BMLI Class 51

Yasmine Abdillahi has a dual role at Comcast in Cybersecurity: she is Executive Director of Security Risk & Compliance, and the Business Information Security Officer for Comcast Business. She is responsible for security policies and standards, compliance programs and executive engagement with the B2B connectivity division of Comcast NBCUniversal.

She started as an apprentice in 2005 while earning her finance bachelor’s and information systems master’s degrees. In 2007, she became a Big4 consultant specializing in business transformation and IT controls.

In 2015, Yasmine joined NBCUniversal’s newly formed Information Risk Management organization to scale and sustain risk and compliance. In 2018, she transitioned to establish a Business Process Re-engineering Center of Excellence. She supported the automation of Intellectual Property, the new streaming service Peacock as well as the automation of health and safety processes for TV/Film studios in 2020.

Yasmine is a mentor with the Executive Women Forum, she serves on a non-profit board, runs 5K, and writes TV scripts on her free time.

Sissy Abraham is a creative, solution-oriented Technology executive with a proven track record in translating business strategy to results. She is responsible for the strategic vision and optimization of the Effectv’s technology experience, services, and technical operations.  She leads over 100 teammates who support technology services including technical portfolio and project management, the shared service center / help desk, application and infrastructure management, governance, risk, and compliance efforts.

She previously led a team of over 60 professionals with a portfolio of 30+ large programs as well as technical operations supporting all facets of HR and Talent inclusive of Reporting and Analytics and was responsible for the multi-year technology strategy to build enterprise solutions that improve productivity and drive efficiencies for 90,000 employees in over 15 countries

She has a career spent in driving toward business outcomes with a cross-section of stakeholders and business teams including various technology implementations inclusive of Workday, SAP, and SuccessFactors software solutions.  Her previous, consulting experience supported multi-national companies across various industries with on-shore and off-shore / remote teams.  She is passionate about improving lives inside and outside of work.  She lives in Maryland with her husband and two children.

Karen Babcock
Vice President, Strategy & Partnerships
Karen Babcock leads strategy & partnerships for Comcast Advertising, the advertising arm of Comcast Cable. Comcast Advertising is a global leader in media, technology, and advertising that fosters powerful connections between brands and their audiences as well as between publishers, distributors, MVPDs, agencies, and other industry players.

Karen’s role enables her to define and lead some of the most important initiatives to ensure Comcast Advertising is building new partnerships, enabling more advertising inventory and enabling Comcast’s assets for advertising revenue. Recently, she has worked with 3rd party data companies like Experian and iSpot on new and innovative currencies for advertising enabled by data. She works with programming partners to ensure their content is ad-supported wherever a consumer is watching – on TV, streaming or VOD. Working closely with Comcast, Karen ensures that every time Comcast makes an innovation in their products, we explore advertising synergies that have the potential to increase revenue. All of this is done with the lens of how we improve the consumer experience by connecting them with the brands that they love.

Throughout her thirteen years at Comcast, Karen prided herself on being a business leader, who focused on listening to business needs to ensure we focus on the right projects that will move the needle. Prior to Karen’s role in Strategy & Partnerships, she held various roles inventory, yield and pricing for Comcast Advertising for about 11 years. Karen’s fuel of passion for her work comes from the culture of Comcast, and how we can actively participate and move from working to solving problems with friends. This led her to Karen expand her participation in Comcast’s culture by leading the creation of the Women’s Network National Advisory Council, alongside Karen Buchholz and Tina Simmons (the amazing National Champions!).

Karen resides in the suburbs of Philadelphia with her husband, Mike, and son, Colton. She finds her biggest purpose in the foundation she and her husband created in memory of their 2-year-old son, Dax – The Dax Pact. Check it out!

I am a seasoned and effective Human Resources leader who excels at driving business results through HR strategy and data-driven insights. Currently VP of HR for Paramount Advertising, I lead my team of HRBPs to serve as co-pilots to leadership across the division in architecting the current and future state of the org by aligning business needs to internal talent, effecting superior business results. Endlessly curious, I am able to quickly build trust with stakeholders by working to demonstrate a nuanced understanding of their respective areas of the business, including their priorities and challenges, and then leverage that trust to elevate employee engagement and unlock incremental P&L value.

