international markets, digital and print technology trends, and market intelligence to drive competitive advantage.
• Deep expertise in strategic planning and execution, business optimization, holistic portfolio management, and corporate transformation.
• Repeated success building exceptional teams passionate about customers, solving challenges, and the executing on ambitious goals.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mmp11/

For the last 29 years, Brian Janning has held various management roles in the field service and support operations field.  Leveraging seven years of prior manufacturing experience as a quality engineer, Brian has directly managed depot repair operations, technical support operations, technical training, and a nationwide field service organization. These teams supported a wide variety of products and services while serving a diverse customer base in many vertical markets.

Leading all operations at a national service organization, Brian has driven advancements in technology and process improvements creating cost savings and competitive advantages for his organization. His experience includes major involvement in multiple acquisitions, large-scale projects for national customers, technical sales support, systems and process conversions, along with profit and loss responsibilities.

Professional Highlights:

• Direct operational management of
  • Depot Repair and Logistics Operations
  • Help Desk and Technical Support Teams
  • Technical Training Programs
  • National Field Service organization
• More than 29 years of experience in the support of a wide variety of products and services in IT environments for a diverse customer base
• Demonstrated leadership in national IT service and solutions organization

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/brian-janning-a567a122

Vern Kathol has more than 35 years of leadership experience in the information technology space including expertise in the areas of Technical Support Operations, Depot Repair Operations, Purchasing, Inventory and Logistics Operations, and IT Governance.  The breadth of his experience has also allowed him to play key roles in M&A activity within the Scantron Technology Solutions brand.  As Vice President of Hardware and Managed Print Services, his responsibilities include the development of growth vision and strategy, the execution of that strategy via organic service development, the creation of strategic alliances and the support of acquisition strategy.

His development of strategic alliances has driven growth in Hardware Maintenance, Managed IT and Manage Print Services lines of business. Vern has also established Scantron Technology Solutions as a key producer for a number of strategic alliance partners. In conjunction with the organic development of services, his IT Governance responsibilities produced supporting systems which earned him and his team the company’s prestigious Pillar of Excellence Award for Innovation.

Professional Highlights:

• More than 35 years of experience in the information technology industry
• Skilled in the development of growth vision and the execution of strategy to achieve results and long term cultural evolution
• Successful integration of acquisitions in support of geographic expansion strategy
• Organic development of market-leading Managed IT and Managed Print product lines
• Development of top-producing strategic alliances with major OEMs

LinkedIn:  linkedin.com/in/vern-kathol-69241414/

Kim Larsen has more than 28 years of experience and first-hand knowledge working in the SMB Marketplace. She has been responsible for the sales, purchasing and deployment of more than $150 million of IT infrastructure, including: IT Managed Services, Network Design and Implementation. Kim also brings a wealth of financial management expertise, business partnership acquisitions, financial reporting and budgetary oversight to Scantron.

Kim provides leadership and financial guidance for the continued development of an innovative, robust and secure Information Technology environment. During her time at WRK Systems, her guidance strategy on realignment of the Managed Services Support model helped grow the organization by 210% in three years. Additionally, during her realignment of support strategies, she was also able to grow gross profit margin on services by 15% during the same three year window.

Professional Highlights:

• Proven ability to implement Managed Services Support models and strategies to substantially grow business
• More than 28 years of experience working in the SMB market with extensive experience relating to IT Managed Services
• Expertise in financial management, business partnership acquisitions, financial reporting, and budgetary oversight.

Associations and Affiliations:

• Omaha Chamber of Commerce
• Trust X Alliance

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/kim-larsen-1bb0b58a/