Zones Welcome and Keynote

The Zones Welcome and Keynote will kick off CustomerConnect. Quentin Gayles, Zones' Vice President of National Solutions Sales, will moderate a panel discussion with our OCTO (Office of the CTO) team on what it means to build an innovative and secure hybrid work environment. The panel will discuss combatting security threats, operationalizing return to work strategies and hybrid work environments, and the benefits that the Zones Innovation Center has to offer.

Quentin Gayles

VP of National Solutions Sales, Zones

As Vice President of National Solutions Sales, Quentin’s primary focus is enabling client success. In leading the U.S. Field Sales organization, Quentin is responsible for executing company strategy, recruit top sales and management talent, provide cross-functional leadership, and foster executive collaboration with OEMs and Partners.

Quentin is a practiced sales leader with demonstrated ability to earn client trusted adviser status through reliable delivery of technology and business solutions to satisfy quantifiable business outcomes. Able to combine innovative sales, business, and technical acumen to overachieve large sales quotas as an individual contributor and leader. Recognized top talent, adept at strategic thinking and planning to efficiently position broad product, solution, and service portfolios to global organizations.

Annika Hafner

Territory VP, Southwest Region, Zones

Annika Hafner has been with Zones for seven years. She was first named AVP of the SW Territory in 2015 and subsequently named TVP of the West Coast in 2020. In her current role, she is responsible for client success, and she works diligently to develop strategic partnerships with her clients, draw up IT budgets, and form long-term strategic plans. She also works as a trusted adviser, delivering IT services that help clients achieve their global delivery goals.

Before joining Zones, Annika was the founder and VP of sales at Channel Chargers, as well as VP of global marketing at GE Capital. She has over 25 years of experience in the IT industry in various leadership positions, partnering with Global Fortune 500 as well as mid-market companies to deliver local and global IT solutions.

Andrew Reese

Chief Architect, Security, Zones

Andrew is a security and compliance subject matter expert with extensive hands-on experience measuring, assessing, designing, implementing, improving, and managing information security management systems (ISMS) as well as cybersecurity programs. He is well versed in aligning organizational controls with legal, regulatory, and contractual requirements as well as business goals and objectives. Andrew also has consulting experience working with hundreds of organizations of all sizes and verticals, using industry best practices.

John Meeks

Chief Architect, Microsoft 365, Zones

John Meeks is the Chief Architect for Microsoft 365 at Zones. In this role, he uses his 15+ years of IT experience to develop best-fit solutions for our clients, with a focus on Microsoft 365 and Azure. Before joining the team at Zones, John worked at several technology companies where he was able to utilize his Microsoft 365 experience. He has earned recognition by Microsoft through the following certifications:

Microsoft 365 Certified: Administrator Expert
Microsoft 365 Certified: Security Administration Associate
Microsoft 365 Certified: Security CIE Facilitator
Microsoft Certified Solution Expert: Productivity
Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate: O365

He’s had the pleasure of sharing success with major clients throughout his career, including The Results Companies, EZCorp, Hydradyne, and many more. Even before John decided to pursue an IT career, he knew his dream job was in the Microsoft 365 Collaboration space. Now that John is doing just that at Zones, he looks forward to applying his expertise to your workplace challenges.

Stan Leszczynski

Chief Technology Officer, Networking, Zones

Stan Leszczynski is an information technology professional with extensive experience in diverse fields dating back to 1997. His work has centered on routing, switching, load balancing, and security. Stan has played a key role in directing major build-outs and upgrades for the NYISO, Onondaga County, New York Department of Tax and Finance, Office of Mental Health, Global Foundries, Key bank, Warner Media (Time Warner), Starbucks, Nike, and many others. A hardworking and dedicated team player who designs, deploys, and troubleshoots complex network and security systems.

Intelligent Tools for Offices and Workspaces of the Future

Zones Collaboration services are designed to enhance the digital collaboration capabilities of all businesses. We offer centralized support for the ongoing operation of your collaboration environment, including a 24/7 service desk and expert technical resources to troubleshoot and resolve issues and ensure reliable system operation. Zones provides fully managed best-in-class services from leading partners, including Microsoft. Learn more about advancing into the future with unified collaboration systems that will help build a culture of cooperation that empowers your employees.

