Management Team
John Broderick, Chief Executive Officer
With more than 30 years’ experience in business and finance, Mr. Broderick joined the company in 2001 to manage the company’s global finance functions. Previously, he was with Swell Inc., a media and commerce company. As the company’s Executive Vice President of Commerce, he launched the company’s commercial initiatives which included catalog and e-commerce activities. Mr. Broderick also served as interim CFO and helped secure Swell’s first round of venture financing. Mr. Broderick previously served as CFO and Senior Vice President of the North American Operations at Programmer’s Paradise — a $250 million international software reseller. Mr. Broderick holds a B.S. degree in Accounting from Villanova University.
Tony Castagno, Chief Technology Officer
Mr. Castagno brings over 20 years of leadership and technology experience to Cicero where he is currently the Company’s Chief Technology Officer and is responsible for the technology vision and execution for Cicero’s Customer Experience software. Prior to joining Cicero, Mr. Castagno was the Chief Executive Officer of SOAdesk LLC, which pioneered the Intelligent Agent Desktop and Customer Interaction Management space. From 2005 to 2007, Mr. Castagno was the co-founder and Chief Technology Officer for OpenSpan, where he led the development of client side integration. Today this integration technique is globally recognized as Surface Integration. In addition to his duties with Cicero, Mr. Castagno also lectures and blogs on technology and has been published in several trade periodicals. Mr. Castagno graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1989 with a BS in Computer Science. During Mr. Castagno’s service in the Army he led a cavalry tank platoon in the Gulf War and was decorated for his combat actions. Over the course of Mr. Castagno’s career, he has held leadership and technology positions with Deloitte, Verifone, ADP, Personic and was the founder of Vertical Thought an Atlanta-based technology incubator.
Mike Garner, Chief Customer Officer
Prior to joining Cicero, Mike founded and was the President of SOAdesk, a customer service technology company. Additionally, Mike led over 7000 service reps to record setting revenue, client satisfaction and profit marks over his operations career at both Verizon and Afni. Mike received his MBA from the Cox School of Business at SMU in Dallas, TX and chairs the Call Center Advisory Board for the Outsourcing Institute. He resides with his wife Kelley and son Grant in the Kansas City area.
Tom Aiello, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales
Mr. Aiello brings more than 25 years’ experience in technology sales in the contact center industry, driving revenue growth and increasing market leadership to Cicero, where he leads worldwide sales. As a proven leader in contact center technology sales, Tom has served as vice president of worldwide sales and marketing for Envision Telephony, Inc., a provider of software solutions for contact centers. He also served as senior director of sales and channel development at Aspect Software and as vice president of sales and channel development at CenterForce before it was acquired by Aspect (formerly Concerto Software). Prior to this position, Tom led sales and marketing for RightForce, LLC. the industry's first hosted WFM solution. Tom also was global director of desktop software at Rockwell Electronic Commerce responsible for development and product marketing for Rockwell's desktop software suite.
James W. Hunt, Director of Product Development
Mr. Hunt has over twenty-five years experience in the customer contact management field. As a founder of Interactive Response Technologies (IRT), Mr. Hunt led the development of a patented interactive desktop interface for call centers. This product was later sold to Rockwell First Point Contact. Mr. Hunt became Senior Engineering Manager, CTI Products and later Senior Product Manager for CTI products for Rockwell First Point Contact (now part of Aspect Software). In 2002, Mr. Hunt formed Stroudwater Contact Point as a value-added reseller of Rockwell and developer of customer contact solutions. Stroudwater served customers ranging from startups to the Fortune 500. In 2008, Mr. Hunt joined SOAdesk, LLC as Chief Technology Officer to productize SOAdesk’s customer interaction management technology. Mr. Hunt is a regular presenter and speaker at industry trade meetings, has had several articles printed in industry journals and has been quoted as an “Industry Visionary” by Customer Inter@ction Solutions magazine. Mr. Hunt holds a Bachelors degree from Bates College.
Neil Crane, Director of Product Strategy
Mr. Crane’s experience spans nearly 25 years of technology change during which he has experienced first-hand the problems of a centralized approach to enterprise computing, the draw-backs of distributed systems and the need for common-sense, value for money, process integration solutions. As an enterprise solution architect, Mr. Crane has designed and overseen the implementation of enterprise computing systems for Fortune 100 companies on the leading edge of technology adoption. Mr. Crane joined the company in 1996 to lead the professional services team in integration projects based on the then-new IBM MQSeries product and other emerging integration technologies. Previously he was with IBM UK where he worked first as a developer on the MQSeries product family and subsequently provided implementation planning services to the first MQSeries customers. Mr. Crane is co-author of the book “MSMQ from Scratch.”
Hal Harris, Director of Professional Services
Mr. Harris has over twenty-five years of experience delivering information technology and solutions to clients. His skill in information planning, business improvement and project management, along with his strong technology background, is focused on delivering solutions and quality professional services to our clients. He has staffed and managed major engagements and projects for Fortune 500 customers throughout the United States. Previous to joining Cicero, Mr. Harris held leadership positions with technology firms delivering solutions in the call center space, education, banking, public sector and commercial market. Hal also serves on the board for several non-profit organizations, including CILOA and the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG).
Alex Aversano, Director of Alliances
Mr. Aversano has been in the technology field for more than thirty years. He is responsible for developing and driving business and marketing solutions through strategic initiatives between Cicero Inc. and select global alliance organizations. Prior to joining Cicero, Alex successfully lead and implemented alliance strategies to drive sales volume through partner channels for major companies such as IBM and Progress Software Corporation. Alex earned his Bachelor of Marketing Management degree at Baruch College, City University of New York.