I have deep experience leading organizational change at startups and Fortune 500 businesses alike, guiding teams through transitions with strategic planning and effective, empathetic communication that helps employees adapt to new realities in an ever-changing media landscape. I am the DE&I lead for Paramount Advertising and pride myself on building inclusive partnerships across our company’s matrixed org to achieve comprehensive and cohesive solutions that uplift the whole. Prior to my current role, I held HR leadership positions at CBS News and NBCUniversal.

Specialties: Organizational Design, Change Management, Culture and Inclusion, Talent Management, Employee Development

Mary Kate brings a unique perspective on brands and marketing from strategy experience in advertising, publishing and media industries. She is a veteran at transforming consumer insights, trends and shifts in culture into actionable communication strategies, creative ideas and media opportunities.

With a focus a newly emerging imperative of brands becoming a part of culture, she currently spends her time at Paramount Advertising as Vice President of Market & Cultural Intelligence working on thought leadership projects and utilizing the wealth of insights that Paramount has about its audiences to inform creative, culturally resonant responses to brand challenges.

Prior to Paramount, Mary Kate developed brand-partner content strategy at Condé Nast and led marketing for trade media brands at Fairchild Fashion Media. Before making the switch to the media and publishing world, she worked on the agency side at Grey New York across multiple categories including CPG, food and healthcare.

And as mom of a 6-year old she has found a new appreciation for the power of marketing as she finds herself extremely susceptible to well-targeted advertising campaigns.

Jennifer (Miles) Crawford is Senior Director of Multiplatform Partnerships for The Walt Disney Company. In this role she oversees brand marketing efforts for TWDC’s entertainment networks: ABC, FX, The Disney Channels, Nat Geo and Freeform across all distribution partners including Apple, Amazon, Roku, Comcast, Cox, and DIRECTV

She started her career as a Writer/Producer/Editor at ABC Television before moving to AT&T where she helped launch U-verse television nationally as the head of upgrade and retention efforts. She was also the liaison for AT&T’s joint venture, Otter Media, where she managed the distribution of Fullscreen SVOD as well as other Otter Media SVOD services.  In 2016 she developed the acquisition and go-to-market plan for AT&T’s dMVPD service DIRECTV NOW which grew to 1M subscribers in its first year.

She has been President of The WICT Network Southern California chapter since 2020.

Jennifer lives in Burbank, CA with her husband and daughter. She has a BA from California State University, Fullerton and an MBA from California State University, Northridge.

Brenda Dodson is Vice President – Strategic HR Solutions for Cox Communications, where she leads a team responsible for leading many of the People Solutions Centers of Expertise, such as Organizational Design, Compensation, Skills & Workforce Development, Talent Management and Organizational Development.

Prior to this role, Brenda served as Sr. Director, HR Business Partnerships, where she was responsible for leading HR business consulting and service delivery for Marketing & Sales.

Dodson joined Cox in 2004 as a Senior Compensation Analyst. During her tenure at Cox, she has risen through the ranks with the compensation and HR business partnership functions, supporting many different Cox functions.

Ms. Dodson holds a Master of Science degree in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from the University of Tennessee @Chattanooga and a Bachelor of Science in Psychology & Sociology from Alma College. She is a member of the Society of Human Resources Management, WorldatWork, C2HR and The WICT Network.

When she is not at Cox striving to create the best employee experience, you can find her running half marathons, traveling and boating with her husband, Tiffery.

Kristie Fox is the Vice President of Public Relations and Employee Communications for Comcast’s Beltway Region and is responsible for developing and executing integrated communications strategies to promote the Company’s residential and commercial products and services along with its broader initiatives through earned, owned, social and paid media. Her team is also responsible for issues management, awards and speaking engagements, employee communications including the planning and execution of leadership meetings, and collaborating with HR to drive employee engagement.

Kristie joined Comcast in May 2017 to lead communications for Xfinity Mobile. Prior to Comcast, she spent close to 20 years on the agency side most recently as SVP and Head of the Technology Practice for Edelman Chicago, where she led the agency team that launched Xfinity Mobile.

Kristie graduated cum laude from Wake Forest University with a Bachelor of Arts in Politics and a minor in communications, and earned a certificate of completion from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business Executive Leadership and Business Development Program. Kristie was honored by PR SourceCode as a 2009 “Top Tech PR Pro” and has won awards for PR campaigns from the League of American Communications Professionals (LACP) and the Publicity Club of Chicago.