Alan Madox

Chief Architect, Datacenter and Cloud, Zones

Alan comes to us with 34 years of experience in the Information Systems/Datacenter and Managed Services spaces. He has held senior positions in the Manufacturing, Financial, Healthcare, and Non-profit verticals. In these roles with the American Cancer Society, Lowen Corporation, Gregory Graphics, as well as Network Management Group, Alan has developed expertise in many Service Delivery areas critical to the success of our Cloud & Datacenter growth mission at Zones.

Alan has been a Senior Systems Engineer at Zones since May of 2018 and has specialized in the Cloud, Hybrid Cloud, and Datacenter spaces. Prior to joining Zones, Alan was a Senior Systems Engineer/Integrator for Network Management Group, Inc. In this role, he was responsible for many facets of pre-sales, physical delivery, and Managed Services for predominantly CPA firms and banks. For almost four years, Alan was also an integral force in driving pre-sales growth initiatives and supporting an internal Managed Services team with 24/7 clients. The company saw a close rate of nearly 70% of deals, where they were averaging 20-25% close rate prior.

Alan, his wife, and adult daughter live a beach life only minutes from the Gulf of Mexico near Pensacola, Florida. He has five daughters, a son, and two grandsons. He is eager to share his knowledge, real-world experiences, and technical expertise to help Zones create partnerships with our clients and to create managed services engagements!

John Meeks

Chief Architect Microsoft 365, Zones

John Meeks is the Chief Architect for Microsoft 365 at Zones. In this role, he uses his 15+ years of IT experience to develop best-fit solutions for our clients, with a focus on Microsoft 365 and Azure.

Before joining the team at Zones, John worked at several technology companies where he was able to utilize his Microsoft 365 experience. He has earned recognition by Microsoft through the following certifications:

Microsoft 365 Certified: Administrator Expert
Microsoft 365 Certified: Security Administration Associate
Microsoft 365 Certified: Security CIE Facilitator
Microsoft Certified Solution Expert: Productivity
Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate: O365

He’s had the pleasure of sharing success with major clients throughout his career, including The Results Companies, EZCorp, Hydradyne, and many more. Even before John decided to pursue an IT career, he knew his dream job was in the Microsoft 365 Collaboration space. Now that John is doing just that at Zones, he looks forward to applying his expertise to your workplace challenges.

Full device Support for Employees Anywhere

Are you managing more devices, demands, and change than ever? You are not alone! Learn how to leverage Zones solutions and the Intel vPro platform to enable your business success, accelerate productivity, and reduce your costs—all while giving your people a great user experience.

Mike Harsch

Solutions Architect, Zones

As a Senior Solutions Architect, Mike Harsch works with Zones’ largest enterprise customers, understanding business needs and complex enterprise issues by leveraging a vast array of technology solutions. Mike works closely with the Sales team to help solve customer critical issues across the spectrum of IT.

As the primary presales engineer on several global customer accounts based in the Pacific Northwest, Mike has experienced significant success in building relationships and expanding overall business with Zones customers. By collaborating with key technology partners, Mike enjoys promoting growth and success with existing clients, while expanding into new opportunities.

Sarah Wieskus

Global Sales Director, Intel

Sarah Wieskus is the Enterprise Client Global Sales Director at Intel. She manages a global technical team of experts focused on the deployment of Intel’s commercial client solutions and technologies in the enterprise marketplace. Sarah started her career with Intel over 20 years ago. She has held numerous sales & technical roles and has built & led teams for many years across intelligent endpoints, data center, networking, storage, security & manageability technologies.

Sarah has degrees in Electrical Engineering and Mathematics. Sarah has been married for over 20 years, has 3 children, and is based in Minnesota where she enjoys boating & camping.

Remote or On-Prem? Maintain Continuity Anywhere

Slowly but surely, the business world is reopening – which means that organizations everywhere have a dilemma on their hands. Do they start the return-to-work process and head back to the office, do they continue their remote work strategy, or do they consider a hybrid approach? No matter your plans, Zones, and Cisco can help. In this breakout, you’ll learn how Zones and Cisco are uniquely positioned to help you maintain workplace continuity no matter which strategy you choose.

