C3 2023 User Conference

From the youth to the corporate world, Thurl Bailey inspires others to win whatever the odds or disappointments. Master storyteller and accomplished speaker, he inspires companies and individuals to focus on what matters most; to persevere, build winning teams, encourage peak performance, develop leadership, and discover opportunity in change.

Twice Thurl has led teams from far behind to win national championships. His most recognized title was the 1983 North Carolina State Wolfpack team which beat the famed University of Houston (Phi-Slamma-Jamma) Cougars, featuring Hakeem Olajuwon & Clyde Drexler. That nation championship game was voted top 5 finishes of all time of any sporting event. Because of his outstanding leadership skills and the quality of his character, as well as his impressive basketball skills, he was drafted by the Utah Jazz as the 1983 7th overall pick of the N. B.A. Draft. Thurl spent twelve of his sixteen-year professional basketball career in the N. B. A., and four years playing overseas, in Italy and Greece. His courtesy and integrity both on and off the court and his strong sense of community service have led to numerous civic awards and earned him the nickname “N.B.A.’s Mr. Nice Guy”.

When you meet Thurl Bailey you first notice a tall (6′ 11″) athlete. But he is a man of as much depth as height. Thurl is a gifted inspirational singer and songwriter. His first album, “Faith In Your Heart”, released in 2000 was a best seller. His second album, “The Gift of Christmas”, released the following year, also experienced record sales. His latest released CD is entitled, “I’m Not The Same”, is a selection of uplifting R & B tunes. Among his many musical awards are the 2000 Pearl Awards of Best Contemporary Recording and Best New Artist of the Year.

His other awards include the N. B. A.’s prestigious J. Walter Kennedy Community Service Award, the Utah Association for Gifted Children Community Service Award, Sigma Gamma Chi Fraternity’s Exemplary Manhood Award, The Great Salt Lake Council of the Boy Scouts of America’s American Champion Award, and the Italian League’s 1998 All Star Games’ Most Valuable Player.

One of Thurl’s favorite activities is the non-profit youth basketball program he has led for over 20 years. His XFactor program teaches important life skills, and have now been expanded to the corporate world to help businesses build winning teams and effective leaders.

Thurl leads a busy life as a professional speaker, singer/songwriter, businessman, community advocate and game analyst for the Utah Jazz. He is a devoted family man and the father of six children. He and his wife Sindi live in Salt Lake City, Utah with the three youngest children.

As ACA’s new president, Courtney’s overall passion for the ARM industry focuses on expanding the dialogue—both at the regulatory level and the membership level—is all part of her overall passion for the ARM industry.Courtney is the 3rd generation to own and operate Creditors Bureau. Her professional experience is rooted in the healthcare industry, with a special understanding of law and consumer rights.

Courtney has participated as a speaker and panelist in multiple Compliance-related education events. Courtney serves on the Executive Committee of the California Association of Collectors and in 2019, Courtney was elected to the ACA Board of Directors.

On a personal note, Courtney is a lover of all things ocean. Owning a collection agency in this day and age is pretty stressful, but once in the ocean, all of that stress and anxiety goes away. It’s replaced with a calm and focus on just breathing.

Mark W. Brennan leads Hogan Lovells’ global Technology and Telecommunications industry sector group. He is also the Lead Innovation Partner, responsible for championing innovation in client service, new products, and legal innovation across the firm’s global business.

Mark has a truly unique global regulatory and policy practice that makes him a valuable resource for clients across industry sectors. An experienced advisor, Mark is a respected voice on privacy and communications matters, and his thoughtful strategies empower clients on matters spanning regulatory consultations and rulemakings to compliance and product design to government investigations and enforcement. He advises clients on artificial intelligence, online content (including Section 230), market entry and licensing, spectrum policy, biometric data and facial recognition, Internet of things, U.S. CLOUD Act, cloud services, calling/texting laws, and other technology and consumer protection matters.

A successful serial entrepreneur, Terrel L. Bird, CEO, and co-founder of TCN, has been at the forefront of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) and call center technology for 15 years.