Kristie lives in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania with her husband and three children. She enjoys skiing, yoga and live music.

Heather Frugoli is Vice President of Integrated Communications for Comcast Advertising, including FreeWheel and Effectv, leading communications for employee engagement, strategy, crisis and change globally including employees from the U.S., 11 countries throughout EMEA and FreeWheel’s Beijing Engineering Center and Comcast’s India Engineering Center. Heather uses strategic communications to drive the global employee experience and support the employee value proposition. Believing that transparency is best, Heather has extensive experience with crisis and issues management dealing with reductions in force and reorgs, company acquisitions, site closures/moves, product sunsets and employee incidents, and in recent years, COVID-19 response and Return to Office planning. In her current role, she leads employee communications related to all aspects of employee experience, including organizational culture, talent and career programs, People Leader strategy, and executive communications.

Prior to her communications roles, Heather oversaw marketing for Effectv’s New England region, focusing on developing leads, creating incentives to close sales and growing existing advertiser spending.  She was successful in elevating the brand in local markets through advertising, promotion and branding.  Heather has held positions in sales, marketing, promotions and events in the Boston market.  She is a board member of The Steeple School of Trinity Church and a former board member of Chelsea Reach and New England Broadcast Association. Heather earned a B.S. in business administration from University of New Hampshire in Durham, NH.

Justine Gaeta is an accomplished global finance executive recognized for her diverse experience in leading finance, accounting, and operations for Fortune 50 companies and small start-ups in the media and technology industries. Her career began at AT&T, moved through three successful start-ups, and, with the sale of one of these companies, returned to a multi-billion dollar corporation: Comcast.

At Comcast, Justine serves as Vice President, Finance at FreeWheel, a global subsidiary that provides the technology platform that powers the premium video advertising industry. In this role, she oversees the financial management of all FreeWheel revenue globally, including the company’s pricing strategy.

Justine joined Comcast through the sale of Visible World, where, as CFO, she provided financial oversight during triple-digit revenue growth and constrained capital.  She was instrumental in executing the sale of the company to Comcast. Before Visible World, Justine served as Controller and Vice President, Finance for Mojiva, Inc., managing the use of capital, negotiating million-dollar lines of credits, facilitating fundraisings and managing all aspects of the negotiations and due diligence process for the final sale to PubMatic, Inc.

Starting at AT&T, Justine quickly moved up their ranks as part of their Finance Leadership Program, with roles in M&A, investor relations, international tax, and internal controls. She went on to close several deals, led the investor relations function for the AT&T Wireless IPO, and served as COO and Vice President for AT&T Alascom, a $130M full-service telecom business serving Alaska. With the merger of AT&T and SBC, Justine was appointed by the AT&T Chairman to implement the corporate integration.

Justine earned a Mathematics/Economics degree from Lafayette College, where she was Valedictorian, and earned her MBA at Columbia Business School. She is also a graduate of Comcast’s Women in Leadership Program at Wharton. She lives in New Jersey with her husband and two daughters.

Amanda Gagliardi is a seasoned leader in customer experience and strategy, with a career marked by transformative roles in top-tier agencies and companies. Currently serving as VP, Digital Self-Service at Charter Communications, she oversees both the centralized design team and the customer journey team responsible for design and development of the web and app purchasing experience for existing customers.

Previously, as Global Head of Experience Innovation at Ogilvy and Vice President at Effective (acquired by Ogilvy), Amanda spearheaded large-scale enterprise MarTech and digital transformation projects for global clients like British Airways and American Express. Her leadership at Effective included establishing the NYC office and setting industry standards in experience design for clients such as IBM and MetLife.

With a foundation in experience design and digital marketing, Amanda founded GetThere UX, focusing on end-to-end customer experience strategy for clients such as Fisher Price, Canon and Fidelity. Her early career includes impactful roles at firms like HUGE and Crispin, Porter and Bogusky, where she led digital initiatives for brands like Volkswagen, JetBlue and Pizza Hut.

Amanda is based in Northern Westchester, New York and spends her free time reading and being a “dance mom” to her nine year old Irish step dancer.

Amanda Gifford is Vice President of Production for ESPN, and she oversees the company’s industry-leading college football event productions as well as the UFL. A 20-year company veteran, Gifford has continuously expanded her role over two decades, contributing to a variety of areas, including ESPN Audio, SportsCenter and other studio and digital shows, the ESPN Talent Office, and, most recently, event productions.