Yli Schwartzman

Chief Architect - Collaboration, Zones

Yli Schwartzman is the Chief Architect – Collaboration in the Office of the CTO at Zones. Yli has worked with collaboration technologies for over 12 years and provides thought leadership and technical expertise to Zones and our customers, with expert specialization in Cisco collaboration solutions.  He is engaged in enterprise consulting to help organizations plan, design, implement, migrate, and support a variety of complex calling, meetings, and teams environments from on-premises to the cloud.

Tom Ryznar

Business Development Manager, Collaboration, Cisco

Tom Ryznar is a Collaboration specialist supporting Cisco’s Americas partner organization. An 18 plus year veteran at Cisco, Tom originally joined Cisco in 1996, and throughout this time held sales roles, supporting customers like Nordstrom, Starbucks, REI, Alaska Air, Amazon to mention a few. Taking a position outside of Cisco in 2001, he returned to Cisco as part of the Tandberg acquisition. Tom has always been involved with Voice, Video, and Data communications throughout his career going back to the days of divesture or breakup of the Bell System in 1982. Since 2011 Tom has been in the Cisco partner organization as a Collaboration specialist supporting Zones and other channel partners in the West.

Empowering The Hybrid Workforce with Apple

Presented by Apple

Josh McLaughlin

Chief Architect II, Zones

Josh McLaughlin is a Digital Transformation Solutions Architect at Zones with more than 10 years of experience modernizing workplace operations in Retail, Utility, Hospitality, and Commercial business units.

Build Cloud-Native Applications that Run Anywhere

Get an overview of the full spectrum of cloud-native application platforms on Azure and learn how Zones and Microsoft can empower your developers to move from ideas to applications rapidly with turnkey application services, now available on any Kubernetes clusters anywhere with Azure Arc.

Brent Durst

Solutions Architect II, Zones

Brent has extensive experience designing solutions for cloud and data center migrations and managed services. He has worked in Cloud and Data Operations as well as Program Management at Microsoft, Real Networks, Comcast, and Sony Media Entertainment. As a Solution Architect at Zones, Brent architects and maintains production-grade secure cloud solutions, supporting IT processes by utilizing industry standards (ITIL).

Deliver a Modern Approach to Data Management

A business needs to ensure its reputation, operations, and data won’t be impacted by a system failure, security breach, or human error. Together, Zones, VMware, and Dell Technologies design and implement solutions that enable quick recovery of infrastructure, applications, and data based upon client policies set across sites on-prem, in a secondary on-prem site, or in the cloud. Our end-to-end recovery solutions safeguard our clients' infrastructure, applications, and data and enable them to make a full recovery in the event of any disaster.

Daniel Kristek

Solution Architect III, DR Specialist, Zones

Daniel has been in the IT industry for more than a decade. He has competency in several key areas, including network administration. In his time with Zones, Daniel performed as a member of our Help Desk team and served as a project engineer.

Daniel’s specialty is in the backup disaster recovery (DR) field. Prior to Zones, Daniel worked as a Backup Disaster Recovery (DR) Specialist at Network Management Group, where he successfully created and deployed continuous backup solutions. Daniel used his expertise to build the Backup DR department from the ground up and secure monthly recurring revenue to sustain profitable business growth year over year. 

Vicki Spacko

Director Experience Solutions - Americas, VMware

Vicki Spacko is the Director of Experience Solutions at VMware. She has a passion for delivering the future of work through interactions and experiences workers have with technology – in any industry and every role. Vicki gets excited about connecting workers with the correct information, applications, and experiences at the right time to drive productivity and engagement.

Jerome Hill

Sales Director - Unified Workspace Solutions, Dell Technologies

Jerome is a hardware, software, cloud, and cybersecurity technology leader known for his passion, persistence, and drive. He has been at Dell Technologies for 21 years and currently serves as their Unified Workspace Business Development Director. Jerome has a passion for new technologies and building strong client relationships. Plus, he has earned a reputation for delivering quantifiable results that exceed objectives.

