The Best of 2019: Program Management tips from Opticon19
As we close out the year we wanted to give back to our users and customers. What better way to do that than to share highlights from the year, beginning with a series of Program Management videos from our annual Opticon conference. Getting the greatest impact from experimentation is something we at Optimizely are constantly

Becca Bruggman
As we close out the year we wanted to give back to our users and customers. What better way to do that than to share highlights from the year, beginning with a series of Program Management videos from our annual Opticon conference. Getting the greatest impact from experimentation is something we at Optimizely are constantly thinking about. So, when putting together our agenda for Opticon19, we wanted to put our customers front and center to share how they’ve used experimentation to accelerate learnings, drive digital transformation and give their customers best-in-class experiences. Below are some of our favorite presentations from Opticon19. We hope you can learn from the best on how to create an impactful experimentation program at your own company.
The Digital Transformation of Northwestern Mutual
Roman Geyzer shares the amazing strategy his team at Northwestern Mutual deployed to introduce a culture of experimentation within the 160-year-old insurance giant. Leveraging experimentation, his team was able to accelerate innovation at such a rapid pace that in just three years that they saw a 4X improvement in leads, 1.3M digital registrations, 154K mobile downloads, and a digital business that is growing quickly.
Program Management 101: Best Practices from Optimizely-on-Optimizely
Alongside Product Manager, Kris McKee, I walked through how Optimizely’s experimentation has gone from ad-hoc to a best-in-class program. We share what tools, tactics, and people are required to make this possible and the impact it has had across Product and Marketing at Optimizely.
How to Build A World-Class Experimentation Practice
An amazing panel of Optimization and Growth experts from Brooks Running, Mailchimp and the Wall Street Journal shared what it actually takes to build an experimentation program from the ground up. They go over what executive sponsorship is required, how to continue making the program visible, overcoming resource constraints and more. Learn from these experts how to accelerate the growth of your experimentation program and what it takes to get to best-in-class!
From a Team of 0 to 6,000: How IBM Accelerated Digital Optimization
Ari Sheinkin and Suman Patnaik share their experience and learnings from launching a Center of Excellence experimentation program model globally scale their experimentation program while also catering to local markets and business units. They walk through the processes they have built to sustain the company’s growth and the adoption of website personalization across over 6,000 experimenters.
Happy Experimenting!