Strategic Storytelling Faculty
Faculty Director
Frank Rose
Senior Fellow, Columbia University School of the Arts
Member, Columbia Digital Storytelling Lab
Author, The Art of Immersion
Frank Rose is a leading authority on the future of media and communications. In his most recent book, The Art of Immersion: How the Digital Generation is Remaking Hollywood, Madison Avenue, and the Way We Tell Stories, he argues that we are witnessing the emergence of a new form of narrative that is native to the Internet – one that is nonlinear, participatory, and immersive. He has addressed this issue at marketing summits and film festivals in New York, London, Paris, Copenhagen, Sydney, and Hong Kong, in academic gatherings at Stanford and the Politecnico di Milano, and at such companies as Google, Lucasfilm, Unilever, and the BBC. Hailed as "an essential overview" by the International Journal of Advertising and “a new media bible” by the Italian daily La Repubblica, the book is required reading for business, film, and game development courses at Columbia, Cambridge, NYU, USC and other schools.
Previously, as a contributing editor at Wired and a contributing writer at Fortune before that, Frank worked as a journalist at the intersection of media and technology, covering such developments as the making of Avatar, Samsung and the rise of the Korean techno-state, and the posthumous career of Philip K. Dick in Hollywood. Among his earlier books are The Agency: William Morris and the Hidden History of Show Business, about the rise and eventual unraveling of the oldest and at one time most successful talent agency in Hollywood, and the 1989 best-seller West of Eden: The End of Innocence at Apple Computer, which detailed the ouster of Steve Jobs from Apple and was named one of the year's ten best by BusinessWeek. Having gotten his start chronicling the punk scene at CBGB for The Village Voice, he currently contributes to The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and other publications.
Guest Speakers*
Rita Gunther McGrath
Faculty of Executive Education
Author, Seeing Around Corners: How to Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen and The End of Competitive Advantage
Rita Gunther McGrath is a best-selling author and longtime faculty member at Columbia Business School Executive Education, where she directs the popular programs Women in Leadership and Leading Strategic Growth and Change. Considered one of the world’s top experts on innovation and growth during times of uncertainty, she is the author of the best-selling The End of Competitive Advantage (2013) and, most recently, Seeing Around Corners: How to Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen.
Rita works with Fortune 1,000 companies as a consultant, helping boards, CEOs and senior executives act strategically in volatile environments. She is a highly sought-after speaker at exclusive events around the globe, including the Microsoft CEO Summit, the Global Peter Drucker Forum and the World Economic Forum in Davos. As one of a small group of experts who have built today’s best-in-class innovation practices, she is one of the thinkers who inspired the “lean startup” movement. She received the prestigious Thinkers50 Strategy Award for The End of Competitive Advantage and has been named one of the world’s top ten management thinkers in its bi-annual ranking ever since. A Fellow of the Strategic Management Society and of the International Academy of Management, she regularly contributes articles and perspectives to such publications as The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company and Fortune and is one of the most-published authors in the Harvard Business Review.
Karin Timpone
Karin Timpone was Global Marketing Officer at Marriott International until the end of 2019. In this role she led the integrated global marketing and consumer relationship management strategy for the company, evolving the strategy to strengthen the relevance of Marriott’s portfolio of brands to the next-generation traveler. Under Karin’s leadership, the global marketing team integrated new brands into the portfolio, grew its loyalty member base, innovated new digital marketing platforms and pioneered an industry-first content studio. Business Insider named her one of the world’s top fifty CMOs—and specifically one of the Storytellers: marketing executives who have mastered the art of storytelling across platforms.
Karin joined Marriott from the Walt Disney Company, where she was Senior Vice President for Product Strategy and Marketing for Disney/ABC Digital Media. While there, she set up Disney’s first-ever digital media product strategy and marketing team and led consumer strategy for such brands as ABC.com, ABCNews.com, ABCFamily.com, the Disney Channel and Oscar.com and the introduction of award-winning mobile products. Prior to the Walt Disney Company, Karin was head of Marketing and Consumer/Customer Innovation for Yahoo! Media Group. Previously she served as a senior marketing executive at the Seagram Company, where she helped lead strategy for a broad portfolio of brands, including Absolut Vodka. On leaving Marriott she returned to Los Angeles to work on a startup that is currently in stealth mode.
Matt Locke
Founder, Storythings
Matt Locke is the founder and co-director of Storythings, a UK-based digital content agency that has worked with such clients as the BBC, PBS, Google, Hachette, the British Council and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Before starting Storythings in 2011, Matt was head of innovation at BBC New Media and later head of multi-platform at Channel 4, where he worked on such shows as Big Brother, Misfits, Skins and Million Pound Drop. He is chair of the Audience Agency, a London-based charity that helps cultural organizations use national data to gain a deeper understanding of current and potential audiences; chair of Photoworks, a commissioning agency for contemporary culture and photography, and deputy chair of the British Science Association.