A global force for change.
What’s the Heart? Science?
We have a lot of respect for consumers.
They don’t want to be interrupted. We dig deep to understand their motivations, passion, and culture to deliver value at their touchpoints of attention.
We respond to data signals.
The creative use of innovative technology guides us. We work to uncover the most valuable consumer and behavioural data signals to drive connections at scale.
At the helm.
Hearts & Science was founded with a special focus on data analytics and a foundation of heart. Here are the masterminds behind our success.
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Stanger Chief Executive OfficerAt the intersection of customer, culture, and content, Chris brings the wealth of OMG capabilities into a cohesive playbook for clients at Hearts & Science. He excels at connecting diverse pieces of information and naturally threads them into clear solutions and strategic narratives. Often, these insights begin by encouraging diverse viewpoints within his team to challenge the status quo, expand their skills, and identify unexpected areas of growth for clients.
With nearly 20 years of agency experience across categories like tech, telco, B2B, travel, and CPG, Chris architects integrated teams to deliver customer-centric solutions that maximize business outcomes and ROI for clients. From awareness and amplification strategies to integrated acquisition solutions, Chris knows how to build blueprints for brands to compete on the world stage.
Chris resides in Dallas with his wife and twin daughters (#twinning), where his meditative riffs often reverberate through the house as he unwinds on his guitars.
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Basile Chief Operating OfficerDana believes that a strong operative unit underpins the capability to power every agency and client relationship. She delivers better client outcomes by bringing practitioner experience and agency solutions into harmony with the needs of each client. At Hearts & Science, she is hard at work dispelling the legacy belief that operations are a back office function and is elevating them to a future-forward strategic unit.
Growing up in the era of digital, Dana carries her intuitive practitioner experience to every role and has done so for more than 11 years. She started her career in search and quickly pivoted to social, where she worked with some of the country’s most famed and loved brands across travel, education, beauty, tech, and telecommunications. Having worked both the agency and platform sides allows her to tackle every client business challenge through a strategic, technology, and activation-centric lens. In her time at Hearts, she has helped build the social practice, created new service models for clients, expanded the local and global talent footprint, and reimagined how to attract, retain, and grow its most valuable agency asset—the talent.
Her passion for clients is matched by her passion for people, which was reinforced in her pursuit of a master’s degree focused on business leadership and management. While a great deal of her current focus as the COO at Hearts & Science is on instituting new service models and optimizing workflows to unlock incremental strategic value, she also remains relentlessly focused on the talent experience and is leading the way for women in leadership.
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Wamble Chief Financial OfficerCrunching numbers and deciphering analytics, Jeff lives and breathes where finance meets creativity. He loves perfecting his craft in an evolving environment like advertising and media and is always analyzing spreadsheets to provide additional value for clients. He wears many hats and gives equal attention to Hearts & Science, its employees and its clients.
Jeff has a firm grounding in finance, starting his career as a senior accountant at the Arthur Andersen accounting firm (now Accenture) before becoming the director of finance at Stillking Films Group. He later made his full foray into the media industry as a finance director at Ogilvy and later at OMD.
Jeff’s diverse work background has enabled him to successfully adapt to different personalities across the agency while still providing support as a business partner. A man of many talents, he also spent six years in the Louisiana Army National Guard and earned his MBA from Columbia University.
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Cullen Chief Investment OfficerWhether it’s making a mean guacamole or streamlining digital and programmatic, Sharon always strives for excellence. She is excited to inspire teams at Hearts & Science to put data at the forefront of their investment decisions and knows that this approach will help build trust with clients.
Sharon has been a key part of the Omnicom Media Group family for the last 25 years. From her early stage career in research and sales for A&E and BBDO to the east coast regional director at OMD, Sharon is ready to help others pivot along with an ever-changing media landscape. She was named Media Buyer of the Year by TVWeek in 2018 and has maintained a curious attitude toward continuously learning in the midst of an evolving industry.
But it’s not just accolades and experience that Sharon has been collecting along her career—she also has a diverse set of Brady Bunch paraphernalia. Ask her about it!
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Siddall Chief Strategy OfficerAlex helps clients keep the emotional connection with consumers strong, even in an ever-growing transactional world. He believes there is true differentiation in how Heart & Science shows up for clients and is at the frontlines of defining strategic products to keep them there. From shaping the value proposition, to winning pitches and expanding the client portfolio, Alex is an invaluable asset on the Hearts & Science team.
With over 15 years of senior leadership experience, Alex directed projects at agencies like Initiative and We are Mobile Ltd to simplify stories, narrow focus, and translate campaigns across touchpoints. This work gave him a deep understanding of the importance of translating insights into actionable media behaviors and his contributions were instrumental to winning Adweek Agency of the Year in 2019.
If he’s not cooking up the next creative strategy for a client, he can be caught compulsively checking the latest property listings or brushing up on his semi-professional soccer skills.
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DePanfilis Managing Executive Director, Head of Marketing Science & TechnologyMaria believes the only constant in this world is change and digs deep into data across both paid and owned marketing touch points to stay ahead of consumers with timely solutions. She brings the Heart into the Science of data analysis and is always looking for ways to help brands connect more deeply and efficiently with consumers.
