Brooke Breit is a resident stage alum of the Second City e.t.c. (A Clown Car Named Desire and Apes of Wrath). She also performed with The Second City National Touring Company and numerous other shows at Second City, iO Chicago and The Annoyance. She can be seen on television shows like Easy, Shrink and Hot Date, and heard as Flower on the popular podcast Hello From the Magic Tavern.
Fall 2019
As the principal product manager, customer success in Saba’s strategic services group, Anita Bowness draws on over 20 years of experience in consulting and professional services to help HR leaders recruit, engage, develop and retain their talent. Bowness has been published in numerous publications such as TD Magazine, HR Daily Advisorand HRO Today, featured in an interview on BBC Capital and presented at many events including DisruptHR Ottawa, Saba Insight and Halogen TalentSpace Live. Although she’s worked with hundreds of organizations from IT to health care, Bowness has never lost sight of what HR is really about: people. Bowness loves helping organizations manage performance so people are more engaged, happier and productive.
Bea Bourne is a full-time faculty member at Purdue University Global. She currently teaches graduate marketing courses online, serves as a faculty evaluator for the portfolio development and assessment program, and is a member of the multicultural and diversity professional competency committee. The majority of Bourne’s professional career was spent with AT &T, where she held a variety of leadership positions in departments that included sales, marketing, training and development, and human resources.
Bourne earned a bachelor’s degree in marketing from Maryville University, a master’s degree in marketing and in HR development from Webster University, and a doctorate in management and organizational leadership from the University of Phoenix.
Ryan Berman is the founder of Courageous, a consultancy that develops Courage Brands. Berman has spent a career developing meaningful stories for household brands such as Caesars Entertainment, Hilton, Major League Baseball, New Era, Subway, U.S. Ski & Snowboard and UNICEF. In addition to Courageous, Berman is the founder of Sock Problems, a charitable sock company that supports causes around the world by socking problems and spreading awareness. Previously, he was the co-founder of i.d.e.a.: a courageous ideas company based in San Diego.
Berman started his career in New York in advertising. After leaving Madison Avenue, he started his first creative agency with clientele including corporations like PUMA, Von Dutch and Aetna. Upon creating i.d.e.a. in 2012, Berman operated with the mantra “Courageous ideas are the only ones that matter.” He built Courageous with the same motto to liberate companies from fear and gain a competitive edge. His upcoming book, “Return on Courage,” uses this methodology and hours of research to train brands to be courageous.
Berman has been named one of San Diego’s “Top 40 under 40” by Metro SDand i.d.e.a won “Best in Show” from industry awards including American Advertising Awards, ADDYs and American Marketer of the Year. Berman has been featured in Entreprenuer.com, Inc.com, Medium.com, PRWeek, SDVoyager.com and podcasts like “Creative Mornings” and “Hustle & Deal Flow.” He is a recognized business and leadership speaker.
Berman has a degree in Television and Radio from the Ithaca College: Park School of Communications and received executive education at Harvard Business School. He’s resided in San Diego for the past 15 years with his wife and their two children. Berman considers himself a compensated observationalist with a gift for people watching. When he’s not observing, he’s playing either on the soccer field or with his children. You can catch up with Berman on Twitter @RyanBerman or on LinkedIn @CourageousBrands.
Brad Beacom is passionate about using learning technology to improve peoples’ lives both in business and at home — offering development opportunities across the enterprise. Having worked in learning technology for nearly two decades, he specializes in learning management systems, distant learning, and analytics. His hobbies include virtual/augmented reality, cooking, craft beer and traveling to experience other cultures.
Diane August serves as senior consultant-learning excellence and architecture at Nationwide Insurance. She provides though leadership, strategy and implementation best practices for enterprisewide learning and development initiatives. She also provides leadership and insight to the Nationwide Learning Leader’s Council (a council that includes representatives from more than 10 functional learning teams). August built Nationwide’s learning architecture including design principles, solution types and learning levels, as well as an instructional design standards knowledge–base to drive innovation and a consistent, engaging and inspirational learning experience.
August previously served at Nationwide as the director of IT learning and development. Previously, she also owned her own instructional design consulting firm for 15 years prior to joining Nationwide. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education from Ohio State University.