ADRP Information
Board of Directors
The ADRP Board of Directors consists of the Executive Committee and 12 directors-at-large. The board formulates the policies of ADRP and develops programs and promotes plans for the advancement of the affairs of ADRP, while also serving as a clearinghouse for ideas and suggestions of special interest to the members of ADRP. The 2010-11 ADRP Directors-at-Large include:
Todd Abner
Vice President of Donor Recruitment,
Oklahoma Blood Institute
Email: tabner@obi.org
With 18 years of donor recruitment experience, Todd Abner started as a blood recruiter at Kent State University, before advancing into management roles with the American Red Cross in Cleveland, Ft. Wayne, and Lansing. In 2002, Todd joined the BloodCenter of Wisconsin (BCW) as Director of Donor Recruitment. In his five years with BCW, blood collection grew 24 percent, with mobile operation growing 67 percent in that same time frame. In January 2008, Todd joined the Oklahoma Blood Institute as the Vice President of Donor Recruitment. Todd’s recruitment philosophy is simple, “Deep down, everyone wants to donate blood and save a life. Our job is to lift them up from their fears, and make donation as easy and convenient as possible.” Todd served on the Membership Committee this year.
Robert E. Carden, Ph. D.
President and Chief Executive Officer
Virginia Blood Services
Email: rcarden@vablood.org
Dr. Robert Carden joined Virginia Blood Services (VBS) in 1997 with a background in top positions at several American Red Cross blood centers and two hospitals. During his time at VBS, he has moved them to self-sufficiency, away from a dependence on other blood centers to meet local hospital needs throughout central Virginia. In the past five years, donations at VBS have increased an average of 10 percent a year. The organization has grown 65% since he joined and it was named Greater Richmond Area Employer of Choice (Mid-sized Company) in 2005 and 2007. He has been published in the Journal of Blood Services Management (in addition to being Editor-in-Chief), Transfusion, Health Marketing Quarterly, Clinical Leadership and Management Review, and ADRP’s the Drop. He’s presented at several annual meetings for AABB, ABC, EBA (European Blood Alliance), and BCA (where he previously served on the board). Robert has also taught Master’s level courses in health care management and operations at Virginia Commonwealth University (Medical College Campus) since 2003. He serves on the board for Virginia Blood Services, VBS Group, Group Services for Americas Blood Centers, and Virginia Baptist Foundation. He received his Doctorate in Health Care Organization and Research from Virginia Commonwealth University, an M.B.A. from Columbus State University, and a B.A. in Industrial Psychology from Auburn University.
Maria Elena Geyer
Vice President, Donor Services Group
Puget Sound Blood Center
Email: Kimiab@psbc.org
As Vice President, Donor Services Group, Maria Elena Geyer is responsible for Puget Sound Blood Center’s departments of Blood Collection Services, Donor and Volunteer Resources and Northwest Tissue Center. Before being promoted to Vice President in May 2005, Maria Elena was Director of Donor and Volunteer Resources. In that position she established successful donor and volunteer programs, emphasizing the application of the same professional principles used to pioneer other facets of blood banking. With more than 26 years of experience in blood banking, Maria Elena is responsible for developing a unique donor recruitment computer application that she has shared through the e-Donations Committee of America’s Blood Centers (ABC). In October 2005, Maria Elena was honored as an exceptional leader in donor recruitment when she received the AABB’s prestigious Chapman-Franzmeier Memorial Award and Lectureship. A graduate of Jacksonville University in Jacksonville, Florida, Maria Elena’s career began in 1983 when she joined Broward Community Blood Center in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Matt Granato
Director, Marketing and
Member Services
America’s Blood Centers
Email: mgranato@americasblood.org
Matt Granato joined America’s Blood Centers in June 2002. During this time, he has been responsible for overseeing all media, communications, marketing and donor recruitment resources made available to members of America’s Blood Centers. He works with his staff and with the Donor Recruitment and Communications Committees to identify best practices and develop programs that assist members with local donor recruitment and public relations activities. With the assistance of the former My Blood, Your Blood Task Force, he developed the My Blood, Your Blood high school and Spanish programs. Matt is also responsible for developing a customer service (donor satisfaction) benchmark program for the blood banking community, and a multi cultural donor recruitment initiative that would allow blood centers to tap into diverse populations for blood donations. Matt is a graduate of the University of Nottingham (England) with a master’s in Law and George Washington University with an MBA in Marketing, and is also fluent in Spanish. In his spare time, Matt likes to travel and spend time in his home countries of Italy and Argentina. He lives in Washington, DC. He serves on the Global Programs Committee.
