Theme: Making Waves

A wave is an incredibly powerful force, they perfectly encompass what this world so desperately needs, disruption of ideas. When you compare a wave to a movement, a single idea starts off as a ripple. It then begins to take form, growing in energy before it takes off in motion. A wave cannot be stopped. That’s what TEDxAirlie is all about. Making waves or disruption that will positively transform lives.

Thalian Hall
310 Chestnut Street
Wilmington, North Carolina, 28401
United States

Adam Burke

Entrepreneur

Delivering quick, sustainable results to increase revenues, reduce costs, and maximize profitability by rapidly improving all functional areas is the common thread across Adam Burke’s diverse executive career. He received his B.S. from Rensselaer in Mechanical Engineering, with a minor in Economics and concentration in Manufacturing and graduated Summa Cum Laude from Boston University with an M.B.A in Marketing and Entrepreneurship. After starting his career on the functional front lines of manufacturing, sales, and marketing, Adam continued to excel in leadership and executive roles in both traditional global Fortune 10 (PG/GE) and start-up/turn-around businesses. With leadership experience across all major markets including CPG, Medical, Industrial, Automotive, Consumer Electronics, Service, Telecommunications, Foods and Drinks, Pharmaceutical, and Nutritionals– he has created his own entrepreneurial approach to helping companies and teams achieve results and beyond.

Anthony Williams

Anthony Williams began playing cello at the age of 12 years old. His love for music has continued to grow over time with continuing education. He has studied on the cello privately with Chris Johns, Preston Luce, Lisa Gattuso, and with many other world renown cellists in masterclasses. Throughout High School he was selected to play in the prestigious North Carolina Music Educators Honors All State Orchestras. Anthony is also Principle Cellist in the Wilmington Symphony Youth Orchestra and has held that position since his freshman year of High School. In addition to performing with the Youth Symphony he also performs in the professional symphony. Anthony is currently a senior at Isaac Bear Early College High School and plans to continue his study of music at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.

David Michael

Software Professional

Originally from Wisconsin, I have a Master’s Degree in Public Administration with an emphasis in Quantitative Analysis from the University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee. I worked for the NC Administrative Office of the Courts for 12 years and then four years as a Trial Court Administrator here in the Fifth Judicial District. 12 years ago I started a consulting business and travel nationwide to advise organizations on business processes and technology. I am an avid reader, traveler, dreamer and enthusiast. My wife of 25 years and I have been blessed with four adult children, two grandchildren and many good friends.

Devon Scott

Digital Technologist

Born in New York, I was transplanted in Wilmington, NC and set root in 1996. With a growing interest in digital technology during the boom of the dot com era, I began learning how to program websites and applications as a hobby. Though I loved the concepts presented by computers and the promise of artificial intelligence, I’ve always been a philosophy enthusiast extremely obsessed with the concepts of human actualization and self realization. Wilmington has presented me many opportunities to discover myself in education and art through my life here. I’ve embraced martial arts, poetry, and entrepreneurship as my methods to embrace challenges and participate in the many activities this city has offered. Joining my interests together I’ve been dedicating myself to applying computer and internet technologies to improve the performance of people and businesses believing that increasing the opportunities our community has to thrive is the best contribution I can offer it.

Ellen Long

Entrepreneur

Born with a love for entrepreneurism, a passion that comes from striving, from achieving. She’s had a front row seat to the entire lifecycle of the entrepreneur – from startups pitching their ideas in front of angel investors to established owners exiting their businesses. Through it all, she’s learned that success and happiness can be found in tandem, but it takes a different kind of mindset. And she wants to help you find it for yourself.

Jim Hall

Chief Technology Officer for N2 Publishing

With an intense work ethic and high risk tolerance, Jim focused on the start-up world and worked for three different companies that would all grow to become successful organizations. With some experience under his belt, Jim connected with a personal friend who had launched a new company and decided THIS was the opportunity worth investing everything. Despite early success and recognition (including an article in WSJ), the company would collapse in less than four years. Jim is now Chief Technology Officer for N2 Publishing. Ironically, the first start-up company that he ever worked for from 2005-2007 and returned in 2013.

