Karen once drove nearly 7000 miles to and from Alaska, rarely exceeding 50 miles per hour due to the fact that permafrost had buckled the highway. When the going gets rough, ROI clients can count on Karen to see them through.
Karen Kay
Over the past 15 years in the tech industry, Karen Kay has managed a wide range of communications initiatives, from executive speeches to sales training events to customer call centers and public relations.
"I love helping people understand business," Karen said. "When employees understand a company's goals and their role in achieving them, they can really bring their talents to bear."
Before joining ROI Communication in 2010, Karen spent more than a decade at Hewlett-Packard. While at HP, she built and managed the company's first speakers bureau for regional executives, led an initiative to review and improve employee satisfaction, developed websites and corporate messaging, planned and managed events, developed and deployed a successful customer loyalty program, designed and led sales meetings, improved the company's call centers and helped cultivate strategic partnerships.
In 2008, Karen worked with HP executive and students at Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business to explore what it means to build a responsible and ethical corporation in an increasingly globalized world. "I loved the ideas and energy in this project," she said. "It's one thing to be ethical in your own country; it takes more focus and commitment when you're doing business elsewhere."
In addition to her professional work, Karen also volunteers and recently collaborated with several non-profit organizations to produce a national virtual summit for Women In Technology International, which focused on using social media to create buzz. She also serves on the board of the Silicon Valley chapter of the International Association of Business Communicators and blogs for the Bay Area Executive IT Meetup.
Karen holds a BA in Business Management from St. Mary's College in Moraga, California. When she's not consulting with clients, she might be found in her garden, where she pulls weeds and tends to more than a dozen beautiful rose bushes.