Dr. Beth Fitz Gibbon, a Senior Consultant with Synergy, is a practitioner in strategy, research, marketing, new business and new product development. She has consulted with and held senior management positions at Fortune 500 corporations, small and medium enterprises, and non-profits. Fitz Gibbon earned her doctorate in Business Management at Case Western Reserve University, where her research focused on the strategic outsourcing of innovation and its implications for long term competitiveness. She holds an MBA in International Marketing from Emory University and a BA in English and Psychology from Rutgers University.

 

Dr. Fitz Gibbon’s 25+ years of professional expertise includes strategic and tactical planning, qualitative, quantitative and secondary market research, alliance and joint venture management, entrepreneurial business development, supply chain management, and strategic marketing. A participating member of the Academy of Management, the New Product Development & Management Association, and the International Association of Outsourcing Professionals, Dr. Fitz Gibbon serves as adjunct professor at the Weatherhead School of Management, where she teaches Entrepreneurship Strategy, Intrapreneurship and Social Entrepreneurship. She also serves on a number of boards in an advisory capacity.

 

Fitz Gibbon’s favorite client engagement has been helping a small collaborative team design and build a new global business venture formed through the strategic alliance of two multinational corporations with very different cultures.  Why did she enjoy this engagement so? “Because,” she says, “it was a complex international undertaking, from market research through strategic planning, regulated product design & development, and complex operational issues through to commercialization. The new business won Ad Age’s Top 10 business launch of the year award and beat every projected 3-year corporate hurdle in year one.”

 

Fitz Gibbon says that she is fortunate to have developed her career as a portfolio, collecting experience in concept design and development, financial and operational processes market launches, sales training, advertising & PR and customer service. “The research begins at the R&D stage with scientists and engineers, and moves into research in the market, industry or sector with suppliers, sellers, consumers, and potential users. That broad experience, in a variety of industries and distribution channels, has provided me with the ability to explore, research, analyze, synthesize and integrate data and information. Additionally, I became skilled at planning, executing and implementing.”

 

The broad base of experience gives me the scale and scope to research and identify opportunities, and to also turn those results into actionable new ideas. My passion and joy is the search and discovery process – doing research and turning the findings into a new business, a new product or service, or a more efficient, effective and profitable process,” says Fitz Gibbon.

 

When she reflects about her work with Synergy Fitz Gibbon’s eyes immediately light up. “My first feeling is ‘pride.’  I am proud to work with such an outstanding group of smart, creative, experienced professionals, who have the highest quality standards and ethics. The second feeling is ‘trust’ – knowing that our accomplishments are achieved with people who collaborate, share, and support each other and our clients with respect and integrity. The third feeling is excitement – every project is interesting, complex and challenging – a great opportunity to contribute, to learn, and to add value to our clients’ success.”

 

Fitz Gibbon stated, “I love working with Synergy!  The projects are so varied, and the clients and their cultures are so different, there’s never the sense of here we go again.” 

Every client presents new issues, challenges, rewards and discoveries.  I particularly like projects where we have to solve “mysteries” like, “What’s happening here?  Why is it happening? What are the hidden factors in the situation that we need to discover? What are the best ways to analyze the issues?  How can they best be resolved?  The process for selecting the appropriate method of market research keeps things intriguing. “Mystery shoppers” bring reality home in a particularly definitive way. Focus groups, on-line surveys and in-person interviews all add richness to the discovery process, providing different kinds of clues for becoming more effective, more efficient, more profitable, or whatever else is the client’s ultimate goal. Variety is truly the spice of working with Synergy.”

With such a great capacity for learning and thought-leadership, one might never have never guessed that Fitz Gibbon’s favorite escapes are camping in the Rocky Mountains and at the Burning Man Festival in the Nevada desert. She also loves speed and wanted to be a racecar driver. By the way, her dad said he’d pay for college but not racing!  Finally, her secret vices for de-stressing include “This Old House” and the Home & Garden Network.

 

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