Management Team
Steve Sibulkin
Co-Founder and CEO
Steve is a Co-Founder and CEO of Expert Planet, where he brings 20 years of experience as a strategic marketer, entrepreneur, and business innovator.
Prior to Expert Planet, Steve served as the Founder and Executive Director of Innovation at Ogilvy & Mather. In this role he worked with clients on the creation of new ventures, social media efforts, and the development of new markets and channels. He also served on the Operating Board as well as the Diversity committee.
Prior to Ogilvy & Mather, Steve worked as the Chief Operating Officer of Affinity Solutions marketing where he had P&L, partner management and operations responsibility, and played a major role in reconfiguring the company’s solutions portfolio and sales management approach. Before this he was Managing Director of the Consumer & Retail practice at Sapient, where he helped Fortune 500 companies to innovate at the convergence of marketing and technology, and lead a sales-reorganization that drove 100% P&L growth in two years.
Steve was the Founder and CEO of GivingZone.com, a social marketing company aimed at targeting affinity and not-for-profit groups that was acquired by Carlson Companies, where he later led acquisition and venture efforts. Prior to GivingZone.com, Steven served as a Managing Director at Mainspring, a venture-backed e-strategy firm where he launched and ran the Consumer & Retail practice. The practice quickly became the company’s fastest growing, and most profitable division before the company was acquired by IBM.
Steve holds an MBA from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, where he graduated Beta Gamma Sigma, and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles. He resides in NYC with his wife and two perfect kids, is a member of the Triple Nine Society, and is a 4th generation Boston Red Sox fan.
Peter DeLuca
Chief Operating Officer
As Chief Operating Officer, Peter is responsible for building and managing the core functions of Expert Planet’s agent community, including recruiting, certification, agent improvement and retention strategies, and quality control.
Prior to Expert Planet, Peter led marketing strategy and technology engagements at Ogilvy & Mather, DraftFCB and Rapp Collins, and has served Fortune 500 brands such as American Express, Citibank, IBM, Kraft, and SAP.
Peter holds a B.A. in Sociology from SUNY Oswego in upstate New York. He enjoys running, golfing, and following his beloved New York Yankees, who have won 27 championships compared to only 7 for the Boston Red Sox.
Pat Ricken
Vice President, Expert Education
Pat joined Expert Planet in December, 2008 as Vice President of Expert Education and Communication, where she will provide strategic leadership for the design and execution of Expert Agent certification programs. In her role, Pat is responsible for ensuring that Expert Agents have the skills, resources and tools necessary to enable them to optimize customer satisfaction with the products and services they purchase, while driving maximum revenue for our clients.
Pat brings over 13 years experience in the call center space, designing and implementing leading edge agent training programs for a wide variety of brands and products for both brick-and-mortar and virtual call centers. As the Director of Training for Victoria’s Secret Direct, she implemented a highly successful branded, consultative selling strategy.
Prior to joining Expert Planet, Pat was the VP of Community Development at LiveOps, supporting the needs of businesses through a vibrant community of 20,000 home based agents. At LiveOps, she translated multi-week, instructor-led training into rigorous, virtual modules to support their distributed workforce model for clients such as TriStar, Pizza Hut, 1-800-Flowers, eBay, and AEGON.
Pat holds a B.A. in Education from Michigan State University. She and her husband now reside in Arizona, and enjoy exploring the beauty of the Southwest, and though they have not lived in Chicago for years, they are still die-hard Cubs and Bears fans.
Paul Hedgecock
Vice President, Expert Operations
Paul joined Expert Planet in May, 2009 as Vice President of Expert Operations, where he is responsible for the day-to-day activities of over 400 call center agents.
Paul brings over 10 years of digital marketing and retail experience. In 2005, Paul established a successful chain of Internet retail consignment businesses throughout the U.S., and was one of the first people to combine the virtual consignment channel with brick-and-mortar retail. Paul has also consulted with numerous small businesses in establishing a retail presence on eBay, Amazon and small business websites.
Paul is active in community service, working with the Boy Scouts of America and various youth leadership programs. He lives in Glendale, Arizona with his wife and six children.
Felipe Cubillos
Manager, Analytics
Felipe joined Expert Planet in September, 2009 as a Manager in the Marketing Analytics group , where he is responsible for the overall measurement of program and agent performance.
Felipe graduated from the Leonard N. Stern School of Business at NYU with a degree in Finance and Marketing. He brings an array of work experiences ranging from top New York financial institutions as well as a few start up companies.
Although his roots are Colombian, Felipe has traveled extensively and has lived and studied in many countries including Brazil, Paraguay, and Guatemala.