Gifford was promoted to her current role in August 2023. Her oversight of college football event productions includes more than a thousand regular season and bowl games – including the College Football Playoff – each year across ESPN platforms.

Prior to joining the football production team, Gifford was a highly respected leader on ESPN’s Content Strategy & Audio team. As Senior Coordinating Producer, Content Strategy & Audio, she was responsible for a variety of areas including the ESPN Radio Network, content planning and strategy as part of the executive leadership team of SportsCenter, and had oversight of the Talent Production Group and the Universal Coverage group.

Gifford, who joined ESPN in 2004, started her career as an intern at the ESPN Radio Network. She spent 12 years in the radio group, including five years as producer of The Herd with Colin Cowherd. Gifford left radio in 2016 after having responsibility for all content and operations from 6a-7p to join the ESPN Talent Office. There, she negotiated ESPN Talent deals and worked on talent strategy and recruiting across the company.

Adayna Gonzalez serves as Vice President of App Strategy and Engagement at Comcast, where she has been for nearly two years. She is a proactive problem solver and a creative, analytical thinker driven by a bias towards action. Passionate about leading and empowering product management teams, she fiercely advocates for their needs and consistently prioritizes customer-centric solutions.

Adayna holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from Wesleyan University and a Master of Business Administration from the Tepper School of Business at Carnegie Mellon University.

Adayna launched her professional career as a marketer at American Express in New York City. After 3 years, she moved on to teach eighth-grade math at a public school. Following her experience in education and fresh out of business school, Adayna joined Citi where she spent nearly 8 years across various roles including acquisitions marketing, existing customer marketing, new product development, and digital product management. After Citi, Adayna spent 3 years at a prepaid debit card start-up and a year at Red Ventures, a digital marketing agency. She spent 7 years at Wells Fargo leading the end-to-end client experience for their automated investing product before joining Comcast in 2022.

She currently lives in the greater Philadelphia area with her daughter Nila and her dog Fluffy. Adayna finds joy in working out, traveling, catching a flick or musical theater, and, most importantly, spending time with her loved ones. She is also deeply committed to raising funds for The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in honor of her daughter, Elsie. Adayna is a proud first-generation Dominican American and a proud (and true) New Yorker.

Catie Haelig helps to lead a team of over 200 user experience design professionals – from UX and UI designers to prompt engineers and prototypers to researchers, content strategists, and more – across the United States and United Kingdom.

In this leadership position, Catie is responsible for the operations, strategic direction, and creative vision for a global product organization that produces groundbreaking in-home consumer connectivity and entertainment products that power the experience at the heart of homes across the world.

Prior to her time in the Global Product Design organization, Catie held several positions within Comcast – as its first-ever content design director, supervising a team of content strategists and writers who advocate for and evangelize the importance of plain language in products. This team was recognized with several awards for its equitable approach to language in product design, as was the larger experience design group recognized for its contributions throughout the industry at large.

Catie is passionate about design ethics, diversity, inclusion, and localization – understanding that an organization that intends to be “global” must respect the differences and unique facets of the unique and varied cultures it seeks to serve.

On a more internal level, Catie is very passionate about leading with emotional intelligence, empathy, and forward-thinking leadership strategies that will help prepare current-day employees for the future of what the workplace may look like.

Outside of work, Catie loves to travel, works out (almost) every day, and looks forward to a time when her 3- and 6-year-old daughters allow her the time to pick back up other hobbies. For now, she’s happy to scratch her extracurricular itch with a rich rotation of arts and crafts projects on a daily basis.

Tina Hamilton is Vice President of Content Sales and Broadcast Syndication within the Walt Disney Company’s Platform Distribution division.   In her Content Sales role, she negotiates complex, high-value license deals for Disney’s extensive library of features, series, and specials across a vast array of client groups and platforms, including SVOD, AVOD, pay television, digital broadcast, basic cable, and U.S. Spanish, and manages content sales responsibilities for Warner Bros. Discovery, NBC Universal, AMC Networks, MGM+, TV One, Univision and Telemundo, among others.

She also leads domestic broadcast syndication sales for the division’s entire portfolio of first-run and off-network syndicated programs across the U.S. and manages broadcast station group responsibilities for Nexstar Media Group, E.W. Scripps, Allen Media Group, and Standard Media.

