IRG Community

Adriana has more than 15 years of experience in the area of Communication, Branding, Marketing and Advertising, working in different B2B and B2C sectors. Her career in 3M began in 2008, she is currently Head of Brand & Communications for 3M in Latin America, being responsible for internal and external communications as well as the 3M brand management (valued at USD 9 billion).

She leads a diverse and multicultural team located in 8 different countries, developing strategies for 15 countries in the region. Adriana is a member of the: Latam Leadership team, Crisis Management Steering Committee, and the Global International Leadership team for Brand and Communications. She has been a member of different diversity and inclusion groups in 3M such as the Women’s Leadership Forum, and has been a coach for marketing teams in storytelling and communication and also for entrepreneurs in brand development.

Adriana graduated from Tecnológico de Monterrey (Mexico), where she studied the Bachelor on Marketing, she also has a degree in Digital Marketing, by Macquarie University (Australia) and a master’s degree in Brand Management and Public Relations by the Universidad Panamericana (Mexico). She is passionate about Curiosity, Innovation, Science, Women’s Empowerment and Gender Equality/

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Allyson Witherspoon is vice president, Marketing Communications and Media. She was appointed to this position in April 2019. In this role, Witherspoon is responsible for marketing communications and media, and model line/product marketing with a focus on revenue growth and profit generation for the Nissan brand and its dealer network.

Previously, Witherspoon was general manager, Global Brand Engagement, Nissan Motor Co., Ltd. (NML), where she was responsible for the leadership and implementation of Nissan’s global marketing and investment strategy including creative, media, sponsorship, agency structure and heritage collection.

Prior to her role at NML, Witherspoon was the director of Marketing Communication and Media for INFINITI USA, where she was responsible for developing the vision and leading the execution of the brand’s cross-carline marketing strategy.

Witherspoon brings more than 15 years of luxury marketing experience working in a number of senior roles with, and on behalf of, automotive OEMs. Prior to her appointment with Nissan and INFINITI, Witherspoon served as the global business director for Volvo in Amsterdam, adding to her marketing agency experience that included leading accounts for BMW North America and Mercedes-Benz USA in New York City.

Witherspoon holds a bachelor’s degree in marketing from the University of Missouri-Columbia. In 2014, Automotive News named Witherspoon as one of the “40 Under 40″for automakers and suppliers. She was recognized as a 2020 female marketing maverick for breaking brand barriers by Campaign US Female Frontier.

Diego has a degree in Marketing from the Universidad San Francisco de Quito with a Master’s Degree in Business Administration and Management from the IAE Business School and an Executive Leadership program from the Harvard Business School.

He is a results-oriented professional with global experience leading cross-functional teams. He has gained increasing responsibilities during 20 years of professional career that consider different marketing and business experiences in multicultural and global environments.

Diego joined the Coca-Cola company in 1998 as a Brand Assistant in Ecuador. He then went on to work as Consumer Marketing Manager for Nestlé in Ecuador in charge of marketing activities for different categories. In 2004 he returned to the Coca-Cola company to occupy professional positions such as Beverage Manager in Peru, Brand Manager for South Latin America, Global Marketing Director and Category Head of the Nutrition Portfolio in Mexico. He currently holds the position of Vice President of Marketing for Coca-Cola for the Southern Cone.With the new spirit of the new networked organizational model at Coca-Cola he recently named head of Marketing for Africa.

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With a passion for Education and Financial Empowerment, Federico is a Marketing Executive with experience leading global teams in Europe, Japan and the US for brands such as GE Healthcare and Gartner.

Currently Partner at Seven Train Ventures, where he operates as Venture CMO, Federico is SVP of Marketing for AI’s rising star RuleX where he brings a wealth of experience on Strategy, Governance, Go To Market execution and Operations.

Driven by social justice, Federico is also Advisor to the United Nations and Faculty at NYU where he teaches Integrated Marketing, Quantitative Marketing and Business Modelling

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Kuo-Hi Lee leads the project house ‘Move Forward’, a brand initiative to innovate the brand at Volkswagen Passenger Cars in China. Before that she has worked in different roles at Volkswagen as Director Brand Management and Director of Brand Marketing.

Born in Germany with Korean roots, Kuo-Hi started in global network and boutique agencies almost 20 years ago. Her career kicked off with international accounts in Germany, notably in diverse client and marketing management positions. Later in her career, she expanded her extensive expertise into strategic brand building as consultant to automotive OEMs and companies in consumer electronics, retail and hospitality.

Since her first experience in China back in 2007, Kuo-Hi is currently on her third stint fascinated by the transformation speed and unlocked marketing potential this country has to offer. She is passionate to enable better brand building and integrated marketing in the new marketing environment. Deeper integration of strategic brand objectives, efficient data insights and creative content development – that’s her constant drive.

