Board of Directors
Learn more about our Board of Directors:
Boland T. Jones
Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
In the mid 1980s, Boland Jones started his first company — American Network Exchange (AMNEX) — which provided the first alternatives to the AT&T operator service. Jones foresaw a future in business communications applications and founded PGi (Premiere Global Services) in 1991. After 28 years in business, PGi now serves 75% of the Fortune 500. With customers around the globe in nearly every industry, PGi has been recognized by Forbes magazine as one of America’s 200 Best Small Companies and received the Growth Excellence of the Year Award from Frost & Sullivan in 2008. Jones has also been included in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for excellence in Web Conferencing Solutions.
Named Georgia’s #5 Top Performing CEO in 2008 by the Atlanta Business Journal, and identified as Entrepreneur of the Year of the Southwest Region by Ernst & Young, Jones supports a different kind of leadership approach. Believing in the power of innovation to make life easier, more efficient and more cost-effective, Jones stands by the value of dreaming big ideas into realities that shape the future and help companies do better business.
Mr. Jones previously served as a director and member of the nominating and governance committee of HSW International, Inc. until June 2010. He received his BS from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. He lives in Atlanta with his wife and three children and is an avid supporter of a variety of charitable efforts.
For more information, see Boland's complete profile.
Wilkie S. Colyer
Partner, The Breckenridge Group, Inc.
Wilkie S. Colyer has served as a partner in The Breckenridge Group, Inc., an Atlanta-based investment banking firm specializing in divestitures, mergers, acquisitions and private placements and public offerings of debt and equity, since 1988.
Mr. Colyer has devoted most of his time and attention over the past 20 years to the telecommunications industry. Since joining The Breckenridge Group, he has provided investment banking services in 43 telecom transactions with a total value of nearly $22 billion. Mr. Colyer was a director of Moeller Products Company, Inc. until it was sold in 2011, and has previously served on numerous for-profit and non-profit boards.
K. Robert Draughon
Chief Executive Officer, Press Ganey Associates, Inc.
Mr. Draughon has served in various executive roles at Press Ganey Associates, Inc., a leader in quality measurement and performance improvement solutions for the health care industry, most recently as the President and a director since February 2010 and as the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) since 2009, and was the interim Chief Executive Officer from July 2011 to February 2012. Prior to joining Press Ganey, Mr. Draughon was Managing Partner of Forest Hills Capital Management, LLC, a private equity investment firm, from March 2008 to February 2009. He also held a variety of positions in finance and corporate development at HLTH Corporation and its subsidiary, WebMD Health Corp. from March 1998 to March 2008, including as CFO of WebMD prior to its merger with HLTH, where Mr. Draughon developed and led multiple strategic partnerships with many of the world’s largest technology companies.
Mr. Draughon graduated from the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University with a master’s in business administration, and he earned a bachelor’s in economics from Wake Forest University.
John R. Harris
Operating Partner, glendonTodd Capital LLC
Chief Executive Officer, Chemical Information Services LLC
John R. Harris is the Operating Partner of glendonTodd Capital LLC, a private equity firm focused on companies in the technology-enabled business services and healthcare sectors, and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Chemical Information Services LLC, a glendonTodd portfolio company that provides information services to the pharmaceutical and chemical industries, since February 2011. He served as CEO and President of eTelecare Global Solutions, Inc., a leading provider of outsourced customer care solutions, from February 2006 to October 2009, when eTelecare was acquired by Stream Global Services, Inc. He was CEO of Seven Worldwide, Inc., a digital content management company, from December 2003 to December 2005 when it was sold to Schawk, Inc. Mr. Harris was CEO and President of Delinea Corporation from July 2002 to December 2003, CEO and President of Exolink from August 2001 to July 2002 and Chairman and CEO of Ztango, Inc. from 1999 to 2001. Prior to that, he served in various executive positions with Electronic Data Systems Corporation for over 25 years and was a corporate officer.