Tina has been instrumental in the ongoing success of Disney’s first-run series including #1 rated syndicated talk show, Live with Kelly and Ryan, and the Emmy-Award winning The Tamron Hall Show, and played a key role in the successful off-network sales of Last Man Standing, Modern Family, Castle, Wipeout, Bob’s Burgers, and Family Guy.

An entertainment industry veteran of 25+ years, she has been an award-winning sales leader across multiple platforms, including linear, DTC, digital, and FAST. Before returning to Disney, Tina held roles at Comast/NBC Universal, Gannett Television (TEGNA), and AOL/Time Warner.

Tina also serves on Disney’s Platform Distribution Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Council, whose mission is to broadly advance representation, culture, and accountability within its business segment and across the company.   Tina has also served as co-founder of Disney Media Mentors, a mentorship program for young executives of color interested in pursuing a career in the entertainment industry.

A graduate of Howard University, she has used her work in media to bring attention to a range of charitable activities and community concerns, with a focus on education, literacy, combating hunger and homelessness including Project Give Back, Comcast Cares, Reading Partners, the youth and community outreach programs of the National Cathedral and Trinity Episcopal Church.

Tina resides in Washington, D.C. with her husband of 25 years and three college-age children.

Dayana Hoffman serves as the Vice President of Advanced Advertising Sales at AMC Networks. In this role, Hoffman spearheads the company’s evolution of Advanced Advertising products and strategies in an ever-changing landscape. She works cross-functionally to lead conversations amongst key stakeholders and closely collaborates with BI, Sales, P&I, Research and Ad Ops to drive AMC Networks’ segmentation and data offerings.  Hoffman collaborates extensively with the organization’s programming and business development teams to explore diverse methods of delivering content to users on emerging platforms, creating additional avenues for clients to connect with audiences.

Prior to joining AMC Networks, Hoffman was most recently Director of Sales for Programmatic Revenue at Univision. Her scope was managing the sales process to drive revenue and leveraging data and tech insights to build client solutions across Univision’s digital footprint. She worked closely with key brand accounts and drove incremental revenue with both existing and new clients for the company.

Before Univision, Hoffman was an Associate Director within Advertising Solutions for PubMatic. Her team led sales for LATAM development both a domestic and internationally.

Katie Horne is the AVP, Cybersecurity at Cox Communications.  In this role she has five main areas of responsibility: Cyber M&A, Product Security, Application Security, Third-party Risk, and CB Customer cyber.  She is responsible for developing and implementing the company’s product and application security strategy and governance.  In addition, Katie leads the cyber security assessment and integration of all mergers and acquisitions into the Cox environment.  Third-party risk and assessment of all vendors for CCI is also an integral part of Katie’s role as well as fulfilling Cox Business customer security requests in support of continued growth.

Katie worked at Anthem from 2015 to 2018. There she served as the staff Vice President in the Office of the Chief Information Officer. In that role, she led internal and external IT communications, metrics and reporting, and an IT department-wide culture campaign. Katie also oversaw core operational areas such as budgets and IT workforce management, while driving key strategic initiatives on behalf of the CIO, to ensure the department operated at maximum efficiency and effectiveness.

Prior to Anthem Katie worked in the Coca-Cola system from 2009 -2015. There she held several different positions, the last of which involved building the North American sales and distribution suite of applications for all Coca-Cola North American bottlers. Her efforts centered around building the application infrastructure, the security controls, both the core and backup data centers, the data model for each of the bottlers, and instituting a comprehensive application support process.

Katie is a graduate of The University of Georgia and started her career with Protiviti Consulting.  She is a member of several industry associations, newly married and enjoying living on Lake Lanier

Brooke Johnson serves as Vice President of Platform Distribution Sales, Disney Entertainment. Johnson and her team negotiate key licensing agreements on behalf of the company across a wide array of media platforms and businesses including domestic multichannel subscription distribution for its full portfolio of linear networks (ABC Owned Television Stations, the ESPN networks, the Disney-branded channels, Freeform, the FX networks and the National Geographic channels) and its global direct-to-consumer platforms (Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu).

