Taleo Board of Directors

Taleo Board of Directors Biographies

Eric Herr

Chairman of the Board of Directors

Eric B. Herr executive brings over 25 years of senior management experience in a variety of industries including software, media, finance, and consulting industries. Mr. Herr has held a variety of senior level executive and consulting positions at a variety of industry leading organizations, most recently with Autodesk, Inc. and Sun Microsystems.

While at Autodesk, Inc., the fifth largest PC software company in the world, Herr served as President and Chief Operating Officer. There, he was responsible for the product development, service, manufacturing, sales, education and training, marketing operations and operating results for the corporation. Mr. Herr also served as Chief Financial Officer during his time at Autodesk, during which time revenues increased nearly $600 million and profits rose sharply.

Prior to joining Autodesk, Mr. Herr served as Vice President of Finance and Planning, Worldwide Field Organization at Sun Microsystems where he was responsible for building a successful customer program and leading the strategic restructuring of the sales organization. He also held senior executive positions at other reputable and successful companies including strategic consulting company Michael Allen Company, McGraw-Hill Publications, Lionel D. Edie investment counselors, and Data Resources.

Mr. Herr has served as a Board Member and Chair for a variety of companies including several non-profit organizations such as the American Red Cross, Whole Village Family Resource Center, and Project Adventure. He also served as an Executive-in-Residence, teaching the capstone course for MBA students at the University of New Hampshire.

Michael Gregoire

President and Chief Executive Officer Taleo

Michael Gregoire is the President and CEO of Taleo, the largest on demand software company in the world focused on talent management solutions. Leading organizations worldwide use Taleo to assess, acquire, develop, and align their workforce for improved business performance.

Prior to Taleo, Mr. Gregoire served as an officer and Executive Vice President of enterprise software company PeopleSoft, responsible for its global Services business. The PeopleSoft Services business consisted of PeopleSoft Consulting, PeopleSoft Education, and PeopleSoft Hosting. Gregoire led a workforce of more than 4,000 professionals and $2.3B in revenue.

Immediately prior to his position at PeopleSoft, Inc. Mr. Gregoire was the Executive Director of the EDS New York Information Solutions Organization based in New York City. The Information Solutions Organization business was a $500M+ in annual revenue unit focused on aligning technology and operations with business strategy. Mr. Gregoire’s more than 12 years at EDS spanned multiple executive positions including Managing Director of the Global Financial Markets Consulting Division and Chief Technology Officer of a division of EDS Canada.

Gregoire has a master’s degree from California Coast University and holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Wilfred Laurier University in Ontario, Canada. He has been named one of Consulting Magazine's "Top 25 Most Influential Consultants."

Gary Bloom

Former Vice Chairman & President
Symantec

Gary Bloom brings more than two decades of senior executive experience in high technology to the Taleo Board of Directors. Most recently, he was Vice Chairman and President of Symantec where he led the company's line of business and corporate development organizations. Mr. Bloom joined Symantec through the company's merger with VERITAS Software, where he was Chairman, President and CEO.

Under Bloom's leadership, VERITAS grew from approximately $1.2 billion in revenue in 2000 to over $2.0 billion in 2004. VERITAS became the global leader in storage software and a leading provider of software and services that are used by 99 percent of the Fortune 500.

Prior to VERITAS, Mr. Bloom was executive vice president at Oracle Corporation. During his 14-year career at Oracle, Bloom led Oracle's database business, worldwide marketing, support, education, and alliance organizations, and was responsible for mergers and acquisitions.

Mr. Bloom has previously served on the boards of Globespan Virata, VERITAS, and Symantec. He holds a bachelor's degree in Computer Science from California Polytechnic State University where currently serves on the President's Cabinet and is the Chairman of the Board of the Cal Poly Foundation.

Patrick Gross

Chairman
The Lovell Group

Mr. Gross brings more than thirty-five years of business management experience to Taleo’s Board of Directors.  He is currently chairman of The Lovell Group, an investment and advisory firm he founded in 2002 to work with private venture-funded technology companies on a range of business, management and financial strategies. 