‘If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.’

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Lex’s career has spanned the growth of the web from the 56k modem to 4G mobile, and has covered North America, Europe and the Middle East.

Lex is Chief Marketing Officer of L’Oréal UK & Ireland, a role he has held since October 2019. Prior to this, Lex held roles in the Western Europe Zone and was Chief Digital Officer of L’Oréal Middle East and Africa Region. The CMO team in the UK has a broad reach covering deep expertise in media, data and technology as well as consumer and market intelligence – and the key responsibility today of accelerating the transformation of the eCommerce business.

Prior to joining L’Oréal, Lex was the Senior Director, Digital Strategy for McDonald’s Europe as the world’s largest QSR organisation digitalised its customer experience and engagement – working on programs from the Happy Meal Studio educating children in reading and creativity to online and digital ordering in-restaurant. As part of the Business Partnerships team at Facebook he has worked with clients to drive better ROI on their marketing investments. He was been the industry lead for CPG, travel, finance and automotive, with a focus on digital and social strategy working hand-in-hand with creative and media agencies as well as brand marketers to leverage the breadth and depth of the social graph.

The first part of Lex’s career in the agency world took him from Paris to New York and Dubai. He was the Regional Director for Digital Strategy & Innovation for Leo Burnett MENA. In this role he oversaw the digital, direct and CRM competencies for the region covering clients in automotive, telco and FMCG. He successfully managed the merger of Arc Worldwide and Leo Burnett into a full-service integrated agency and played a lead role in the acquisition of Flip Media into the group. Prior to this he was a Business Director for JWT & RMG Connect in Paris, and the WPP France Lead for the HSBC business as well as working for the relationship marketing group FullSIX, where he was responsible for US development.

Lex began his career as a brand planner at The Richards Group in Texas, working with consultants and multi-nationals to take their brands beyond communications and into the heart of the organisation; and as an online+offline account executive at OgilvyOne in Paris.

With his experience in Europe, North America and the Middle East, and a skill set covering advertising, brand marketing, CRM, media and eCommerce, Lex has a strategic, global, view of how digital is changing the face of business today, beyond the realms of marketing into operations, organisation and business strategy.

He has an MBA in Strategy from the UPF in Barcelona, and undergraduate finance degrees from Kedge Business School in France and the Westminster Business School in London. He is trilingual.
Lex splits his time between his role at L’Oréal, helping charities and small businesses navigate the new digital world and finally, with his three daughters.

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Experienced Head Of Division with a demonstrated leadership history of working in the FMCG and consumer health industries. Skilled in P&L Management, Commercial Operations, Customer Marketing, Consumer Products, Integrated Marketing, HCP management and Advertising. Strong FMCG and healthcare services professional graduated from Bosphorus University.

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Raquelle M. Zuzarte is an award-winning global marketing leader, who has led successful brand campaigns at Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Accenture, Charter Communications, Time Warner Cable and CBS. As Vice President of Marketing at the Washington Post, she has delivered exceptional client solutions and digital products with performance that has over-indexed the industry. She is also Founder & CMO at Equity Project For All, a social impact venture focused on maximizing growth by building great brands and empowering human capital through marketing and D&I strategies. She is a global citizen and passionate storyteller, having lived in the Europe, Asia, Australia, Middle East and the US and serves as a contributing journalist at Media Village, a leading source of news and thought leadership in the advertising industry. Zuzarte has spearheaded Leadership initiatives throughout her career, including as Board Member of the Procter & Gamble Global Alumni Network New York, as a member of the Innovation & Inclusion Taskforce at J&J Global Marketing, as President of Time Warner Cable’s Women’s Collective and as Chair, “Do Digital Summit for Women Leaders” at She Runs It. She has been recognized with multiple awards including the Ad Age Business Advertising Award and leadership awards from Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, McKinsey &Co and KPMG. She has spoken at global venues including SXSW, the Sydney Opera House, Davos Congress Center, Dubai Media City and Advertising Week New York and earned her Bachelor of Economics degree from the University of Sydney and MBA from Australian Graduate School of Management UNSW and Kellogg Business School (joint program).

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Have been instrumental in evolving the areas like Consumer Insights and Strategy, Media and Customer care. Have successfully started the function of Data and Analytics, Online Reputation Management. Evangelised Digital Media within the organisation. Created new practices like Marketing Command Centre , Customer Data Hub and Ecommerce. Helped build higher efficiencies in the areas like Trade Mark and IP management, Consumer Activation and Sales Operations

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Foo Siew Ting is currently the Vice President and Global Head of Marketing Strategy and Planning, Print Category for HP Inc. Shewas previouslyregional head of Marketing Services and Personal Systems Marketing, for HP in Asia-Pacific & Japan (Chief Marketing Officer for HP Asia- Pacific & Japan). She is an established marketing leader with more than two decades of marketing experience in international consumer-goods companies, including Unilever, Mars, Diageo and Fonterra.

