New directors 

Marston Gould and Peggy Willingham promoted

February 1, 2007

Marston Gould, Director of customer relationship management and interactive marketing

In the new position of director of CRM and interactive marketing, Gould has been tasked with finding new ways to use customer information in company databases to enhance the airline’s marketing efforts and help frontline employees make better customer service decisions.

That includes getting customer information into the hands of reservation sales agents and customer service agents at the point of contact. “Knowing a customer previously missed a flight, lost a bag or likes to sit in an aisle seat will help our CSAs quickly find the best solution for a specific customer,” Gould said. “They’ll also be able to see who our best customers are and why. Having this kind of information at their fingertips will make their jobs easier.”

The interactive marketing side of Gould’s job includes responsibility for e-mail marketing, online campaign management, online advertising and statistical analysis.
“The ultimate goal is a marketing strategy that is data driven instead of guessing,” he said.

Leading a team of seven employees, Gould will report to Ann Ardizzone, managing director of customer experience.

Gould earned bachelor’s degrees in mathematics from Stanford University, engineering from Purdue University and aeronautical engineering from the University of Texas. In 1997, he earned a master of business administration degree from the University of Virginia.

Before joining Alaska Airlines in 2003 as a senior financial analyst and later controller for the Marketing Division, Gould spent 10 years at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration as program manager on the International Space Station project. He has also worked as a strategy consultant and founded a project management company focused on online technologies.

Peggy Willingham, Director of the Project Management Office

Reporting to Bob Reeder, senior vice president of IT Services, Willingham is responsible for coordinating project management initiatives at Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air.

“The Project Management Office was organized a year ago by Steve Lovell (manager of the IT Project Management Team),” Reeder said. “Since then, Steve and a core group of project managers in IT and other divisions have done a terrific job of moving Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air up the learning curve in this important discipline. It’s now time to take the next step and devote more time and attention to improving our project management execution.”

According to Reeder, the goal is “to solidify the framework we use to perform project management, including scope definition, project scheduling and staffing, cost management, status reporting, and measuring progress and impact. Our objective is to move Alaska and Horizon to a place where we have predictable results from all the projects we undertake.”

In her new position, Willingham will work closely with Diana Shaw, director of strategic planning and execution, “to make sure our corporate initiatives are accomplished,” Reeder said.

Willingham came to Alaska Airlines in 1990 as risk management specialist. Since then, she has held several positions in the Environmental Affairs/Risk Management Department and Safety Division, including director of ground safety and environmental affairs.

She graduated from the University of Washington with a bachelor’s degree in sociology. In 2006, Willingham earned a masters degree in project management. Her master’s thesis evaluated Alaska’s level of project management maturity, recommending best practices for improving the airline’s project management processes.