Mark Sebell Speaker & Booking Information

Mark is founder and president of Creative Realities, Inc., a highly successful 16-year-old innovation consulting firm, based in Boston, MA. For over 30 years, Mark has been leading Fortune 500 companies to the achievement of truly innovative results, having worked in advertising, as a consumer packaged goods specialist in new products, and as a leading innovation consultant. He defines innovation as "the process of envisioning and successfully implementing new ways of doing anything that adds value to an enterprise and its customers/consumers. It's NOT about brainstorming a bunch of new ideas and hoping that they stick! And it's more than just new products and new services." In fact, Mark's firm has worked with clients in a variety of applications, some of which have been: -Revitalizing existing brands -Cost reduction -Strategy & alignment -Supply chain optimization -Technology transfer -Human resource motivation -Cultural mergers -Packaging Believing that many management consulting firms--and their traditional approaches to brainstorming--fall short by failing to help clients implement the ideas generated, Mark has built a consulting team that provides clients with a rigorous, multi-step process that produces solutions with direct bottom-line impact. Fresh out of Colgate University in 1970, he spent two years in advertising before earning his M.B.A. at the University of Michigan Graduate Business School. He began his marketing career with Colgate-Palmolive, where he was chosen to join the Corporate New Ventures Group, reporting to the chairman of the corporation. "We were his 'frustration group.' Every new product concept being developed by conventional means was going through so many layers of decision reviews that they were losing their newness by the time they got to him. We reported directly to him and our charter was to 'make new things happen.' It was an unbelievable learning lab for a 28 year old. It was also where I was first trained in some preliminary innovation facilitation skills." Mark has played a key role in developing the philosophy, vision, and strategies that have made Creative Realities a leading provider of innovation services. He is driven by the conviction that the magic in innovation is not in the generation of new ideas. The real magic lies in an organization's commitment to nurturing the development of an idea through the evolutionary maze to market launch. A source of great pride to Mark is the fact that the Company continues to have strong relationships with its three founding clients: Pitney Bowes, Bacardi-Martini, and Rich Products. Since their founding in 1988, client satisfaction has been CRI's key performance indicator, which is reinforced by the fact that over 75% of the firm's business comes from existing clients and referrals. In his very limited spare time Mark is "Grand Poobah" of the Alumini Association of The Colgate Thirteen, his college singing group, and he has recently taken up golf. Mark has also written an exciting new book on business innovation, entitled "Ban the Humorous Bazooka." He regularly lectures to management groups and professional seminars.