CMO of Siemens Business Communications to headline CMO summit

This is among the key topics of conversation at the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council's 2010 elite retreat, 9 December 2010 in San Jose, California. The theme for this year's gathering of top marketing decision makers at the Fairmont Hotel is Synchronising the C-Suite.

Chris Hummel, chief marketing officer at Siemens Enterprise Communications reporting to CEO Hamid Akhavan, will present a headline keynote address at the CMO Council 2010 CMO Summit (www.cmosummit.org) and aims to provide important insights and tips on how to leverage international field experience in helping to focus, engage and energise culturally diverse organisations. In this session, entitled Leveraging Global Field Experience in Leading Cross-Cultural Companies: How the Operationally Savvy CMO Can Become a Valued CEO Asset, Hummel will touch on his own extensive experience in global enterprise marketing and sales, having lived and worked in a range of countries, including the US, Germany, Eastern Europe and Asia.

CMOs must understand and know regional dynamics and cross-cultural sensitivities

As more and more companies merge or are acquired by geo-expansionist market leaders and new emerging market contenders, it is critical that CMOs understand and are knowledgeable about regional dynamics and cross-cultural sensitivities. Broad international marketing experience and insights into diverse customer and channel requirements can be an important stepping stone in transitioning from a strategic marketing to a global operating role.

"Chris Hummel exemplifies today's CMO, leveraging a deep global background that crosses marketing, field marketing and sales, and has become a valued asset to his CEO and across the Siemens organisation," said Donovan Neale-May, executive director of the CMO Council. "Having this extensive cross-border view and a network of contacts and relationships worldwide can be a real advantage for a CMO in unifying and integrating distributed operating groups, business lines and organisations."

As CMO, Hummel is responsible for the strategy, structure and execution of all Siemens Enterprise Communications' marketing activities globally. Prior to joining Siemens, Hummel served as executive vice president of Global Field Marketing for SAP AG, leading the development and execution of innovative programs like "Best Run Now" and "Clear Enterprise" in support of SAP's go-to-market strategy. With SAP, Hummel managed an organisation of more than 600 employees that annually generated more than US$7 billion (about R50 billion) in qualified customer opportunities. Before SAP, Hummel spent 13 years at Oracle Corporation in a number of senior sales and marketing roles around the world and helped Oracle's customer service organisation earn certification from J.D. Power and Associates for its "outstanding customer service."

Gathering keynote speakers

The CMO Summit will gather keynote speakers and panellists from across the C-suite to share in their experiences, insights and best practices for optimising three key areas of collaboration: Customer Experience, Marketing Effectiveness and Operational Efficiency. The full-day event, themed around Synchronising the C-Suite, will focus on ways chief marketers can more effectively enjoin and collaborate with CEOs and functional leaders in the finance, information technology, procurement, legal, operational and other customer-facing and back office environments.

Marketing and business leaders from Accenture, Chrysler, Prudential, Juniper Networks, Taleo, Denny's, Motorola, Lenovo, Wells Fargo, ADP, Papa Murphy's, Nokia, FNC, Farmers Insurance, SAP, Orbitz, Egon Zehnder, SunPower, Merkle, Cisco, CA, AIG Bank, Intel, Franke, Xerox, Subway, Ricoh InfoPrint Solutions, McKee Foods, Aprimo, Gaylord Entertainment, OpenText, Flowserve, Intertek, 24-Hour Fitness, and Wrigley's will be among those attending the event.

The CMO Council's CMO Summit (www.cmosummit.org) is the premiere networking and thought leadership event in marketing and the official peer-to-peer networking event for the CMO Council (www.cmocouncil.org), an organisation of more than 6000 global marketers controlling more than US$200 billion (about R1400 billion) in combined annual marketing spend. Invitees across both the B-to-B and B-to-C market sectors will be invited to attend this exclusive retreat to connect with peers and tap into this global network of insight, access and influence.

For more information about the CMO Council's CMO Summit, go to www.cmosummit.org. Attendance to the North America Summit is by invitation-only, and while membership in the CMO Council is not required for attendance, member requests will have priority handling for this limited attendance event.

To request an invitation to the CMO Summit, go to www.cmosummit.org/2010/invitation_request.asp. Senior marketers can be nominated for membership by going to www.cmocouncil.org/members/nomination.asp.