Among these substantial high-profile agreements managed by Johnson are in-home TVOD, EHVL and global direct-to-consumer app distribution among digital aggregators, MVPDs, devices, wireless providers and social media platforms. She also pursues and negotiates wholesale marketing partnerships for the company’s direct-to-consumer streaming services. Johnson’s key accounts include Apple, Google, Sony and Verizon, to name a few.

A seasoned executive with 20 years of experience, Brooke joined the company in 2003 as a production assistant on ESPN’s flagship multi-platform news program SportsCenter. Since that time, she has held various management and executive roles in digital distribution, affiliate field sales and national accounts. Johnson has relocated several times and has been based in Connecticut, Burbank, Denver and New York.

Johnson earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism and Mass Communication from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. She is presently based in New York City.

Pooja Kapadia joined Comcast in 2020 as the Vice President of Customer Growth & Loyalty for Xfinity, the residential cable arm of Comcast. In this role, she is responsible for identifying new opportunities to shape base management in a changing competitive environment. In 2021, Pooja led the launch of Xfinity Rewards which today has over 8.5MM members. And more recently, Pooja has been working on designing and implementing the AI/ML strategy to improve customer retention.

Prior to joining Comcast, Pooja spent nearly 15 years at American Express working in various strategy, brand, marketing and product management roles. Before American Express, Pooja was a management consultant with Monitor Group where she focused on advising clients on marketing and growth strategy. She is an interpreter, translator, and builder; someone who is insanely curious and never willing to settle for the status quo. Her superpower is balancing creativity with rigorous analytics and logical problem solving, leveraging equal parts art and science to drive results.

Pooja graduated with a B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. Originally from St. Louis, Pooja has maintained her loyalty to Cardinals baseball despite being surrounded by boisterous Phillies fans. She lives in the suburbs of Philadelphia with her husband and two kids. When she is not on the side-lines cheering on her son’s Little League team or shouting for an encore at her daughter’s dance recitals, you can find her trying to perfect her serve on the tennis court or scouring blogs for new recipes.

Madelyn Marino joined Charter Communications in 2021 and was named Group Vice President, Human Resources, Customer Operations in June 2022. In her role, she oversees a team that provides human resources support for Spectrum’s 20,000+ employees in Customer Operations.

With innovation and professional development at the forefront of her approach, Madelyn has spearheaded a women’s leadership development program in Customer Operations, and has helped to enhance Charter’s partnership with Hiring Our Heroes, a nationwide initiative to help connect the military community with civilian companies to create economic opportunity and a strong and diversified workforce. She also serves as Co-Chair of the Spectrum Women Business Resource Group, which provides networking, mentorship, and skill-building opportunities that empower employees to grow and contributes to the company’s culture of inclusion.

Prior to Charter, Madelyn worked at American Express for over 15 years, starting as an HR analyst and eventually moving up to manager, director and vice president roles, including providing HR support for the company’s global merchant services and global servicing networks. Her initiatives at AmEx included the streamlining of the US sales and client management talent recruitment process, the successful cross-functional integration of two separate business units, and the development of diversity and inclusion programs to increase racial/ethnic diversity.

Madelyn received a Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from the University of Mary Washington, and a Master’s degree in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from Hofstra University. She lives in Glen Rock, NJ with her husband Michael and son Jonas. Madelyn is an avid runner, having completed over 50 half marathons.

Amanda O’Brien is a leader in Product Management at Comcast. Amanda has spent the last nine years at Comcast in the Technology, Product and Experience organization, leading experiences for the X1 premium video product and building the Xinfity Flex streaming box.  Several years ago, she led the Product Experience and operating system development for Xumo TV, Comcast’s first out of footprint, in retail device, sold online and in-stores at Walmart.  Since then, the product has scaled and launched with three OEM partners, across 5 retailers while exponentially offering additional screen sizes both large and small.  In her new role, Amanda leads the Global Device Experience team, enduring that we fully maximize all hardware components to drive exceptional customer experiences, for all TV and stream box products across the globe.

Before Comcast, Amanda’s background was in product development at Samsung, Fisher Price and NBCUniversal.  Amanda has a Masters degree from New York University, in Interactive Telecommunications, where she focused on rapid prototyping with arduinos, Zigbee radios, wearable soft circuits, animation and video production.  Amanda is happiest when she is making things (digital or physical) and lives in Bala Cynwyd, PA with her husband, 2 sons and dog.  She currently has more TVs in her home than she has electrical outlets!

