Nancy Wellott
Marlborough,MA
Summary
Expert and entrepreneurial strategic innovation consultant with a proven track record in driving growth for major product, digital, and brand development initiatives. Successful experience in both early-stage companies and large corporate environments, utilizing a hands-on leadership approach to deliver results. Diverse client and industry background includes market leaders such as Verizon, Microsoft, GE, PetSmart, Norton, UBS, Reebok, Bayer, and Shark-Ninja and Frito-Lay. Excels in consumer-insight driven strategy and possesses deep understanding of innovation, new product development, and go-to-market strategy.
Overview
29
29
years of professional experience
Work History
Innovation Strategist (Contract)
AMICA
05.2019 - 09.2023
- Acted as a consultative thought partner to create clarity out of ambiguous problem spaces; collaborate with different business units to generate ideas and implement projects through the adoption of emerging technologies
- Managed multiple projects simultaneously by finding and executing on features that worked together to create cohesive consumer experiences and balance investments and priorities
- Discovered new pathways in the form of product and service ideas that built the product portfolio, clarified the value propositions, deepened market and consumer segmentation understanding, and increased profitability
- Partnered cross functionally with product management, engineering, marketing and business stakeholders to lead large-scale application and service development
- Regularly presented to C+E level audiences, communicating vision, positioning, differentiators, strengths, vertical market value propositions, and market trends
- Led multi-method research studies (from ideation through pilot and GTM) that drove broad and deep consumer insights to assist in identifying priority areas for concept development, prototype testing, and business development.
Principal, CX Innovation
VERIZON
04.2015 - 11.2018
- Managed and scaled a growing Innovation practice responsible for the research, ideation, prototyping, and piloting of new product and business model opportunities
- Defined and explored ambiguous business challenges using human-centered design for Cloud, Connected Home, Consumer IoT, 5G, Smart Cities, IPTV, Geo-tagging, and SaaS.
- Led the incubation of new revenue-generating businesses, and business transformation solutions focusing on customer experience
- Partnered cross-functionally with product management, engineering, marketing, and other stakeholders to lead large-scale application and service development efforts
- Established and facilitated a 5000-member Consumer Collaboration Community to vet promising developments and terminate faulty ones
- Developed innovation framework/process and defined guardrails on how innovation is managed, from research to insights to project prioritization and go-to-market.
Senior Vice President – Research & Strategy
INVOKE SOLUTIONS
01.2011 - 12.2011
- Developed and implemented the short and long-term innovation game plan in support of the organization's strategy and objectives
- Worked with CPG clients on early-stage hypothesis exploration to final-stage screening to identify strong performers, interest drivers, barriers to adoption, and areas for enhancement
- Led development of new product solutions at the front end by utilizing key customer insights to identify portfolio gaps and drive adoption and usage of new offers, features and platform functionality
- Developed client acquisition and retention programs with Sales and Marketing teams
- Provided marketing thought leadership through speaking engagements, authoring, website content to increase company visibility & credibility
Innovation Strategist and Founder
HABITS & HABITATS
02.2002 - 01.2011
- Fused the disciplines of design & market research within a business strategy framework to direct multi-disciplinary teams in discovering, structuring, & cultivating previously unrecognized market and product opportunities under tight deadlines and budgets
- Deployed innovation toolset, including ethnography, ideation, storytelling, prototyping, personas, concept visualizations, customer journey maps and system diagrams to drive consumer-centric, innovation strategies to solve critical market issues
- Developed and drove the creative vision and strategy of branding, packaging and product development projects for clients including: Purina, Delta Faucet, Bayer AG, Gerber, UBS, Chameleon Networks, Acterna, and Project Rescue.
Director - Digital Brand Strategy
SCIENT
01.2001 - 12.2001
- Developed & delivered digital brand strategies for B2B and B2C clients that provided the vision, values and attributes to define the business offer
- Identified trends and growth opportunities, diagnosed customer needs and behaviors, predicted likely competitive dynamics to maximize client's advantage
- Represented company via speaking engagements at digital conferences
- Clients included: Chase Bank, Baxter Pharmaceutical.
Vice President – Design Research & Strategy
LANDOR & Fitch
04.1994 - 12.2000
- Proactively managed senior-level client relationships by leading key stakeholders through the insight hunting, idea generation, and validation process
- Led a global team of user and market researchers, information designers and strategists, included hiring, managing, and mentoring a high-performing team
- Contributed to overall corporate direction of Fitch US as part of Senior Management team
- P & L responsibility, including forecasts, pipelines, budgets and profitability
- Clients included: Norton, Diageo, Streamline, Philips, Compaq, and Polaroid.
Education
Master of Business Administration - Market Strategy
Babson College, F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business
Wellesley, MABachelor of Arts - Visual Communication & Business Management
Simmons College
Boston, MASkills
- Consumer & Market Research
- New Product Development
- Agile & Iterative Product Innovation
- Front & Back End of Innovation
- Ethnographic & Non-Traditional Research
- Design Thinking/Human Centered Design
- Product Strategy & Positioning
- UX Rapid-Cycle Research & Prototyping
- Consumer, Market, & User Segmentation
- Persona Development
- Brand Narrative/Strategic Storytelling
- Moderation & Ideation Facilitation
Affiliations
- Mass Challenge, Mentor and Judge, 2019 - present
- Babson Babson B.E.T.A. Challenge alumni evaluator, 2015 - present
- Front End of Innovation Conference Speaker, 2022, 2021, 2019
- IBM Enterprise Design Thinking Practitioner, 2019
Timeline
Innovation Strategist (Contract)
AMICA
05.2019 - 09.2023
Principal, CX Innovation
VERIZON
04.2015 - 11.2018
Senior Vice President – Research & Strategy
INVOKE SOLUTIONS
01.2011 - 12.2011
Innovation Strategist and Founder
HABITS & HABITATS
02.2002 - 01.2011
Director - Digital Brand Strategy
SCIENT
01.2001 - 12.2001
Vice President – Design Research & Strategy
LANDOR & Fitch
04.1994 - 12.2000
Master of Business Administration - Market Strategy
Babson College, F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business
Bachelor of Arts - Visual Communication & Business Management
Simmons College
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