From the client side to the management consultancy side and now agency side, Maria brings 20+ years of deep experience across CRM, digital, and creative for large brands, including Pfizer, AT&T, Janssen, JPMorgan Chase, and more. She most recently pioneered an unstructured data approach using natural language processing (NLP) to analyze voice call center data with her team for Janssen, and it won the first place Quantie Award from the Digital Analytics Association.
As a proud member of the LGBTQIA+ community, Maria has developed the gift of appreciating and soliciting diversity in perspectives from others. This carries through in her work at Hearts & Science as she looks for new ways to solve problems and explore divergent thinking. This diversity extends to her eclectic hobbies, too, as she goes from moving to new places and trying new foods to completing her seventh Ironman and qualifying for the World Championship.
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Leung Managing Executive Director, Head of ActivationCurious by nature, Catherine is always thinking of new initiatives to improve how Hearts & Science services its clients in the digital world. Her big-picture perspective and deep technical knowledge are the foundation of every solution and help her to balance data and emotion throughout the consumer journey. Most recently, she brought her unique expertise to key accounts by uncovering new paths to growth in opportunity-ripe areas, such as commerce and experience design.
Catherine has over a decade of experience building future-proofed connections between consumers and global brands and knows what it takes to unlock client growth. In her previous role as SVP at Zenith, she oversaw digital investment and activation for Verizon. There, she delivered over $20M in savings and media value through strategic marketplace negotiations and joint business plan developments with key partners. During her time on Microsoft at Carat, Catherine also drove a number of key initiatives and product launches across both consumer and commercial categories. Most notably, she led the digital marketing efforts for the launch of Surface products across six markets globally.
Catherine loves to get deep into the weeds of data to uncover insights and accelerate digital transformation for clients. Her strategic vision has led to award-winning work, earning her an Effie, Cannes Creative Data Lions, and a Carat Diamond. Her obsessive digital research skills also serve her well when visiting new cities, where she is the master of finding the best restaurants, hotels, and bars. Just consider her your personal Yelp.
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Standish Head of Content & CreativityWith a career that began as a trend forecaster, Wilson continues to get ahead of consumers with the right content before they even know they need it. He elevates content creation far beyond a “nice to have” for businesses. Rather, he believes it is an essential way to tell meaningful stories, give back to communities, and ultimately create moments that provide value and drive emotional velocity for consumers.
Wilson has more than 10 years of experience across diverse content mediums. From helping Porsche launch its first endeavors into AR and VR to PepsiCo’s first integrations into wearables, Wilson knows how to help brands navigate what’s next. His work on voice technology won a first-ever Cannes Lions award for a voice skill at Gimlet Media and led to its acquisition by Spotify. He is the winner of three Adweek Media Plan of the Year awards and loves to see content that his team has created out in the world.
A ravenous learner, Wilson is always looking to experience something new, be it a sport, a project, or history. Most recently, he has been exploring the art of fermentation, where he finds joy in the subtle differences of each batch created from produce sourced in ever-changing environments.
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Jahn Executive Director, Marketing & Employee EngagementEver an artist and scientist, Jason has a powerful capacity to reverse-engineer complex brand challenges and harness this knowledge in the service of growth. His strategic leadership is consistently inspired by data and powered by purpose to produce positive impact fast. No process is too technical to break down into understandable pieces, and his connection-building extends internally across the Hearts & Science team, too. He is a listener, a trust-builder and a mentor — always putting people first and letting the results follow.
Jason has extensive experience managing marketing teams, honing his deep empathy, negotiation skills and contagious enthusiasm. From Marketing Director at ShareThis to Head of Agency & Partnership Marketing at AOL, he knows firsthand the value of a well-defined brand and how to make magic happen through marketing. His work at AOL helped drive $100M+ in revenue and prepared him for his role at Hearts & Science, where he has spearheaded and won 125+ agency nominations and awards.
Whether it’s optimizing a complicated campaign or the maximum number of travel points, Jason has a passion for hacking systems and improving processes. He also recently discovered a soft spot for rescue dogs — ask him about his latest foster!
Closer to home.
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Mariana
Lorena DirectorHi all! My name is Mariana Lorena, and I am the Director of Hearts & Science, the most recent media agency of Omnicom Media Group Portugal. When I was a little girl, I wanted to be a film director. I even took a summer course in London at the London Film Academy but ended up taking a degree in Journalism at the Catholic University in Lisbon. I began my professional experience with an internship at MTV Network headquarters in New York. Back in Lisbon, I started working as a journalist at TVI one of the main aerial channels in Portugal. It was a fascinating experience, where I got to know the adrenaline of a count-down to go live on television. I joined Omnicom Media Group Portugal in 2006, where I had the opportunity to work with different teams and discover the whole reality of a media agency. In 2010 I joined the team at Fuse, the group's content, and brand activation agency, first as project manager and, since 2017, as director. During this period, I had the opportunity of working for a wide range of clients from automotive, to FMCG, Food & Beverage, retail amongst others. Now that I look back, I see that I am close to my childhood dream. I don't make movies, but I develop media and communication strategies, from brands to consumers. What I love most about my profession is undoubtedly the daily contact with good ideas, good professionals, good colleagues, the teamwork that allows us, often in record time and with tight budgets, to make the impossible possible.
Belonging at Hearts
We’re deeply committed to breaking down systemic bias and building a more inclusive world. Our action plan addresses a broad range of workplace inequalities with an urgent focus on advancing opportunities for Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC).