Leadership
MV-21
The entire company votes to select a team of leaders annually called MV-21. We found that voting for leaders is key, it is an extremely powerful data point to understand who others in the company would like to follow. The "MV" stands for Martha's Vineyard (a vacation island off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts), where one of Next Jump's investors owns a compound that the company has been using annually for a leadership offsite. The house sleeps 21 and, hence, the tradition of choosing 21 key employees each year was born.
The purpose of the leadership team is two-fold. First, members are responsible for growing Next Jump's core business results. Second, the group is responsible for leading and developing the company's culture.
Board of Directors
Charlie Kim
Charlie Kim is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Next Jump, described by the New York Times as "a bellwether for the next generation of ecommerce." While building Next Jump from the ground up, Mr. Kim gained professional experience working in the Information Technology and Human Resources groups of Morgan Stanley in New York, Hong Kong and Tokyo from 1995 to 1997. He returned to Boston in April 1997 to grow the Next Jump brand full-time and expanded Next Jump from a one-person operation to a multi-layered corporation.
Today, Next Jump has built the largest consumer database of people with jobs by partnering with over 90,000 HR departments, including 70% of Fortune 1000. Charlie never took a dime from VC's and private equity firms, however, raised an unusually large amount of money ($45mm) from over 100 angel investors. Next Jump's eco-system of blue-chip brands and high-value shoppers have made them the go-to source for loyalty and rewards programs for Dell, Hilton Hotels, and numerous others, as well as similar programs for membership organizations like AARP.
What sets Next Jump apart is their culture and focus on human capital. The Company has become the top destination for engineers from the top east coast universities. Experts have called Next Jump the Demonstration Project, proving the combination of caring for your employees and helping them grow as human beings is possible while making money and helping the world become a better place. Next Jump believes this is a pre-requisite in today's human capital economy and calls it Better Me + Better You = Better Us.
Charlie's passion for giving back has led him to become heavily involved in the tech community. He has been a keynote speaker at many conferences including: Tim O'Reilly's Web 2.0 and Gabe Zichermann's GSummit. Charlie is also the highest rated mentor for the NYC Venture Fellows Program: a mentorship program built by Mayor Bloomberg for top technology companies in NYC, as well as the Founders Institute: largest incubation program of entrepreneurs. He has also served on Bloomberg's Applied Sciences NYC Advisory Committee, ultimately selecting Cornell to build a $2-billion technology campus in NYC. Charlie resides in Manhattan with his wife, Ella and son, Jackson.
Kevin Parker
Kevin Parker is a member of the Group Executive Committee of Deutsche Bank since 2001, and is the Global Head of Deutsche Asset Management. Prior to his current role, Kevin worked for Morgan Stanley, where he was named the youngest Managing Director in the history of Morgan Stanley and held a variety of positions including Head of Asian Derivatives, Global Head of Equity Derivatives Trading and Chief Information Officer.
In 1994, Kevin was awarded the prestigious NYU Stern's Richard L. Rosenthal Award for Innovation in Investment Management / Corporate Finance. This honor recognizes young innovators in finance who have made substantial contributions in the field of investment management and corporate finance. In June 2008, Kevin received the Fulbright Award for Business Diplomacy in recognition of his role in furthering international cooperation and investment across cultures.
Advisory Board
Tim O'Reilly
Tim O'Reilly is the founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media, one of the best computer book publishers in the world. The company also publishes online through the O'Reilly network and hosts conferences on technology topics, such as Web 2.0 Expo and Sci Foo, events that host the best and brightest in web and technology innovation. Tim is an activist for open source, open standards, and sensible intellectual property laws. Since 1978 Tim has led the company's pursuit of its core goal: to be a catalyst for technology change by capturing and transmitting the knowledge of "alpha geeks" and other innovators. Tim has built a culture where advocacy, meme-making, and evangelism are key tenets of the business philosophy.