Suzy Oh is the Sr. Director, Systems Integration for Charter Communications and is based in Stamford, CT.

She leads a diverse team that specializes in the delivery of critical system requirements, system configuration changes, automation, billing migrations, and systems support for all billing systems and CRM application that are leveraged by Spectrum Enterprise. Her team works closely with all cross functional teams and business units to ensure all initiatives across products, process, and systems are executed flawlessly and with minimal impacts to our clients.

Suzy joined Charter Communications (then Time Warner Cable) in 2008 and has held various roles across Customer Care, Sales, and Operations. Suzy received her undergraduate degree from Syracuse University and currently resides in New York City. She is an avid golfer who enjoys traveling, fishing, and spending time with her family and friends.

Shaina Panos is the Vice President of Business Development and Partnerships at NBC Universal Media Group, where she oversees partnerships for Peacock/DTC. With a background in media and a strong entrepreneurial drive, Shaina has a proven track record of leadership in strategic direction, subscriber performance, and revenue maximization. She is known for her expertise in leading large-scale projects in fast-paced environments.

Shaina’s career began at HBO, where she focused on affiliate distribution before taking on various sales and marketing roles. Ultimately, she oversaw the launch of HBO GO, HBO NOW and HBO Max and managed relationships for several MVPD distributors generating over $2 billion in annual revenue. In her current role, Shaina is responsible for caring after a portfolio of accounts, ensuring favorable distribution terms, implementing deals, and maximizing opportunities for subscriber growth, engagement and revenue.

With her expertise in developing relationships, Shaina plays a crucial role in driving the success of Peacock and its partnerships. Her strategic approach and collaborative leadership style make her a trusted advisor in the industry, and her focus on delivering results has consistently contributed to the growth and success of the organizations she has been a part of.

In her spare time, Shaina is passionate about mentoring others in the industry, as a member of the WICT Network NY’s mentoring committee and as a current mentor for Prime Access and the NBC Universal’s DTC Mentoring Program. She cherishes spending time with her blended family, traveling, reading and singing showtunes at the local piano bar.

Yana Podroubaeva, Senior Account Leader, AWS Media & Entertainment, Games, and Sports

Yana Podroubaeva is a passionate media technology leader, renowned for her think big vision and innovative approach to cloud solutions. As the Senior Account Leader at Amazon Web Services, she spearheads a team dedicated to transforming the broadcast, production, streaming, monetization, media supply chain, and immersive experiences for the industry.

Based in the global media hub of New York City, Yana has worked with and transformed the businesses of some of the world’s largest media customers, such as NBCUniversal, The New York Times, News Corporation, AMC Networks, and Foxtel. Her leadership and impact have earned her recognition as a 40 under Forty award winner by the prestigious NYC TV Week.

Yana is a strong advocate for diversity and talent development. She actively mentors fourteen Amazonians, fostering an inclusive and nurturing environment for professional growth. Additionally, Yana is an active member of the WICT Network and America On-Tech organizations, driving initiatives that empower and uplift underrepresented groups in the industry.

Reynolds works in close coordination with content leaders across ESPN, the product and technology teams at The Walt Disney Company, and sales and business development teams on revenue-driving sponsorship opportunities and third-party partnerships. In addition, Reynolds serves on ESPN’s Editorial Board, a company-wide, cross-disciplinary team of leaders who guide and inform editorial standards of conduct.

Prior to ESPN, Reynolds began her journalism career with the North Carolina-based newspaper The Globe, as the sports editor before being promoted to managing editor.

Reynolds, originally from Yonkers, N.Y., graduated from Hamilton College with a Bachelor of Arts in history. While at Hamilton, Reynolds was the sports editor of the school’s newspaper, The Spectator, and played basketball and lacrosse.

Erin Rich leads industry trade partnerships and programming for Paramount Advertising with a focus on elevating the company’s presence and influence across the industry. A 30-year veteran of the media business, Erin has deep institutional knowledge of the technology and entertainment industries, along with a proven track record in architecting strategic partnerships and programming that drive business goals.

Erin is known for her resilience, compassion and creative problem-solving, ever-ready to pave new ground and opportunities for the sales organization and industry audiences she and her team represent. Highly adept at navigating matrixed organizations, Erin leverages trusted cross-functional relationships she has built at Paramount Advertising to collaborate on achieving organizational objectives.