Manage Deployments in Real-Time with Zones nterprise

Join us for this informative breakout session, where we’ll be discussing Zones’ proprietary nterprise program management tool. You’ll learn how nterprise benefits our clients at every stage of a program’s lifecycle, allowing them to observe and interact with their programs in real-time. Through work requests, approvals, and in-flight communications, nterprise saves effort, time, and money. This is one session you won’t want to miss, so make sure you register today.

Wade Valla

Digital Project Manager, Zones

Wade is the Digital Product Manager and a Project Designer for the Zones nterprise software suite. Previously, as a Senior Project Manager with the Zones PMO, Wade was focused on large-scale service delivery projects within the Retail and Manufacturing sectors. Prior to joining Zones, Wade led the Professional Services team for a leading e-commerce software provider, and earlier, developed tools and processes to optimize global supply chains at two Fortune 500 retailers.

Keep Threats at Bay with Zones 365Essentials

In today's remote world, it is more important than ever for a business to run smoothly and securely. Attacks are on the rise while the number of resources organizations have available has dwindled. This means it's not easy to find or create the right solution before the problem becomes unmanageable. What if it was as simple as purchasing a single product? Zones 365Essentials takes out the guesswork so you can work securely from anywhere. Stop worrying about data compromise or deletion from internal and external threats – learn from the experts how this bundle can quickly get you up and running a remote workforce as simple as 1-2-3.

Annemarie Merchant

Advanced Technology Executive, Zones

As an Advanced Technology Executive (ATE) at Zones, Annemarie Merchant provides solutions to meet clients’ strategic IT goals and needs in data center transformation and security, wireless and networking optimization, and managed services, with a specific focus on IaaS. Annemarie collaborates with Zones Engineers, Solution Architects, and Software Licensing Sales Executives to develop deep, value-added technology solutions utilizing Dynamics CRM.

Prior to joining Zones, Annemarie worked as a Cloud Specialist for SHI International and Tech Data. She has a bachelor’s degree in Marketing and is pursuing her MBA at the University of South Florida.

Zack Brigman

Senior Product Marketer, Metallic

Zack Brigman joined Commvault last year as a Senior Product Marketer for Metallic – overseeing Metallic’s endpoint and SaaS application portfolios. Prior to joining Metallic, Zack spent the previous decade supporting various tech solutions and platforms across the HR, field service, and chemical industries. 

Selena Dao

Associate Inside Sales Engineer, Trend Micro

Selena Dao is an Associate Inside Sales Engineer and a certified cybersecurity professional at Trend Micro. She is a proud Longhorn with a bachelor’s degree from The University of Texas at Austin. Selena is currently based in Dallas, Texas. 

Ensure Protection for Your Hybrid Cloud

If your company is one of the countless organizations that has found value in the hybrid cloud, you know how crucial a best-fit security posture is to keep your data safe. Join us for this breakout session – Zones and Dell will be discussing the security needs of the hybrid cloud, how they differ from those of traditional public or private cloud, and why Zones and Dell's experience and expertise can help no matter your situation.

Sujit Goudar

Solution Architect II, Zones

In his role as a Solution Architect, Sujit leverages his knowledge and experience regarding the design and architecture of both cloud and on-prem solutions to provide Zones’ clients with the best-in-class services and support they’ve come to expect from our organization.

Prior to his role at Zones, Sujit worked at Microsoft in various technical, sales, and enterprise strategy positions over the course of ten years. While there, he focused on creating solutions to move from legacy on-prem solutions to the cloud. He accomplished this via designing and implementing global cloud systems for Microsoft utilizing O365 and Azure, and his areas of expertise include cross-platform transformation.

Jason Proctor

Advisory Systems Engineer, Cyber Recovery, Dell Technologies

With over 20 years of experience as well as a strong technical, financial, and business acumen, Jason Proctor is a member of Dell Technologies’ Global Technology Office as an Advisory Systems Engineer for Cyber Recovery and Compliance. Jason recently joined Dell from IBM where he was a Solution Specialist inside the Resiliency Services division, specializing in Resiliency Orchestration and Cyber Resilience. In addition, he has spent many years as part of the VAR/Integrator + cloud/managed service provider communities in the Chicagoland area working with clients throughout the Midwest. Jason attended Holy Cross College in Notre Dame, IN as well as Northwestern University where his focus was Finance and Economics. Jason lives in Chicago, IL with his wife and three children. Outside of work he enjoys golf, scuba diving, ice hockey, skiing, and cooking.