Darrin Greenlee
Director of Donor Recruitment
San Diego Blood Bank
Email: dgreenlee@sandiegobloodbank.org
Darrin Greenlee is the Director of Donor Recruitment for San Diego Blood Bank. His career in blood banking began 23 years ago after his father utilized 336 red cells and countless units of platelets and plasma during a major illness. Prior to holding his current position at San Diego Blood Bank, Darrin was employed by Houchin Community Blood Bank in Bakersfield, California, the Midwest Region of the American Red Cross in Omaha, Nebraska, the Pacific Northwest Region of the American Red Cross in Portland, Oregon and Community Blood Bank in Rancho Mirage, California. He has worked in numerous departments throughout his career including hospital services, component preparation, testing laboratory, human tissue transplant services, collections and data management. Darrin received the American Red Cross Tiff any Award for Excellence in Management in 1999 and served on that organization’s Donor Recruitment Optimization Project committee. For the last 11 years, Darrin’s work has been dedicated to Donor Recruitment. He is currently responsible for blood and platelet collections in the metropolitan San Diego area and surrounding Southern California communities. Darrin currently serves as the ADRP Conference Committee Chair.
Paul Hayes
Marketing Manager,
New Zealand Blood Service,
Auckland, New Zealand
Email: paul.hayes@nzblood.co.nz
Paul Hayes is the Marketing Manager for the New Zealand Blood Service (NZBS) and has held this position since July 2003. His main roles at NZBS are the development of programs for the recruitment and retention of volunteer blood donors, donor recruitment resources and external media communications management. Paul has an honours degree in microbiology from the University of Canterbury, but has spent most of his career in sales and marketing roles in the healthcare sector, in particular the pharmaceutical industry. He has held a number of senior marketing roles at leading pharmaceutical companies such as 3M and Pfizer. Paul has previous experience of the blood products industry having been employed from 1995 to 2000 at the English National Blood Service’s Fractionation Facility, Bio Products Laboratory near London. Paul also has a Post-Graduate Diploma of Marketing and is a member of the New Zealand Marketing Association and the Public Relations Institute of New Zealand. Paul has been a member of ADRP since 2005 and has been a country liaison and a Board Member since 2009. He serves on the Global Programs and Career Development Committee.
Wyn Johnson
Manager, Donor Recruitment
Marrow Donor Program
Gulf Coast Regional Blood Center
Email: wjohnson@giveblood.org
Wyn Johnson began her career in blood banking with the Gulf Coast Regional Blood Center in the Donor Recruitment department in 1999. After eight years in Donor Recruitment, Wyn joined the Marrow Donor program where her sister was a marrow donor in the mid 1990’s. Currently, Wyn manages one of the most successful marrow recruitment teams in the country while developing a volunteer services program. In addition, Wyn serves on the National Marketing Advisory Panel for the National Marrow Donor Program which operates the new brand name, Be the Match marrow donor registry. During her tenure with Gulf Coast Wyn has received many awards centered on goal achievement including the Rising Star award. Wyn holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with emphasis on Marketing from Texas Woman’s University. She is Co-Chair of the Corporate Partnership Committee.
Aissa Martin
Regional Manager Recruitment Support
American Red Cross, Southern Region
Email: martina@usa.redcross.org
Aissa Martin’s career began in collections where she was promoted to SCAMP Supervisor in Central South Carolinas Region of American Red Cross. She later served as a lead blood banking tech for LABCorp in Tampa, FL. Aissa’s recruitment career began with Florida Blood Services as a donor recruiter, specializing in the youth market. She continued her career in donor recruitment with LifeSouth, prior to her current position with the American Red Cross. She was the recipient of the 2002 Leadership Award in Recruitment from the Southern Region and 2003 Manager of the Year from ADRP. Aissa’s past presentations include ADRP 2007 “Right Time, Right Product” and the ADRP 2008 Pre-Conference committee on calendar management. She is currently the chairperson for the ADRP Career Development Committee.
Carol Mitchell
Corporate Manager, Donor Services
Canadian Blood Services
Email: carol.mitchell@bloodservices.ca
Carol Mitchell serves as Corporate Manager, Donor Services for Canadian Blood Services. Her primary focus in this role is supporting regional Donor Services’ teams across the country. Carol began her career in the blood system in Southwestern Ontario in 1993 as a recruitment coordinator primarily focused on new donor recruitment with high school, college and university populations. Over the next several years, she broadened her responsibilities to include corporate and community recruitment activity while maintaining a focus on new donor recruitment. Carol’s responsibilities grew to include leadership of the Recruitment team in Southwestern Ontario for Canadian Blood Services. Carol is based in London, Ontario. She is currently serving as ADRP’s Global Programs Committee Chair.