Before co-founding TCN in 1999, Terrel served as president of Northern Allied Steel and Propane for 16 years in Ontario, Canada. Seeking the opportunity for his young children to grow up in the States, Terrel began researching emerging technologies for a new business venture and recognized an opportunity in VoIP and call center technology. He created TCN with a mission of implementing groundbreaking changes, following his vision of how the technology would evolve over time. Shortly after launching TCN in St. George, Utah, he made the area his home.

Under Terrel’s leadership, TCN has grown steadily and is now recognized as a leading provider of cloud-based call center technology for enterprises, contact centers, BPOs, and collection agencies worldwide. Combining a deep understanding of call center users’ needs with a highly affordable delivery model, TCN serves various Fortune 500 companies and enterprises in multiple industries, including newspapers, collection, education, healthcare, automotive, political, customer service, and marketing.

Terrel and his team credit the lasting success of TCN to the planning efforts at the inception of the company. TCN has successfully and consistently provided the most cutting-edge call center solutions that help its customers operate efficiently and cost-effectively by taking a consultative approach to serving customers.

Along with spending time with his wife and 10 children, Terrel has long been a fan of the great outdoors, competing in 100- to 200-mile races. He received a B.S. in accounting from Brigham Young University.

Jesse Bird is the co-founder and chief technology officer of TCN. Since co-founding TCN, Jesse has played a vital role in establishing and developing what has now turned into a global software company. Jesse spearheads the software development, implementation, and execution of TCN’s call center technology while leading the company’s strategic direction and global expansion.

With more than two decades of technology experience, Jesse has specialized in network and database design, cloud computing, process improvement, CRM, speech analytics, business intelligence, omnichannel tools, physical hardware, and virtualized computing environments.

As an industry trailblazer, Jesse continues to play a critical role in keeping TCN’s call center platform at the forefront of the industry. Over the last several years, Jesse has taken an interest in call blocking, labeling, and STIR/SHAKEN and how these issues are getting resolved using software.

Darrin Bird is the Executive Vice President at TCN. Within this role, Darrin is responsible for overseeing all business operations, establishing best practices across sales and account management teams, and driving execution. With over 20 years of experience in the IT and software industry, Darrin has a proven track record of building and mentoring high-performing teams, increasing capital, creating strategic plans and implementing organizational structure.

Prior to joining TCN, Darrin served as the Chief Operating Officer of Global Connect, another leading cloud-based dialing and communication services provider. In this role, Darrin played an instrumental part in overseeing all facets of the organization and overarching business performance levels, including introducing several new divisions. Under Darrin’s leadership, Global Connect has grown steadily and developed platforms that have attracted major companies, including Blackboard Inc. that acquired Global Connect’s K-12 student messaging notification system. As part of TCN’s merger with Global Connect in December 2015, Darrin has leveraged his background in operations to help further TCN’s presence and expertise within the contact center community.

Darrin worked at various companies including Swift Transportation as a Senior Financial Operations Analyst and PricewaterhouseCoopers as a Senior Associate.

Darrin began his career as a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) through the California Board of Accountancy. He received his B.S. degree in accounting and finance from Brigham Young University. As a family man, he enjoys spending time with loved ones and participating in outdoor recreation. Darrin is also very involved in philanthropic activities such as working to mentor youth in his community.

Bryce Payne spearheads all global partner and channel efforts at TCN. With over 20 years of experience in the telecommunications industry, Bryce has contributed significantly to the company’s rapid growth by successfully building partnerships across multiple industries and acquiring new customers globally.

An industry veteran, Bryce holds years of experience working with various phone systems and cloud-based call center technologies. Prior to joining TCN, Bryce owned and operated Nutel Wireless, a wireless telecommunications store, for eight years. Before that, he served as the Operations and Sales Manager with Nutel Technologies, an NEC phone systems reseller, heading up the sales department and growing its customer base.

His personable approach and extensive understanding of the call center industry have proven invaluable in his career, even internationally. He has helped expand TCN’s global operations in the Philippines, the United Kingdom, and Australia.

Over the years, Bryce has adopted an interest in aviation, earning his certification as a Robinson R-44 helicopter pilot. For the past 10 years, Bryce has been a helicopter pilot for the Washington County Search & Rescue in Utah and was awarded The Dedicated Member Award. Bryce earned a B.A. degree from Brigham Young University.