Public vs. Private Cloud: Which One is Right For You?

There are so many different options out there for cloud storage – some organizations keep their data in the public cloud, while some prefer the private cloud. Others are using a hybrid cloud strategy. Without help from a knowledgeable and dedicated partner, choosing the right option can be a challenge. That’s why we’re holding a breakout session on the different cloud strategies. You’ll get the chance to weigh the differences between public, private, and hybrid cloud, and see which one is the right fit for your business needs.

Tim Bisping

Solutions Architect, Zones

Tim is an on-prem Cloud Solution Architect who specializes in on-prem solutions. Not only is Tim focused on Zones’ current on-prem cloud portfolio but he also strives to continuously add additional on-prem cloud partners to the Zones portfolio. In his previous role as the lead HPE Inside Solution Architect, Tim designed over 5,000 solutions for Zones clients totaling over $150M in shipped revenue, a feat for which he was awarded the Zones Platinum Seller Award in 2013, 2014, 2016, 2017, 2018, and 2019.

Before joining Zones, Tim worked at Microsoft as a Data Center Engineer. He also served in the US Army as an AH-64D Apache Helicopter crew chief. 

Zones Cloud Orchestrator for Hybrid/Multi-Cloud Infrastructure

Zones Multi-Cloud Orchestrator streamlines application and workload deployments across a private, hybrid, and public cloud stack from a single pane of glass. Organizations can use integrations with configuration management tools to easily create unique IaaS solutions and services for their cloud infrastructure. 

Join Todd Carter, Director of Cloud Services at Zones, while he discusses how Zones Multi-Cloud Orchestrator can help your business develop unique IaaS solutions and services faster. You’ll learn how to create pre-configured application templates and deliver them on multiple cloud platforms with one click, as well as save time and resources managing the scale of your cloud infrastructure to maintain a leaner, more efficient multi-cloud strategy.

Todd Carter

Director, Cloud Services, Zones

As the Director of Zones Cloud Program and Platform Strategy at Zones Inc, I strive to stay two steps ahead of the market by looking toward what’s next in recurring revenue and subscription-based cloud business models.

I have two decades of experience in the Information Technology world. Since joining Zones in 2018, I have focused on defining and realizing our cloud platform strategy, moving from inception to go-to-market through several Product Subscription Offer launches. By developing our Zones Cloud Program, defining our portfolio of products and attached services, increasing the number of SaaS and IaaS options for our customers, and publishing new subscription offers to our Zones Cloud Marketplace, I help put Zones Cloud at the forefront of our new digital engagement with our customers, drive cloud-delivery innovation, improve our operational efficiency, and increase customer satisfaction.

Before coming to Zones, I led the Global Sales Engineering team at Odin, a software business unit of Parallels focused on developing Operational and Billing solutions for the Hosting, Telecommunications, and Service Provider industries, where I worked to improve our technical sales programs, expand our sales engineering team globally, and support sales with highly skilled technical pre-sales experts. Prior to that, I served in multiple senior technical sales roles at Amazon Web Services, Blue Coat Systems, Symantec, Veritas, and 3COM, where I assisted in the development of our sales pipeline and closing deals through the delivery of compelling presentations, concise demonstrations, and successful Proof of Concept projects that established the company’s value to our prospects and customers. Such improvements to our technical sales programs resulted in globally accelerated pipeline growth, faster time to deal closure, and 10X growth in deal size.

I’ve worked and studied throughout the Northwest and have traveled around the globe. Born in Northern Idaho, raised in Alaska and Oregon, I completed my service in the Army in Washington. I returned to Alaska and obtained my electronics and computer systems degree from the University of Alaska, followed by studies in business management, consulting, accounting systems, and security systems (CISSP) adding multiple technical certifications and awards along the way. As a computer system engineer, consultant, and entrepreneur, my first big win was when I was hired to lead the Oregon Hill Sciences and Springfield School Districts AT&T Computer Systems implementations and their campus local area and wide-area network deployments. 

Seamlessly Power Your Data from Edge to Cloud

Shed the complexity and silos inherent in conventional hybrid cloud environments. If you’ve ever asked one of these questions, this session is for you: 

• How can I run all my apps without any compromises? 

