Gartner Expert
Michelle Bazargan
Sr Director Analyst
Michelle Bazargan is a Sr. Director Strategy and Innovation in Gartner's CIO Research group. Ms. Bazargan works with organizations to advise on best practices and practical recommendations in strategy and innovation across business models including talent management, partner ecosystems, technology , marketing, leadership, culture and diversity equality and inclusion. Leveraging her extensive and diverse hands-on experience in both startups, and leadership execution roles in enterprises she provides pragmatic advise and recommendations. She globally focuses on authentic conscious leadership, human-centered innovation, shared intelligence ecosystems, and courageous open mindset cultures and environments.
Previous experience
Prior to joining Gartner, Ms. Bazargan had a unique and diverse leadership background spanning startups and complex enterprise organizations across numerous industries and sectors including Technology, Wellness, Automotive, Finance and more. She inspires a new way of business thinking to balance putting people first, challenge outdated rules and systems, create resilient and sustainable business models and legacies. Her experience spans executing business innovation, product and marketing strategies in both startups and enterprises by placing focus on the one commonality everyone has - All of our customers, employees and partners are diverse humans. When people feel equal and included, they are empowered to contribute to driving change, creativity and innovation and impact business results and revenue.
Her baseline of struggle and possibilities is different, as she escaped a revolutionary war and came to the U.S. with $500 and unable to speak a word of English. The experience built a foundation of resiliency, reinvention and purpose to help others face fears, adversity and believe in their strengths.
Passion fueled her to create a technology business from the ground up with a successful exit. She is obsessed with inspiring people to keep it real and believe in themselves and speaks at events like Tedx on The Value of Human Connections. What lights her up is contributing to Children's Shark Tanks Innovation programs, running innovation bootcamps for schools and universities, advocating for diversity and STEM and sharing perspective on Forbes Council, Huff Post, Podcasts and other platforms.
Professional background
Oracle
Sr.Director Global Strategy & Product Engineering
Ultimate Software
Product Strategy and Innovation Consultant to Executive Team
JM Family - SE Toyota
Business Strategy and Technology Leadership - R&D,Innovation Labs, Office of CIO
Areas of coverage
Digital Marketing Strategy and Execution
CIO Leadership of Innovation, Disruptive Trends and Emerging Practices
Industry Product Planning (retired)
Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Executive Leadership: Digital Business
Education
B.S., in Marketing
Founders Institute
Scrum Alliance - Certified Scrum Master (CSM)
Scrum Alliance - Certified Product Owner (CPO)
Project Management Institute (PMI)
Various Leadership, Coaching, Consciousness and Psychology Practices and Certifications
Top Issues That I Help Clients Address
1Drive business change through open innovation engines that generate continuous idea and incubation loops
2Shift investments & value from managing commodity lights on activities, to high value new horizon business innovation
3Create strong innovation ecosystems, labs, experiences and partnerships with customers, employees, & partners
4Right time customer marketing and sales engagement strategy leveraging AI, ML and Data Analytics
5Leverage actionable Diversity, Inclusion and Equality beyond pretty marketing and check boxes to drive and enable business innovation