Matthew Allen, Project Coordinator
Matthew Allen joined Forum at the beginning of 2009 as a Project Coordinator. Within this role, he has helped ensure excellence in project management throughout the various phases of client work. Matthew has successfully added to and leveraged Forum’s time tested and high quality tools and best practices in order to manage successful projects, creating a seamless, high-quality client experience. Matthew has already gained experience in driving value within client engagements through work with global pharma and financial companies the likes of Sanofi Aventis, BlueCross/BlueShield, JH Cohn, The IMF, and The Hartford.
Most recently, Matthew has been working directly with both consulting partners and executive consultants within Forum’s strategic services group, which focuses on high level strategy execution around the areas of sales transformation, change management, strategy alignment, M&As, and branded customer experiences.
New to the learning and leadership industry, Matthew brings with him a wide array of experiences, most notably as a research analyst with Investor Group Services, a Due-Diligence and Market Strategy firm, and as a Consultant with Paystar Logistics, a supply chain management and logistics firm. As a self-professed life-long learner, Matthew hopes to bring a fresh perspective to the field of leadership development, business training, and strategy execution.
Matthew received a B.A. in English from Davidson College, where he played four years of varsity soccer and wrote for the college newspaper and literary journal.
André Alphonso, Managing Director, Forum India
André joined Forum in Australia after 20 years experience in Human Resource and Organisational Development gained in the Public Sector, Manufacturing and Information Technology industries in organisations such as Sydney Water, Humes, Prime Computer and Unisys. In Unisys he held several senior level executive roles from Director of Learning and Development to Head of Human Resources and lived and worked in different countries across the Asia Pacific region.
André joined Forum in Sydney in 1995. His roles have encompassed business, development, consulting, design and development of learning solutions, workshop delivery and various facilitation engagements. He has helped organizations increase their sales, service, management and leadership capabilities. His clients include some of the major professional services, financial services, pharmaceutical, retail, manufacturing, hospitality and information technology organisations in Australia.
Since 1998 Andre has been in a number of leadership roles in Forum from General Manager for Forum Sydney to Managing Director of Forum where he was responsible for the Pacific Region.
His academic background is in Business Studies and Psychology. Andre’s expertise lies in linking learning and development initiatives with the strategic imperatives of organisations to produce real business benefit.
Since November 2008 André has been responsible for establishing Forum’s business in the Indian sub-continent. He is based in Delhi.
Tom Atkinson, Ph.D., Director of Customer Research
With more than 25 years of experience helping companies achieve measurable business results through learning, Tom Atkinson focuses on assessing performance gaps, applying principles of workplace learning, and tracking results. As a researcher, he has conducted groundbreaking studies on such topics as how to increase sales and service effectiveness; how to prepare leaders to drive growth; how to enable companies to execute with speed; and how to create a high-performance organizational climate. Tom’s findings, which have been published in the Harvard Business Review, are the foundation for many of Forum’s learning programs.
As a consultant, Tom has helped companies diagnose their people’s learning needs and implement programs to improve their people’s performance. He has served more than 100 client organizations, including Fortune 500 companies in such industries as consumer products, energy, financial services, government, high technology, travel, manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, health care, and professional services.
Tom holds three degrees in Psychology: a B.A. from the University of Connecticut, an M.A. from Fairleigh Dickinson University, and a Ph.D. from Boston College. He is active in the community of families affected by autism.
Jeffrey Baker
Jeffrey Baker is a senior consultant and practice leader for the sales and customer experience practice area within The Forum Corporation. Jeffrey has worked directly with customers over his entire career, “carrying a bag” as a direct sales representative, leading sales teams, managing sales alliance partnerships, running a customer service P&L, all while working for companies such as AT&T, Siemens Communications, PictureTel (now Polycom), and Intervoice-Brite (now part of Convergys). Since joining Forum in 1998 Jeffrey has sold Forum services, managed major account relationships, and delivered consulting services for clients to boost their sales effectiveness and to drive their company results.
In his current role as practice leader for Forum sales and customer experience Jeffrey directs research efforts, new product and service development, and market positioning. One of his recent research projects investigated the impact of the 2008-2010 recession on buyer behavior and the implications for effective selling in that environment.
Jeffrey received his bachelor’s degree in organizational psychology and economics from The University of Michigan. He resides in the Boston area with his family.
Steve Barry
Steve is Senior Manager of Strategic Marketing at Forum Corporation based in Boston. Over his 5 years with Forum, his key responsibilities have been mainly in the area of leadership research and development. He has developed new leadership capabilities, tailored existing products to meet client needs, and authored white papers on the subject. He also is actively involved in Forum’s major research efforts, including the most recent research on Strategic Speed. Steve recently moved from R&D to Marketing to focus on bringing the insights from our research to our clients and external audiences.
Steve earned a Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from University of New Hampshire in Durham, NH, in 1998 and a Master of Science in Industrial/Organizational Psychology from Springfield College in Springfield, MA in 2003.
Jocelyn R. Davis, Executive Vice President, Research and Development
Jocelyn leads Forum’s global R&D function. She is responsible for Forum’s strategies for creating and leveraging intellectual property–including original research, learningware, consulting and coaching tools, assessments, and all other core content. Jocelyn is an author of Forum’s upcoming book, Strategic Speed. Jocelyn also provides design advice on client projects, working with clients such as Eli Lilly, Bausch & Lomb, Coca Cola, Agilent, Microsoft, BankOne, Walt Disney, and Nike.
In the past decade Jocelyn’s teams have doubled the size of Forum’s library with innovative learning curricula and consulting protocols, including the Strategy Execution Suite, Leading Change, Leading Innovation, Leading Across Boundaries, Achieving Service Excellence, Sales Through Service, Leading Effective Sales Teams, Strategic Account Management, Senior-Level Selling, and Consultative Skills. In addition to personally designing and writing many of these Forum courses, Jocelyn co-authored the research reports “Blended Learning Strategy” and “Principles of Workplace Learning,” which offer new strategies and tools for improving performance in the workplace. Over the years she has evolved Forum’s products and capabilities to make them more flexible, broader-ranging, and more attuned to client needs.
As a consultant with the Forum Corporation of Canada, Jocelyn previously led projects in the design and development of client-specific learning solutions, working with clients such as The Toronto Star, KPMG, MCI, GE Capital, and Unilever.
Jocelyn is the recipient of numerous awards including three of Forum’s Corporate Excellence Awards, a Forum Manager of the Year Award, and two Human Resource Executive Training Products Awards for sales and teaming courses. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy with high honors from Swarthmore College and a Master of Arts in Philosophy from the University of Pittsburgh.