In HP, Siew Ting is focused on building HP as a global brand with local soul – driving brand relevance and purpose by combining data and emotional connection. To drive effective engagement with consumers, she tasks her team with anchoring impactful, experiential marketing campaigns on customer insights from big data as well as local authentic stories and used digital as a key tool to connect with customers. Her goal is also to grow a team of innovative, passionate people who embrace the culture of reinvention. She is also an astute leader who believes in purpose -led leadership and championing diversity to drive an innovative internal culture. This effort has been recognized by the industry with her team achieving 25 awards in 2018-2019.

During her 10 years in Diageo, Siew Ting has successfully repositioned global brands – Johnnie Walker, Smirnoff, Guinness – into brands which are not just known as global icons but also representative of progressive lifestyles, culturally relevant, inspirational and favored by millennials. This focus on authentic storytelling and deepening customer connections has enabled Diageo to turnaround its declining business in Southeast Asia into one of double-digit growth within two years and grow its sales in China two times more than the market.

Siew Ting is a firm believer in promoting diversity through inclusivity, women and youth. This can be demonstrated through the initiatives she has initiated during her tenure in HP Asia Pacific, specifically mentioning the “Reinvent stereotypes “campaign in Japan in 2018- 2019 and also the “Youth Dream Factory “ ambassador program in China and many parts of SEA. She has also been active in mentorship of start-ups.

Siew Ting’s astute marketing leadership and strong track record of purposeful leadership has won her many industry awards. Most recently, she was listed on Campaign Asia’s Power and Influential List 2020 of CMOs. This was the 2nd time awarding to the list , including that in 2018. Previously she was named a Top 50 Asia’s women leader by 7th CMO congress in 2016.She had also been recognized as a “New York Ad Age China Woman to watch” in 2014 and Marketing Innovator of the Year from China CNBC in 2012.

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Simon Walsh is Chief Operating Officer for New York Life’s Retail Annuities business. His goal is to deliver a great customer experience by linking marketing, sales and service on digital platforms. Mr. Walsh manages service and operations for the more than 275 banks and broker dealers selling New York Life annuities. He also leads service technology and digital marketing and led several cloud-based integrations, including Salesforce, Eloqua and Qualtrics. Previously Mr. Walsh was head of marketing and operations at General Sentiment Inc., a social media measurement firm and ran the credit and debit card program at UBS, where he restored the group to profitability and more than tripled spend to $1.2 billion. Mr. Walsh was also the Chief Marketing Officer at Jefferson National and before that at ETRADE Bank, where he managed a $50 million marketing budget and doubled deposits to $8 billion. His focus is promoting technology careers to under-represented groups: PepUp Tech Board Member ~ Year Up, Insurance Advisory Board ~ YMCA of Greater New York, Development Board.

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Sylvia is currently serving as the Chief Customer Officer in Safaricom PLC. She is the commercial leader at the most profitable company in East and Central Africa and is responsible for driving the company’s commercial strategy and focus on the consumer to deliver long term shareholder growth as well as create preference for the Safaricom brand.

Over the span of her 20-year career in the corporate sector, Sylvia has built a reputation as one of Kenya’s outstanding business transformative leaders, a mentor and a go-getter. She is the recipient of several awards, which includes her appointment to the Presidential Award Scheme, a self-development programme in Kenya aimed at equipping young people aged between 14-25 years with positive life skills so they can make a difference for themselves, their communities, Kenya and the world.

Sylvia was named as one of Kenya’s Top 25 Women In Digital in 2019, and has also been feted as one of Kenya’s Top 40 under 40 Women for 3 consecutive years. She is a ‘2015 Young Global Leader (YGL) recipient, an award given by the World Economic Forum to those distinguished as exceptional global leaders under the age of 40.

Sylvia is a certified executive coach and a Bachelor of Science degree alumna from the University of Nairobi where she graduated with the highest distinction of First-Class Honors.

Her passion for transforming lives, leadership, women empowerment & community impact has her currently serving on several boards including SHOFCO (Shining Hope for Communities), Endeavor Kenyaand Food4Education, and she is also a Trustee of the President Award Kenya as well as the Safaricom Foundation. She was also appointed by the Unstereotype Alliance as one of the four Global Vice Chairs in 2019.

A mentor and coach in both her professional and personal life, Sylvia operates on the principles of partnership, humility, openness and professionalism. But when all is said and done, her most treasured role is that of a mother to her two beautiful children.

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