Mr. Harris currently is a director and member of the audit, compensation and nominating and corporate governance committees of The Hackett Group, Inc., a director, chairman of the compensation committee and member of the audit committee of Digital Generation, Inc., formerly known as DG FastChannel Inc., and a director and chairman of the compensation committee of Commercetel Corp. He previously served on the boards of eTelecare Global Solutions and Seven Worldwide, and was a director and member of the audit committees of Genuity Inc. and inVentiv Health, Inc., and a director, chairman of the compensation committee and member of the nominating and corporate governance committee of StarTek, Inc. He is also a director, chairman of the nominating and governance committee and member of the compensation committee of BancTec, Inc., a privately-held company.
W. Steven Jones
Professor of Strategy and Organizational Behavior, Kenan-Flagler Business School, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
W. Steven Jones is professor of Strategy and Organizational Behavior at the Kenan-Flagler Business School of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he also served as Dean from 2003 to 2008. Before becoming Dean, Mr. Jones was a 15-year resident of Australia and New Zealand where he was Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Managing Director of Suncorp Metway Ltd., a publicly listed Australian banking, insurance and funds management company in Brisbane, Queensland, from 1997 through 2002. Prior to Suncorp, Mr. Jones was CEO and Managing Director of ANZ Banking Group, N.Z., Ltd. in Wellington, New Zealand.
Mr. Jones is currently a director of Progress Energy, Inc. and member of the Progress Energy audit and corporate performance committee and operations and nuclear oversight committee and previously served on the organization and compensation committee. He is a director of State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company where he serves as the chairman of the risk committee and as a member of the audit and governance committees, a director and chairman of the risk committee of State Farm Bank and a director of State Farm Life Insurance Company. In addition, he is a director and member of the corporate governance committee of Glen Raven, Inc., a privately-held company. He is a former director of Bank of America Corporation where he served on the audit and asset quality committees.
Raymond H. Pirtle, Jr.
Chief Manager, Claridge Company, LLC
Raymond H. Pirtle, Jr. has served as Chief Manager of Claridge Company, LLC, a privately-held financial services firm whose primary focus is to link small corporations with professional investors, since March 2005. Mr. Pirtle was founder and Senior Managing Director of Avondale Partners, LLC, an independently-owned, Nashville-based financial services firm dedicated to equity research investment banking activities and equity capital markets, from June 2001 to March 2005. He previously served as Managing Director and as a director of SunTrust Equitable Securities Corporation from February 1989 to June 2001.
Mr. Pirtle is currently a director and member of the audit committee of IceWeb, Inc., and a director and member of the audit and nominating committee of CNPV Solar Power S.A., a privately-held company. He was previously a director and member of the audit committee of TriCell, Inc., a director and member of the audit and compensation committees of China Wind Systems, Inc., a director and member of the audit committee of eNucleus, Inc., and a director and chairman of the compensation committee of Sirrom Capital Corporation, which was acquired by the Finova Group.
J. Walker Smith, Jr.
Global Executive Chairman, The Futures Company
J. Walker Smith, Jr. is Global Executive Chairman of the Futures Company since the merger of Yankelovich, Inc. with Henley Centre Headlight Vision in January 2008. The Futures Company is a global marketing research company specializing in future-facing research and consulting. Mr. Smith was previously a director and President of Yankelovich Inc., a market services company specializing in database marketing solutions and consumer lifestyles consulting, from May 1999 to January 2008.
Mr. Smith is a recognized authority on marketplace trends and consumer buying motivations and is regularly quoted in Newsweek, Fortune, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and USA Today. He is the co-author of “Rocking the Ages: The Yankelovich Report on Generational Marketing and Life is Not Work, Work is Not Life: Simple Reminders for Finding Balance in a 24-7 World.” He serves as a member of the board of advisors for the School of Journalism and Mass Communications at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is a 2012 inductee into the North Carolina Hall of Fame. Mr. Smith previously served as director of Cyber Dialogue, which is now known as Fulcrum Analytics, and as a member of the board of advisors of Screen4Me Corporation and A.C. Nielsen Masters in Marketing Research Program and the board of the American Marketing Association Foundation.