​​Dave Bethers is the Vice President of Product at TCN. Within this role, Dave oversees product development, onboarding processes, and continuous feedback from clients using the TCN Operator platform. As an industry veteran, Dave has been at the forefront of call center technology, spearheading strategic partnerships and assessing client initiatives for TCN’s global operations.

Specialized in results-oriented needs assessment, solution design and implementation management, Dave has a proven track record of finding ways to maximize efficiency, profitability and growth for his clients. Most recently, he has played an integral role in developing and onboarding education to clients on the value of leveraging TCN’s Business Intelligence platform to make more informed decisions through real-time big data and analytics. Dave’s path to success has been fueled by his drive to maximize efficiency, profitability, and growth. He did so with a focus on people, results-oriented needs assessment, and implementation management.

Dave received a B.A. in Psychology with a concentration in learning and behavior science and a Masters in Education in Instructional Technology from Utah State University.

Deon Appelgryn is the Vice President of Product Engineering Management at TCN. Despite joining TCN during the COVID-19 pandemic, Deon has successfully launched a SaaS-based suite of products, including Workforce Optimization. He also successfully implemented Workforce Management for a client with 35,000 agents and 15 sites worldwide. Deon plans to help TCN continue to grow by strengthening and expanding its development processes, teams and product suite. When he isn’t making innovative waves through his work, Deon loves to spend time outdoors hiking, biking and golfing.

Scott Brownlee is an industry veteran in the call center and financial services industries. During his over thirty years of hands-on experience in the ARM industry, he has focused mainly on the healthcare vertical and has gained a wealth of practical knowledge. In 2003, Scott successfully started a new business vertical at a near-shore contact center that had its agents outperforming the USA-based control group of agents at a 1-1 level within four months.

Scott continually strives to be the best asset to his organization and drive maximum efficiency of operations to ensure best-in-class performance. While serving the ARM industry through his active involvement in multiple trade associations, Scott has increased performance at every step in his career for his organizations.

From serving on the ACA International Council of Delegates, the ACA International Education & Credentialing Committee and his current position serving on the ACA International Healthcare Committee, Scott continues to enhance the performance of the ARM industry at the local, regional and national levels.

Mike Borden is a Senior Account Manager at TCN. Since starting in 2004 as a Sales Representative, he has since strived to bring all of TCN’s customers better service through his dedication and TCN’s advanced software. After majoring in computer science, Mike went on to work in the realm of IT for years and has dedicated much of his career to providing consumers with technology solutions. When he is off the clock, Mike enjoys spending time with his family in the beautiful outdoors and fishing.

Sameer is 25-year veteran of the BPO/Contact Center/ARM space. Sameer Maini is the CEO/Founder of next generation agent engagement, productivity and compliance solution called Collaborationroom.AI. Prior to starting Collaborationroom.AI Sameer was CIO of ACT holdings where he played a key leadership role in critical strategic technical and management initiatives. As a CIO he led the digital transformation of the business and built a world class center of excellence that served both internal and external stake holders. Prior to joining ACT Holdings, Sameer has server as CTO for Bureau of Collection Recovery and held various engineering roles with Target and Tata Telecom.

Josh Ploude is the current CEO and co-founder of Apeiron, a CPaaS delivering best-in-breed voice, messaging and video products. Aperion’s platform is supported by amazing APIs that enable customers to build applications using plug-and-play access to these cloud communications components.

Josh began his career in telecommunications working with CLECs when local network deregulations were disrupting the telecom industry. He managed his first service-provider build as the CTO for PCS1/Datavo, a regional CLEC provider of integrated voice & data communications to California businesses.

Next, Josh founded and ran Ethos Communications before becoming the CTO for TNCI, Inc with a charter to deploy a nationwide integrated VoIP and data network. In 2014, Josh formed a team of engineers and developers to create a software-integrated cloud communications service provider and has been consistently growing the company ever since. Josh holds a BS in Political Science from UCLA and an MS in Telecommunications Management from Golden Gate University.