Carla Peterson
Regional Donor Recruitment Director
United Blood Services
Email: cpeterson@bloodsystems.org
Carla Peterson became the Regional Donor Recruitment Director for United Blood Services in 2005. In this position she works with United Blood Services centers in six states on recruitment initiatives. Carla’s primary focus is supporting recruitment management out in the field to create strength and knowledge in donor recruitment. She enjoys traveling to the locations and partnering with staff to adapt sound recruitment practices in different regional situations. Prior to this position she was the Donor Recruitment Director for United Blood Services in Wyoming where she led a successful recruitment team for 20 years. Carla graduated from St. Cloud State University in Minnesota with a BS degree in Mass Communications and from the University of Wyoming with a Masters in Public Administration. She has presented at AABB and ADRP on several occasions beginning in 2002. Carla currently resides in Fargo, North Dakota.
Marty Ricker
Recruiter Supervisor
U.S. Armed Services Blood Program
Email: thomasv@usa.redcross.org
Marty Ricker has been with the Armed Services Blood Program for more than seven years and was promoted to Recruiter Supervisor in 2007. He started as a recruiter at the Armed Services Blood Bank Center at Fort Lewis, WA in 2001. He has helped this program grow from its infancy and developed many of the current practices used by their recruiters around the world. He oversees the recruitment plan and development of recruitment improvement tools and concepts throughout the program.
Paul Sullivan
Chief Executive Officer
American Red Cross,
Connecticut Blood Services Region
Farmington, Connecticut
Email: sullivanp@usa.redcross.org
Paul Sullivan was named Chief Executive Officer of the American Red Cross, Connecticut Blood Services Region in January 2005. Paul manages Donor Recruitment, Collections and Hospital Service for the Red Cross blood program in Connecticut. The region is focused on growing collections in Connecticut in an effort to return to state self-sufficiency while continuing to focus on providing a terrific experience for our donors. Paul is responsible for working with Connecticut’s hospitals to ensure all their blood product needs are met. Prior to coming to Connecticut, he served as Vice President of Strategy and Technical Operations for the American Red Cross Biomedical Services in Washington, D.C. With the Red Cross since December 2001, he led the development of the Biomedical Services ten-year strategic and infrastructure plans. Before joining the American Red Cross, Paul was a partner of Mercer Management Consulting, a leading, international strategy consultancy. At Mercer his primary areas of focus were in supply chain management and marketing strategy. He holds a Master’s of Business from the Yale School of Management in New Haven, Connecticut and a Bachelors degree from Pomona College in Claremont, California.
Betsy B. Ward
As Director of Donor Recruitment with Memorial Blood Centers in St. Paul, MN Betsy Ward is responsible for the field donor recruitment department of three managers, 12 field representatives as a well as telerecruitment and the automated collections and an annual goal of 137,000 red cell units. In her role as Director, Betsy is responsible for the platelets and plasma. During Betsy’s first year with Memorial Blood Centers, she increased collections by 13 percent, leading MBC to number one blood center for growth in the Blood Centers of America group. Initially hired by American Red Cross North Central Region, St. Paul, MN as a donor recruitment representative in 1999, Betsy grew blood collections by more than 10 percent annually in her Minnesota and Western Wisconsin territory. Betsy was promoted to District Manager and was responsible for managing in the “Donor Services” model, both a team of donor recruiters and a team of collections supervisors with a goal of 58,000 units annually. She led her team in increasing collection targets and exceeding their goal - achieving 104 percent. In September 2003, Betsy accepted a promotion to Deputy Director of Field Operations for the American Red Cross, Southern California Region. The same year, Betsy joined ADRP and participated in her first annual meeting in Houston, Texas. Since joining ADRP, Betsy has served on the Membership, Career Development and Corporate Partnership Committees. She is currently Chair of the Corporate Partnership Committee.
The 2009-10 Executive Committee and Board of Directors stand together in Florida.
Board Members Serve as Ambassadors
Board Members Carol Mitchell and Scott Caswell prepare to greet guests to the International Reception at the 2008 ADRP Conference in Halifax.
Board Meetings
The ADRP Board of Directors meets a minimum of three times a year. For additional information on the board or its meetings, contact Deborah Swift, ADRP executive director, at dswift@adrp.org.