Nurture Connect was founded by Shana Duthie and Mike Kennedy with the vision of creating an outsourced call center that would increase their clients’ customer satisfaction rates and customer retention as well as creating jobs for older Americans allowing them to be valued and productive. Their entire team is devoted to this mission and is proud to be providing jobs and training to older Americans.

Shana Duthie – Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer

   Shana Duthie brings to Nurture Connect more than 20 years of experience in assisting start-ups and "early stage” companies to reach their growth potential by serving on their executive teams. Ms. Duthie has held key executive positions in Sales/Marketing as well as Finance/Operations which together gives her the knowledge and ability to drive revenue. Ms. Duthie understands the operational challenges that rapid growth creates and her multifaceted background provides an extremely powerful tool for achieving ROI and other bottom line results.

   Shana has specific experience in building companies that focus on older Americans such as SOS Wireless Communications whom she worked for in the 1990’s and Jitterbug Cellular Phones (GreatCall, Inc. 2005-2008) of which she was a founding member of the management team. As a consultant she has created marketing strategies and training programs for companies selling to the Senior and Boomer market and is still highly regarded this area.

   Additionally, Shana has run her own consulting company, Duthie Consulting Group where she assisted emerging companies with a variety of projects such as, developing strategic plans, organization development, budgets and forecasts and plan execution. Shana graduated Magna Cum Laude from Chapman University in Orange, CA with a double major in Economics and Pre-med.

Mike Kennedy – Founder and Chief Operations Officer

   Mike Kennedy brings to Nurture Connect over 25 years of management and operational experience in the contact center industry. He brings with him the depth and understanding of what it takes to make customers truly satisfied with their call center experience. Mike is leading Nurture Connect’s client implementation, training, and systems and ensuring that all Nurture Connect’s clients and agents are satisfied.

   Mike has an extensive consulting background with companies such as Customer Interface Strategies, Digitas, Wasatch Solutions Group and he also spent several years with Convergys Corporation, one of the world’s largest call center outsourcing firms, as an Operations Director in Salt Lake City. While at Convergys, he oversaw several high-profile accounts serviced by over 600 customer care and telesales agents.

   Additionally, he has held several senior level contact center and operations management positions at L.A. Cellular (now Cingular Wireless), Lockheed Information Management Systems, and HealthRider, Inc. where he pioneered a number of innovative customer contact initiatives. Mike graduated Cum Laude from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles with a BA in Communications.

JB Hendrickson – Chief Financial Officer

   JB Henriksen is joining Nurture Connect, Inc as a part-time CFO. JB has over 20 years of experience in financial management and accounting for growth businesses. He has served as CFO for over 20 businesses ranging from pre-revenue to over $1 billion in revenue. He has worked with various industries ranging from service, retail and manufacturing businesses to more high tech software and hardware businesses.

   Prior to joining Nurture Connect, JB was a principal with a consulting firm called Mavericx, where he served as a CFO for VC backed companies such as Encover and Private Equity backed companies such as O’Currance and Roundy Apparel. He has been involved in mergers and acquisitions on all levels and has worked closely with investment bankers as well as with private equity to help to purchase and to sell various parts of businesses. He has expertise in accounting and accounting systems and has implemented new systems in many companies.

    JB graduated from the University of Utah in accounting and worked for Deloitte and Touche where he earned his CPA. He has been a speaker and presenter at many seminars and is also an adjunct professor at both the University of Utah and at Brigham Young University, where he has taught accounting for over 20 years. He volunteers his time to work with entrepreneurs through the Wayne Brown Institute, Utah Technology Transfer Office, BYU Student Mentor Group and advises other entrepreneurial groups in the community.

Cynthia Ahlstrom- Vice President of Business Development

   Cynthia Ahlstrom is joining Nurture Connect as our VP of Business Development and brings to our clients over 20 years of management in the contact center industry. She has an extensive background including managing multi centers and has a strong understanding of the client side and what is expected from the relationship with a vendor/partner. Cynthia is leading Nurture Connect's business development effort which involves bringing in new clients while creating and nurturing long term alliances with our current client partners.

   Ms. Ahlstrom began her career in reservations for Salt Lake City-based Morris Air, eventually becoming its Reservation Director. While there, Ahlstrom was instrumental in developing and implementing the airline's innovative agent telecommuting program, where agents took and made reservations from a home office environment. She has worked for Viacom, Inc./Showtime Networks as Manager/Director of Telemarketing services where she managed its client/vendor relationships, and for Convergys Corporation as its Senior Business Manager over high profile accounts.

    Most recently, she worked for O'Currance Teleservices' as Director/Vice President of Operations and was instrumental in the company's overall operational strategy and strengthening its operational management team and positioning the company for future growth. She is excited about the opportunity with Nurture Connect and looks forward to serving many delighted clients.

Betty Jo Soldano – Senior Training Manager

   Betty Jo Soldano brings years of working within the Senior Community to the Nurture Connect training team. Her most recent experience was with Jitterbug cell phones. As a field agent, she was responsible for supervising all mobile phone sales agents in Best Buy, Sears and CVS stores; including corporate training sessions, on-site training sessions and one-on-one training sessions with individual mobile phone sales agents.   Providing the mobile departments with all updates, written and verbal and assuring the staff of the support given by Jitterbug, resulted in a solid partnership. Her success with the first 50 Best Buy stores resulted in an additional 950 stores after the first season.   In addition, she visited many Senior Communities to introduce the phone, answer questions and help them to feel comfortable with cell phones. 

   Previous to her Field Agent position, Betty Jo worked at The-Connection, first as a Coach and Mentor and quickly promoted to Trainer. It was during this time that she realized how important it was for seniors to feel that they were still able to contribute to the workforce as call center agents. She trained many seniors who were new to computers and who became viable and capable call center agents and learned very quickly how to interact and explain information on their own level. She has great respect for seniors and a great rapport with them in the work place. Betty Jo has found that seniors are very reliable and successful employees and they are always willing to learn.