Government Outreach Team
The Government Outreach team brings your agency vast experience in local government, customer service, technology, communications, and operations. Each team member is an industry leader in their area of expertise.
KENDALL SMITH - FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT
Kendall Smith brings a very unique set of attributes to Government Outreach’s local government clients: he’s a visionary who bridges the worlds of technology and engineering and is... well, understandable. Kendall observes the needs of local agencies and then can articulate cutting-edge solutions so that managers and IT staff come together to better serve citizens.
He gained these skills via a variety of engineering and marketing positions for technology firms based in the United States and the United Kingdom. Most notably, Kendall served as Vice President and Founding Engineer at Documentum, developing enterprise content management software that lets global employees simultaneously update and manage business content through the Internet and corporate intranets and share it with partners and clients.
STEVE BROZOSKY – FOUNDER AND VICE PRESIDENT OF DEVELOPMENT
Following his election to the Pleasanton City Council in 2002, Steve Brozosky learned quickly that the city, like most local governments, faced a major challenge to easily process the thousands of requests for services received from citizens, visitors, and businesses. Meeting the classic definition of marketing, he saw the need and, using his broad experience as a software engineer, immediately set about filling it by developing GORequest.
Steve was particularly well-positioned to help meet this need, previously serving as Director of Technology Planning for Vantive Corporation, a market leader of customer relationship management (CRM) software applications. Vantive was acquired by PeopleSoft and subsequently Oracle. He set the technology vision for the firm, which provided customer interaction software that enabled businesses to improve customer satisfaction and automate customer support, sales, field service and internal help desk functions. Steve is able to take the best practices of the private sector, add his 20+ years of software development experience, and apply them to the public sector.
TIM SCHMIDT – VICE PRESIDENT OF SALES
Find a better way – particularly when it comes to leveraging technology to improve customer service. That philosophy summarizes Tim Schmidt’s impressive career and makes him a valued member of the Government Outreach team. As Vice President at Vision Internet, he led a transformation in the way governments serve their community via the web; as an employee for a southern California city, he innovated the way workforce development services were provided; and in the ski industry he helped create systems that let skiers go direct to lift and bypass the ticket line. Each of these innovations resulted in major improvements in customer service and each resulted from his rich background in technology, operations, and communications.
SCOTT SUMMERFIELD – VICE PRESIDENT
Scott Summerfield has a natural curiosity about how things work. From radio stations to professional sports to government agencies, Scott knows the right questions to ask and instinctively knows how to translate industry jargon to words that we all can understand. It’s an invaluable skill as Scott provides senior counseling services for clients of Government Outreach.
Based on his experience as Director of Communications for the Bay Area city of Newark and as Communications Director for the Oakland Chamber of Commerce, Scott has advised a diverse client roster, including the California Lottery, the League of California Cities, Waste Management, Inc., the State of California Office of Emergency Services, and dozens of local government entities. Scott is a past president of the California Association of Public Information Officials, which honored him for his lifetime contributions to local government, and a crisis communications instructor for the State of California. He’s a past radio journalist in Southern California and media coordinator for Bay Area professional football.
SHERI BENNINGHOVEN, APR – VICE PRESIDENT
As far back as high school, Sheri Benninghoven was fascinated by the work of her hometown city government. She followed the actions of the City Council and paid close attention to who managed the city and the various departments. Sheri found a way to combine this passion for the public sector with her innate skills as a strategist and communicator to specializing in helping local government agencies prepare and implement strategic communications programs.
Sheri served as the first Communications Director for the League of California Cities and is a former Public Information Officer for the City of Anaheim. She also held the position of Vice President/Group Manager for Ketchum Public Relations Worldwide, managing global high technology public relations programs as well as numerous public agency and corporate accounts. She is a recipient of the Paul Clark Award from the California Association of Public Information Officials (CAPIO) and a founder of the City-County Communications and Marketing Association (3CMA). Sheri is also a former member of the Adjunct Faculty at the University of Southern California, Annenberg School of Communication.