Jordan Watson

CEO

Jordan Watson is an entrepreneur, a Gearhead, an artist, a rebel, and a bit of a zealot. He’s driven by an intense curiosity for all things, a killer fight that never quits, a love of connecting with and helping people, but most of all, driven by an unrelenting need to change things – to make a huge, positive, and lasting mark on the things I care about. He’s driven by PASSION. He uses these traits, motives, and passion every single day running a company – a company that will forever change the way people across the nation modify and enjoy their cars. On his journey from practically failing out of high school to leading a company, a team, and a vision as a 28-year old CEO, he learned to deconstruct, understand, and use my driving passion to achieve. He learned how to turn passion into something big. Jordan learned that his passion was not enough! The universe does not reward your ideas; it rewards results.

Kimberly Paul

Vice President of Outreach and Communications for Lower Cape Fear Hospice

As Vice President of Outreach and Communications for Lower Cape Fear Hospice, one of my greatest accomplishments has been developing an advance care planning program known as Begin the Conversation. Begin the Conversation, a stand-alone community education initiative and mixed media campaign, includes advance care planning materials, healthcare resources, and an interactive website devoted to encouraging people to have difficult discussions before a crisis occurs. Through Begin the Conversation, I want to change how people spend the last years, months, and days of their lives. Begin the Conversation has grown both locally and statewide, and has even sparked national interest.

Matthew Magne

Musician and Technologist

Matthew is a musician, technologist, and avid Catan player currently working at SAS as the Global Product Marketing Manager for Big Data and Data Management. A recovering entrepreneur and coder, Matthew has taught entrepreneurship in prison, counseled hundreds of small business owners and has had his music on the sound track of MTV Road Rules. Locally, Matt is a board member of the UNCW Marketing Advisory Board and a mentor at TekMountain, a local co-working space and technology incubator. Previously, Matthew was a Solutions Architect at SAS, a Technical Sales Engineer at IBM, and has held positions in sales enablement, booking, consulting, and software development. Mr. Magne received his BS, cum laude, in Computer Engineering at Boston University, has done graduate work in Object Oriented Development and completed his MBA at UNCW.

Sandra Bates

CMO

Ms Bates is a veteran Chief Marketing Officer and ‘Innovation Nut’. After spending fifteen years working with organizations – from Fortune 100 to start-ups – to help them improve the success rate of innovation, she had what she calls her “Jerry McGuire” moment. The result: her book The Social Innovation Imperative which illustrates how the same techniques and methods that helped major corporations launch successful products, could be used to address complex social problems. This started her quest to identify ways to exponentially increase the success rate of innovation in the social sector.

Sandy Carter

General Manager for IBM’s Cloud Developer Ecosystem and Startups

Sandy was one of CNN’s top 10 most powerful women in tech. She’s the General Manager for IBM’s Cloud Developer Ecosystem and Startups, founded the IBM Super Women’s Group, and was the CMO and CSO of two startups that had successful exits. Throughout her career, she’s worked tirelessly to foster the education and advancement of women in tech at all stages of their lives and careers. Her partnership with Girls Who Code and seat on the board of Girls in Tech has served to spread a positive message about women, diversity, and the future of technological greatness in both.

Terry Jackson

Executive Advisor

Terry Jackson is a highly accomplished, experienced and dynamic Certified Executive Advisor and Leadership Development Consultant. Terry has an established history of helping others improve their skills sets, their ability think and process information and change their behaviors. Terry is a visionary with 25+ years of progressive leadership experience in sales, marketing, operations management, and business consulting within startups and Fortune 500 companies. Terry holds a Ph.D. in Leadership and Organizational Change. Terry has led large scale consulting and coaching engagements. Terry is a native Wilmingtonian.