Prior to her 18 years with Paramount, she held various roles focused on digital marketing integration, brand management, and developing marketing strategies to extend brand presence and awareness. Erin has launched successful marketing programs and campaigns for a number of tech companies and start-ups including eGroups, which became the former Yahoo! Groups. She also spent time in publishing at Ziff-Davis and IDG in various marketing roles.

Erin resides in Oakland, CA with her husband, David and two children, Mateo and Simone. You can find her unrolling her yoga mat, paddleboarding or mountain biking in between the hustle and bustle of daily life.

Kelli Riggs serves as the Vice President of Marketing for the Comcast Northeast Division.  In this role, Kelli oversees go-to-market strategic planning and execution, marketing communications and partnerships.  Kelli also leads the merchandising and sales strategy efforts for the e-commerce channel.  Kelli joined Comcast in 2007 and has held various regional and divisional roles within marketing, all with increasing scope and responsibility.

Kelli also serves as the Marketing Chair on the Executive Board for Granite United Way.  The organization’s goal is to create a healthy community where every child succeeds in school and every individual and family is financially stable.  Kelli is passionate about her work with Granite United Way and has led the organization as they re-positioned their branding and strategic marketing plans.

Kelli holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Marketing from Plymouth State University and an MBA from Southern New Hampshire University.  She has also completed executive leadership programs through Wharton Executive Education and Columbia Business School.

Kelli resides in Bow, NH with her husband Jeff, and two children.  Kelli enjoys being creative in the kitchen, remaining active in the gym, and cheering on her children as they play competitive sports.

Jennifer Sullivan Hanks, currently serves as Executive Director on the Customer Experience Strategy, Innovation and Optimization team at Comcast where she has been working for the past 13 years. Passionate about building brand love among consumers, she steers the “Enjoy Journey,” one of Comcast’s six customer journeys. This journey fosters cross-functional collaboration to ensure high satisfaction (NPS) and ignite advocacy by creating experiences that customers share with others to fuel growth.

Jenn pioneered an initiative that reimagines the customer relationship, fostering positive experiences worth sharing with others and celebrating employees who deliver them which is now an enterprise wide program. In addition, her team manages the world’s largest outer loop process, known as elevations, where teammates submit ideas to enhance tools, products, process and policies that improve the customer and employee experiences.

Lastly, Jenn’s role is to ensure all teammates are engaged in the mission to make Xfinity a best-in-class brand among consumers. She enjoys branding, storytelling, marketing and energizing teams around a common goal.

Previously throughout her tenure at Comcast, Jenn held roles focused on new product trials and deployment, optimizing processes and technology for both employees and customers and running business operations as chief of staff.

Joining Comcast in 2011, Jenn’s consistent passion and visionary leadership were soon recognized: CableFax named her an “Overachiever Under 30” in 2015. Throughout her tenure, this dedication has propelled the company to reimagine the way we do business.. A vocal advocate for women’s advancement in the cable industry, Jenn served on the WICT Philadelphia board and co-led the Women’s Network, the largest employee resource group at Comcast.

Jenn holds a marketing degree from Bloomsburg University and resides in the Philadelphia suburbs with her husband, daughters and dogs. She enjoys watching Bravo, reading and working out.

Fang Xu is Vice President of Talent Acquisition and Diversity at A+E Networks. In this role she oversees the execution and implementation of the corporate DEI strategy, as well as professional/executive recruiting and early talent engagement.

Prior to joining A+E Networks 3 years ago, she held roles in talent, DEI, and consulting across different industries. She is a graduate of Lehigh University and Manhattanville College and resides in New York with her family.

Virginia Zigras is the Vice President of Legislative Affairs at Charter Communications having joined their team after serving as Vice President of Government Relations for NCTA – the Internet & Television Association.  Prior to entering the private sector, she spent nearly a decade in government, including serving for Rep.  Tony Cardenas (D-CA), Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), and the Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government.  Most recently, she served as Chief of Staff to Rep. Tony Cardenas during which time he became Chairman of CHC BOLD PAC, the political arm of the Hispanic Caucus. Ms. Zigras was instrumental in helping Chairman Cardenas grow the PAC to one of the largest and most influential member-led political organizations in the country. She received her LL.M. from American University, Washington College of Law, her J.D. from Western Michigan University Law School, and her B.A. from York University.