Our Executive Team

Ara A. Ohanian Chief Executive Officer, Founder and President

Ara has led CERTPOINT from a start-up company in 1996, to a global player, delivering product and brand knowledge to some of the world's most powerful brands. His leadership has put CERTPOINT on the map by earning the trust of great companies such as Toyota, A.T. Kearney, The Hartford, and Black & Decker. Ara works closely with senior executives from these organizations to develop proven and unique methodologies for leveraging Product and Brand Knowledge to accelerate sales. His expertise in managing business-critical knowledge for competitive advantage is recognized by market leaders. He has been quoted in leading publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Information Week, CFO Magazine, Sales & Marketing Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Knowledge Management Magazine, Online Investor, Professional Certification, Mac Report, Chief Learning Officer Magazine and Software Magazine. Prior to serving as President and CEO of CERTPOINT, Ara founded an international “business management readiness” program with the late Nobel Laureate, Dr. W. Leontief. Ara also developed and ran a successful series of “entrepreneurship preparation programs” for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) His background includes working in London as part of an advertising team on Kellogg's Brand Flakes, and S.C Johnson's RAID. His career started in sales with NCR in 1989. Ara has lived, studied, and worked across Europe and the United States. He is multi-lingual and earned his Bachelor of Arts in Business Communications from Baruch College, The City University of New York.

Constantin Ohanian, Founder and Executive Chairman

Constantin is a successful line executive with an outstanding record of pioneering and growing major business for Procter & Gamble, CBS Records, Clorox, Tambrands, and RJR Nabisco in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, China, the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Before founding CERTPOINT, he engineered and led Tambrands' global expansion and RJR's $1.2 billion entry into the former Soviet Union. Constantin's opening of the Soviet Union for Tambrands is a current case study of innovative business leadership at Harvard University and his "Marketing Guide for Entrepreneurs" was widely distributed by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

Daniel M. Pess, Chief Financial Officer and Executive Vice President

Dan is responsible for the financial and administrative management of CERTPOINT, including accounting, banking relationships, investor relations and legal, as well as the Human Resource function. He plays an active role in global strategy and related tactical initiatives and execution. Dan brings to CERTPOINT more than 25-years of experience in both public and private company environments with extensive experience in companies from the development stage to IPO, through revenues in excess of $350 million. Dan has a proven track record in mergers and acquisitions to facilitate growth. He was formerly Senior Vice President and CFO of USADATA, Inc., and was part of the management team that affected a leveraged buy-out of the company during a period of rapid growth. Prior to USADATA, Dan was Senior Vice President and CFO of White Amber, Inc., during which time its revenues increased by five-fold, leading to its successful sale to a large public company. Prior to White Amber, Dan was Executive Vice President and CFO of QueryObject Systems Corporation, and prior to that he was the senior financial executive for a variety of public and private companies. He is a Certified Public Accountant and began his career with a Big Four international accounting firm. Dan graduated with high honors from the C.W. Post School of Professional Accountancy.

Brian D. Baloga, Senior Vice President of Sales

Responsible for CERTPOINT's revenue generation, Brian manages the Sales Team in their focus to achieve growth objectives through new business initiatives and revenue retention. He brings to CERTPOINT a highly successful 18-year background in Strategic Enterprise Sales and Sales Force Management. Before joining CERTPOINT, Brian was the National Sales Director for eSignal, a division of Interactive Data Corporation, where he was responsible for leading a successful North American Sales Team. At eSignal, Brian managed a quota of $16.5 million in new business and $70.5 million in renewable business and exceeded his quota by over $2 million. In 2001 Brian served as Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing at AFX News LTD where he handled all accounting aspects of North American operations. In his tenure with AFX News, he managed a quota of $7 million in new business with $18.5 million in renewable business. Prior to AFX News, Brian served as Senior Vice President of Sales for Wavo Corporation where he was successfully responsible for a yearly quota of $12 million in new business and $8.5 million in renewable business. At Wavo Corp, Brian exceeded his quota by $2 million. Brian graduated from Adelphi University with a Bachelor's Degree Business Management in 1990.

Kenneth Fung, Senior Vice President, Strategic Global Initiatives

Kenneth is responsible for management of CERTPOINT’s Global Services Group. In this capacity he oversees all pre and post sales support activities and client services on a world-wide basis. With over 15 years of experience in the learning industry, Kenneth has a breadth of knowledge in client services working with world-class organizations such as Deloitte & Touche, Johnson & Johnson, and Tambrands. Since 1996, Kenneth has lead global deployments reaching 40+ countries for customers such as Toyota, A.T. Kearney, Black & Decker and Honda for CERTPOINT. While working with Deloitte & Touche, he led an international training program rated one of the top three in the United States by the Agency for International Development. Kenneth previously served as a member of the Board of Directors for the New York Chapter of the American Society of Training and Development (ASTD). Kenneth holds a B.A in Business Economics from the University of California at Santa Barbara.