Mr. Gross is currently a director of several companies: Capital One Financial Corporation and Waste Management, Inc, both listed on the NYSE; and Career Education Corporation, Liquidity Services, Inc, and Mobius Management Systems, Inc, three NASDAQ listed companies.  He has served as lead and presiding director of several public companies and as chairman of the boards of two private equity owned companies.

Prior to The Lovell Group, Mr. Gross co-founded American Management Systems in 1970.  After leading the company through several rounds of funding, Mr. Gross also saw the company through its successful IPO in 1979.  Mr. Gross was responsible for leading the American Management System’s movement to a vertical market structure where they focused on financial services, communications and government sectors.  This strategic change in the 1980’s fueled the Company’s growth from a $60 million dollar company to a $1 billion company by 2002.

Mr. Gross holds an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, an MSE from the University of Michigan, and a BES from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

Howard Gwin

Former Executive Vice President of Worldwide Operations
PeopleSoft, Inc.

Howard Gwin is a seasoned software industry expert with 25 years of experience, having held a variety of executive positions at leading global technology and software organizations.

Mr. Gwin served as executive vice president, worldwide operations, at PeopleSoft, Inc., during which time the company grew from $100 million in sales to $1.3 billion. Prior to his time at PeopleSoft, Mr. Gwin spent 13 years in senior sales, marketing, and operations roles at IBM Corporation and Xerox Corporation. Recently, he also served as president and COO of Solect Technology Group, a global provider of billing, customer care and service management software for the telecommunications industry. During his tenure, Mr. Gwin helped orchestrate the sale of Solect to Amdocs Inc., a world leader in customer management billing systems, marking the largest transaction ever for a private Canadian software company.

Mr. Gwin has also served on the Board of Directors of several technology companies including Longview Solutions Corp., Mobile Computing Corporation, MaestroCMS Corporation, and Intelligauge Solutions.

Greg Santora

Former CFO Shopping.com & Intuit, Inc.

Greg Santora brings more than two decades of senior corporate finance experience in high technology to Taleo’s Board of Directors. Most recently, Mr. Santora was the Chief Financial Officer of Shopping.com where he was responsible for all areas of finance as well as human resources, legal, web operations, and information technology (IT). During his tenure, he built the necessary infrastructure and organizations to allow the company to go public and get on the path towards Sarbanes-Oxley 404 compliance.

Prior to Shopping.com, Mr. Santora was Senior Vice President and CFO at Intuit, Inc. from 1996- 2003. He was responsible for the software company’s treasury operations, investor relations, and communicating financial and operational information to the board of directors and the analyst community.

Before Intuit, Mr. Santora held a number of increasingly responsible finance positions at Apple Computer, Inc. where he was the senior director of finance for Apple Americas. He has also held finance positions at Bally Manufacturing Corporation and Arthur Anderson and Company.

Mr. Santora is a currently director on the boards of Align Technology and Digital Insight. He holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the University of Illinois and MBA from San Jose State University. He is also a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA).

Jeffrey Schwartz

Managing Director
Bain Capital, LLC

Jeffrey Schwartz is a Managing Director at Bain Capital in Boston, Massachusetts, where he is one of three executives coordinating the firm's venture efforts. He carries both investing and administrative responsibilities for the fund complex and currently sits on eight private company Boards including Taleo, ProfitLogic, Thor Technologies, Eldorado Marketing, Work'n Gear, Soleil Securities, Invoke Solutions, and Gamelogic. Prior to Bain Capital, he was a portfolio manager at Wellington Management Co where he managed several public equity funds. He also served in the Equity Capital Markets Group of Merrill Lynch.

Mr. Schwartz received a bachelor's degree in economics from Dartmouth College and a M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Michael Tierney

Chief Executive Officer
Seneca Investments LLC

Michael Tierney is the Chief Executive Officer of Seneca Investments, LLC, a financial holding company which owns major stakes in several U.S. and European marketing services and technology companies. He was previously a senior executive with Omnicom Group, Inc., a $10 billion public company (NYSE:OMC) which owns hundreds of the world's leading advertising, communications, and marketing services companies.

Mr. Tierney sits on the boards of directors of several companies in the US and abroad. He received his undergraduate degree from the University of Maryland, and his law degree from the University of Chicago.

    Search