• How can I mobilize my data where it needs to be? 

• How can I maximize my capital? 

• How can I get the cloud experience everywhere? 

• How can I best leverage the public cloud? 

Zones and Hewlett Packard Enterprise are here to help you transform your business by accelerating innovation, modernizing your end-user experience, and driving operational efficiency. In this breakout, you’ll learn how our solutions and services can streamline your data delivery and ensure it is correctly received – to an individual, an organization, and potentially the world. Learn how to unleash the true potential of your hybrid cloud with Zones and HPE Alletra.

Anjali Fields

IT Visionary Keynote

As a cybersecurity executive who has faced down the challenges of securing huge systems and investigating the actions of America's adversaries, Alex Stamos speaks from experience – drawing from his time leading security at Facebook and Yahoo to share difficult lessons on crisis prevention and management. Alex arms organizations with the means to fight back against cybersecurity breaches, insider threats, and propaganda online. Stamos provides the actions companies should take to understand their risk profile, integrate adversarial thinking into their business decisions, and what it means to build a "trustworthy company" in 2021 and beyond.

Alex Stamos

Alex Stamos is a cybersecurity expert, business leader, and entrepreneur whose career has focused on improving the security and safety of the Internet. The former Chief Security Officer of Facebook and the former Chief Information Security Officer at Yahoo, he is currently an Adjunct Professor at Stanford University, where his teaching and research focuses on international security and cooperation. During his time at Facebook, Stamos led a threat intelligence team of engineers, researchers, investigators, and analysts charged with understanding and mitigating information security risks to the company and safety risks to the 2.5 billion people on Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. The New York Times called Stamos “a celebrated figure in privacy and security circles,” and Tech Crunch said he is “widely regarded as one of the smartest people working in the security space.” Stamos helps groups better understand the cyber threat and how to stay one step ahead of bad actors.

During Stamos’ time at Facebook, he led the company’s investigation into manipulation of the 2016 US election and helped pioneer several successful protections against these new classes of abuse. According to The New York Times, through that work, he became known for his role as a “strong advocate inside [Facebook] for investigating and disclosing Russian activity on Facebook.” Alex represented the company to regulators, lawmakers, and civil society on six continents, and has served as a bridge between the interests of the Internet policy community and the complicated reality of platforms operating at a billion-user scale. In April 2017, he co-authored “Information Operations and Facebook,” a highly cited examination of the influence campaign against the US election, which still stands as the most thorough description of the issue by a major technology company.

Before joining Facebook, Alex was the Chief Information Security Officer at Yahoo, rebuilding a storied security team while dealing with multiple assaults by nation-state actors. While at Yahoo, he led the company’s response to the Snowden disclosures by implementing massive cryptographic improvements in his first months. He also represented the company in an open hearing of the US Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations.

In 2004, Alex co-founded iSEC Partners, an elite security consultancy known for groundbreaking work in secure software development, embedded and mobile security. As a trusted partner to the world’s largest technology firms, Alex coordinated the response to the “Aurora” attacks by the People’s Liberation Army at multiple Silicon Valley firms and led groundbreaking work securing the world’s largest desktop and mobile platforms. During this time, he also served as an expert witness in several notable civil and criminal cases, such as the Google Street View incident and pro bono work for the defendants in Sony vs George Hotz and the US vs Aaron Swartz. After the 2010 acquisition of iSEC Partners by NCC Group, Alex formed an experimental R&D division at the combined company, producing five patents.

Stamos is an Adjunct Professor at Stanford’s Freeman-Spogli Institute, a William J. Perry Fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation, and a visiting scholar at the Hoover Institution. He has been involved with securing the US election system as a contributor to Harvard’s Defending Digital Democracy Project and involved in the academic community as an advisor to Stanford’s Cybersecurity Policy Program and UC Berkeley’s Center for Long-Term Cybersecurity. He is a member of the Aspen Institute’s Cyber Security Task Force, the Bay Area CSO Council, and the Council on Foreign Relations. Alex also serves on the advisory board to NATO’s Collective Cybersecurity Center of Excellence in Tallinn, Estonia.