Maria van Vlodrop, Senior Vice President, Europe

Maria is the Senior Vice President for CERTPOINT Europe based in Brussels. She brings 15 years of global Account Management experience in the US and international markets to CERTPOINT. With CERTPOINT, Maria also co-led the launch and implementation of the CERTPOINTVLS™ for TAE-SED (Toyota Academy Europe School for Employee Development) and managed its entire launch and adoption program. She has held senior positions with leading advertising agencies in New York, London, and the Benelux, managing worldwide accounts such as Pepsi (USA), DuPont (USA), US Navy (USA), Haagen-Dazs (Europe), Kellogg’s (Russia), Clorox (Middle East), Finlandia Vodka (Europe), Iridium (global), and Gillette (Global). Maria is a graduate of the London School of Economics (Masters in European Studies).

Robert Stewart, Vice President of Technology and Product Innovation

In his role as Vice President of Technology and Product Innovation, Robert previously held the position of Senior Product Manager. During his tenure at CERTPOINT, Robert effectively integrated “Lean Thinking” practices into the core product development approach of CERTPOINT, putting clients at the center of key product innovations. This achievement earned CERTPOINT the “Kaizen Spirit Award” from the University of Toyota. Furthermore, in his earlier capacity as Chief Network Officer of CERTPOINT, Robert had successfully lead the global implementation of CERTPOINT’s e-Learning suite in more than 40 countries deployed in over 35 languages while ensuring 99.99% up time. In his role as Vice President of Technology and Product Innovation, Rob will continue to infuse the culture of Lean Thinking into all aspects of product development innovation while keeping the customer at the center of all such activity. He will also lead CERTPOINT IT, deployment and quality assurance in addition to Research and Development. Prior to joining CERTPOINT, Robert developed and managed several web sites for the Hankamer School of Business, Baylor University, Texas where he received his MBA in Information Systems Management.

Preston Dodd, Vice President- Strategy & Development

Preston currently leads CERTPOINT’s efforts in marketplace research, competitive analysis, and analyst relations and has contributed in multiple business areas since he joined CERTPOINT in 2001. Previously, Preston worked as a Senior Analyst, Technology & Operations, at Jupiter Research in New York, where he produced dozens of published research reports, served as a featured speaker in over 20 US and European cities and appeared in such media outlets as ABC World News Tonight, the BBC, CNBC, CNN, US News & World Report, and The Wall Street Journal Europe. Earlier in his career, he led the professional services teams that built the first public Website for CBS News and the initial Internet reservation system interface for United Airlines. Preston holds degrees from Harvard University and Duke University and currently serves on the Board of Directors for the Harvard University Club of San Francisco.

Mary Grace Sauve, Vice President – Client Community

Mary Grace is responsible for the planning and execution of CERTPOINT’s Client Community activities, including Live forums, monthly virtual web conferences and the online portal. The goal of these activities is to provide the venues, tools, and resources for clients to collaborate, share best practices, drive the product roadmap, and bring added value and business results. In 2004, Mary Grace was appointed by the CEO to lead all Lean Thinking initiatives within the organization which resulted in the first ever “Lean Kaizen Spirit” award from Toyota recognizing CERTPOINT’s transformation and accomplishments. Previously, she served in critical operational roles to ensure the effectiveness of the senior management team. Prior to joining CERTPOINT in 2000, Mary Grace held operational positions in the telecommunications and banking industries as well as merchandising positions in the retail/apparel industry. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Business from the State University of New York.

Stan Ulis, Director of Client Services

Stan manages CERTPOINT’s Client Services group, a team that helps clients realize the full value of CERTPOINT’s solution by providing technical support, business support, content creation, and training services. His team also does business needs analysis and manages development and deployment of custom enhancements. Stan has been with CERTPOINT for over 7 years, taking on progressively broader responsibilities. He has been a longtime driving force behind CERTPOINTVLS™ beginning with the development of CERTPOINTVLS™ version 2.0. Previously, Stan was Director of Software Development, driving product development, including the deployment of an internationalized version of CERTPOINTVLS™ supporting multiple languages applicable to the global market. Stan holds a Bachelor of Science in Computer Information Systems with a minor in Business Management from Stony Brook University.

Jim Moshinskie, Ph.D., Chief Knowledge Officer

A recognized authority on knowledge management and web-associated knowledge transfer, Jim also heads the Performance Improvement Technologies (PIT) major at the Hankammer School of Business, Baylor University, Waco, Texas. His honors include three instructional design awards from the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) and two coveted Instructional Design Awards of Excellence from the International Society of Performance Improvement (ISPI). He is a Certified Performance Technologist, and has published numerous articles on e-Learning implementation and evaluation.

Denis Finnegan, Ed.D., Chief Learning Officer

Denis is a lifelong alternative learner who has pursued his education part-time while at sea on submarines with the US Navy and by distance learning. He has earned a B.S. in vocational education from Southern Illinois University, an M.A. from the University of Connecticut, an MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a Doctorate in Educational Leadership from the University of Phoenix. The research interest of his Doctorate was “Correlation of Reading Skill and E-Learning Success in a United States Fortune 100 Company.”

Denis served as the Assistant VP of Training at The Hartford Financial Services Group until April 2010 when he retired after 14 years of service. In his last position, Denis managed a nationwide staff of training professionals who developed technical courses on insurance topics and taught all facets of the Property and Casualty profession. During his time at The Hartford, Denis brought e-learning, videoconference-based education and web-based education to the organization. Prior to this last position, Denis served as the Assistant VP of Corporate Education at The Hartford and was responsible for all aspects of general business and leadership training.