Innovation
Jim Menge brings over 25 years of executive management and
technical expertise to Solutionz.
Most recently, Jim served as the Vice President of travel
distribution and business development for Silverrail Technologies and Wandrian,
a 2010 winner of the PhoCusWright Innovator of the Year award. There, he was hired to sell newly developed
travel products. He was also challenged to increase usage by creating more
efficient ways of buying products over the Internet. A key part of his role was
to create distribution channels and sales models for rail distribution. In that role, he sold $91 million in access
to Silverrail’s global rail content. He
also launched sales channels that include top-tier travel providers, including
online, corporate, leisure, technology developers, and suppliers.
Prior to joining Silverrail, Jim worked as a consultant with
his own firm and with Solutionz, where he spearheaded multiple large/regional
agency growth initiatives, including product development, supplier
negotiations, marketing and sales support, technology definition and
relationship management. He also managed a large regional travel agency,
including staff oversight, accounting, operations, technology and contracts.
Jim also served as the Executive Vice President of Member
Development for leisure leader Virtuoso adds a strong perspective on sales and
operations to complement his technical solutions orientation. He also served as the Vice President of
Information Technology for Sabre. His
experience advising S&P 500 companies is extensive.
Throughout his career, Jim has directed technology sales,
technology marketing, operations and telecommunications teams. He is Innovation Management certified.
A sample of Menge’s career highlights and achievements
include:
- Developing comprehensive sales methodology
continuum and process for a 6,000-travel consultant network.
- Developing and leading a $30mm, five-year
operations cost reduction implementation of customer eCommerce systems which
delivered and improved customer service and provided 24 hour customer access to
supplier-integrated and operational content.
- Directing a $150mm business-unit cost
reduction initiative and business process innovation resulting in business
process improvement across multiple business units and suppliers.
- Developing and leading a $130mm
business unit telecommunications migration to TCP/IP and leading the
business unit telecommunication cost reduction to $60mm over 3 years
through supplier contract, renegotiations and customer product
modification.
- Successfully integrating disparate
technical sales positions into a global Technology Services Group
resulting in second year revenue of $1.2mm while managing consultants
including software developers, hardware and network integrators, and
project managers.
As a public speaker, Jim’s speaking
engagements include topics on business technology, innovation and management,
increasing sales through technology, and motivating employees on corporate
change, developing and forming a global technical sales consulting
organization.
Jim is passionate about increasing customer satisfaction,
while attaining cost reduction, productivity improvement and increased customer
renewals. He has a Bachelor of Science
in Management from LeTourneau University and is a Professional Member of the
National Speakers Association, a Certified Travel Consultant (CTC), and has
held the position of Chair, Technology Council for the American Society of
Travel Agents (ASTA). He is working on
his masters in Technology Commercialization.