Aaron Patzer
Aaron Patzer is currently the Vice President and General Manager of Personal Finance at Intuit. Prior to Intuit, Aaron served as the CEO of Mint.com, after founding the company in 2006. He served as an Architect and Technical Lead for the San Jose division of Nascentric. Before Nascentric, he worked for IBM and founded two web development and online marketing companies: PWeb and International.
Joshua S. Levine
Joshua S. Levine joined the company in June 2007 from Kita Capital Management, a private investment management firm, where he had been a Managing Director since 2006. For the prior 6 years, Mr. Levine was the Chief Technology and Operations Officer for E*TRADE FINANCIAL, ensuring the complete alignment of delivering technology for the benefit of the customer. His experience and expertise in electronic trading spans both retail and institutional clients. Mr. Levine also served as a Managing Director for 12 years at Morgan Stanley and 3 years at Deutsche Bank.
Randy Befumo
Randy Befumo joined Legg Mason Capital Management in 1998, was named Co-Director of Research in 2006 and was named sole Director of Research in May 2007. Randy is currently responsible for managing LMCM's research team, and serving as the Core Internet Analyst for the firm. Prior to joining LMCM, he spent three years as a Senior Analyst for an online investment service, developing news and research offerings and managing a staff of six. He was also an NCO in an Army Reserve medical unit for six years.
George Bell
George Bell is a Managing Director of General Catalyst Partners, focusing on investment opportunities in new media, interactive marketing and digital-driven disruptions of traditional consumer behavior. Before General Catalyst, he was CEO of Upromise, the country's largest college savings service, sold in 2006 to Sallie Mae. George was also Chairman and CEO of Excite@Home, bringing together the Excite portal with the @Home cable broadband platform in a $7 billion merger. George was CEO of Excite prior to the merger, and led the company's IPO. Previously George served as SVP of Times Mirror Magazines, where he oversaw eight special interest magazines.
Human Capital Advisory BoardNEW
HAB, our Human Capital Advisory Board, was created at Next Jump to measure and optimize top performance in our employees. The board will drive new programs that best encourage personal and professional development among NxJumpers, creating a cohesive curriculum to guide both new and existing employees to success.
Dr. Jim Loehr
Jim Loehr is a world-renowned performance psychologist, Co-Founder of the Human Performance Institute, and author of 15 books including his most recent, The Power of Story. He also co-authored the national bestseller The Power of Full Engagement. Dr. Loehr's ground-breaking, science-based energy management training system has achieved world-wide recognition chronicled in leading national publications such as the Harvard Business Review, Business Week, Fortune, Newsweek, Time, US News and World Report, Success, Fast Company and Omni. He has appeared on NBC's Today Show, ABC's Nightline with Ted Koppel, The CBS Evening News with Dan Rather and CBS Morning News and the Oprah Winfrey Show. At the core of his training system is the understanding that the stories we tell ourselves represent the single most powerful tool we have for managing energy and achieving any important mission in life. The right stories mobilize us to make tough values-based choices that lead to expanded growth and the wrong stories disengage us. Dr. Loehr has worked with hundreds of world-class performers from the arenas of sport, business, medicine and law enforcement including Fortune 100 executives, FBI Hostage Rescue Teams, and military Special Forces. Corporate clients of the Institute represent hundreds of Fortune 500 companies including Procter & Gamble, The Estée Lauder Companies, Dell, FBI, GlaxoSmithKline, PepsiCo, and Citigroup Smith Barney. A sampling of his elite clients from the world of sport include: golfers Mark O'Meara and Justin Rose; tennis players Jim Courier, Monica Seles, and Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario; boxer Ray Mancini; hockey players Eric Lindros and Mike Richter; and Olympic gold medal speed skater Dan Jansen. Dr. Loehr has a masters and doctorate in psychology, serves on several prestigious scientific boards and is a full member of the American Psychological Association, the American College of Sports Medicine, the National Strength and Conditioning Association, and the Association for the Advancement of Applied Sport Psychology. The Human Performance Institute is the leader in Energy Management technology. Managing energy, not time, is the key to sustained high performance. The Institute's ground-breaking Corporate Athlete® training solutions range from executive and on-site training courses to keynotes and train-the-trainer courses.
