Teva Pharmaceuticals

Strategic Projects Lead, Corporate Affairs

◦	Manage F2F & Virtual corporate meetings and events projects from brief to delivery
◦	Conducting research of international venues, site visits, negotiate and contracting with 3rd party 
         vendors 
◦	Super-user in Cvent event management system  
◦	Manage onsite event management, branding materials
◦	Collaborate with various levels in the organizational structure, including senior management

Global Meeting and Events Manager

Isrotel Hotel Chain

◦	Managed 4 coordinators, maintained customer relationships
◦	Developed groups incentive programs, including onsite management
◦	Involved and influenced company's special projects

Groups Operations Manager

Kenes Group

◦	Arranged conferences & Incentives, ranged between 20-3000 employees
◦	Negotiated contracts with events 3rd party vendors
◦	Worked with senior management in leading Israelis companies

Project Manager, Welfare Events

Strategic Project Manager, leading cross-functional Corporate Affairs initiatives. Experienced in global event and meetings management with a strong background in project management, budget control, vendor negotiations, and marcom strategy. Skilled in stakeholder engagement, corporate sustainability, and global program execution. Proven ability to deliver complex projects on time and within budget in matrixed, international environments.

Yifat Birenbaum

Sr. Director, Global Travel, Meetings, and Card Procurement and Operations

Global Procurement Category Head - Travel, Hotels, Air, Meetings, Virtual, & Card

Novartis

As one of the two Global Procurement Heads in Marketing, Meetings, Congresses & Events (MC&E) Strategic Sourcing at Novartis, Debi works as a Business Partner to drive strategic vision through operational excellence with partners.   Debi has brought together several stakeholders to develop the vision for Commercial, Agencies, Strategic Meetings Management Program (agency consolidation, technology, etc.) along with Travel and Payment options, develop the complex HCP engagement technology vision, drive HCP virtual and hybrid meetings through a digital strategy, and provide ROO through data insights. She uses her past experience in training & development to work toward obtaining the ROI, ROO, and ROE of meetings.

Debi has worked on several of Novartis worldwide initiatives such as driving virtual and hybrid meetings to more HCPs for both commercial and medical purposes, developing the vision for connecting HCP and Meetings data by using the right, integrated technologies (Cvent, IQVIA) and co-leading the Meeting & Event Agency consolidation project, one that she had done several times in the past with other clients, including another major pharma.  

Debi has worked on many society contracts with her Stakeholders to expand the reach of the extremely important education to HCPs around the world through the use of digital platforms.  She also sourced and selected, along with her stakeholders, one major digital app for worldwide deployment.

Debi works with matrixed, global teams and completed a 6-month Business Partnering Certification Program and while at PwC, won the PwC All-Star Coaching award.  One of her mottos is “People First” because without teamwork and collaboration, global implementations fail.  

Novartis has allowed Debi to bring together skills from all past work experience, including her career in meetings, travel and training, to identify  the "why," "how," and "results" so that funding reallocation to other marketing channels is possible if needed.

Global Cross-Divisional Category Leader in Marketing, Meetings, Virtual, Tech, Congress & Events

American Express

Led several clients to improved Meeting & Event strategy and operations through facilitating workshops, consulting with teams, and benchmarking with other organizations.  Influenced prospective and current clients to consider more wide-ranging meeting management, travel, and payment options through consulting engagements.

Director, Managed Meetings Strategies, Mtg. Techs, Virtual and Digital Solutions

The Scholar Consulting Group

908-304-4954 or debi@debischolar.com
Debi Scholar consults with Fortune 1000 and mid-size companies on procurement projects, supply chain and expense management categories such as airlines, hotels, meetings, ground transportation, corporate card programs, travel management companies, and entertainment assets such as venue suites, boxes and tickets.  Debi has led numerous projects for global organizations, entertainment venues, and government agencies as she was the PricewaterhouseCoopers’ (PwC) Lead for Travel and Entertainment Expenses (T&E) strategic management  and worked for the leading consulting firm for 13 years.  Debi has a unique advantage as a consultant because she started as a practitioner by leading PwC’s internal group travel and meetings departments and has in-depth knowledge of the industry. Acknowledged nationally for groundbreaking efforts in shaping the Strategic Meetings and Events industry and integrating Travel and Meetings teams with Procurement.   

Debi is a pioneer in the virtual meetings industry using virtual technologies beginning in 1998. She was the first Meeting Director to have included Virtual Meetings under her direction back in 2002 and since, has become a leading expert in how to effectively drive virtual meeting adoption to reduce travel costs & complement meetings. 

Debi participated on the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) Foundation Board of Trustees for two years and was the co-chair of the GBTA Groups & Meetings Committee for four years. She participated on the Editorial Advisory Board for MeetingNews magazine. Debi was selected as the one of the top 20 Changemakers in the Industry, one of the Business Travel News Practitioners of the Year and one of the VIPs in the Strategic Meetings Management Industry.  She has been featured in numerous industry articles and was the highest rated speaker for two years in a row at the Strategic Meetings Management Forum.  She continues to be a requested speaker at conferences.

President, Strategist

PricewaterhouseCoopers

Director and Lead for Travel and Entertainment (T&E) strategic management, cost reduction and risk mitigation.  Consults with Fortune 1000 companies and the government on airlines, hotels, meetings, ground transportation, corporate card programs, expense management, travel management companies, and entertainment assets such as country club memberships, venue suites, boxes and tickets.  Approach is to streamline suppliers, gain efficiencies, and instill accountability, consistency and service at the enterprise level.  Acknowledged nationally for ground breaking efforts in shaping the Strategic Meetings and Events industry. Was the first Meeting Director to have included Virtual Meetings under her direction back in 2002 and since, has become a leading expert in how to effectively drive virtual meeting adoption to a) reduce travel costs and b) complement or reduce face-to-face meetings.

Assurance Director, Procurement Head for T&E, Mtgs, Virtual, and Techs

Delivered the Strategic Meetings Management and Group Travel Strategy and Operations for over $200M in spend with over 2,000 meetings annually to all U.S. partners and associates along with global, coordinated efforts.  Led a team of over 70 meeting sourcing agents, planners, and technologists.  Won the All-Star PwC Coaching Award as Debi was progressive in volunteering the Category for a Six Sigma project that helped surpass savings expectations to more than 18%. 

Designed a new service delivery model and the organization structure for the local office meetings and events in 2007 called "Market Event Managers" (MEMs) which are still the cornerstone of local meetings in local offices in 2018.  

Developed the first ever "Virtual Meeting Planning Team" that reported into M&E so that virtual and hybrid meetings were a part of the service offering.

Meeting & Event Services Leader, Virtual Meetings Leader, Group Travel Director

Educated thousands of PwC staff on new technologies, through a team of 35 direct and indirect reports, to enable PwC client effectiveness and drive innovation.  Led the tech training team (for both IT and end users) with a $3.7M budget and as a working director, trained thousands of people in-person and virtually through the use of virtual technologies. 

Built a training profit center by teaming with customers, developing proposals, and producing training plans.  Saved 25% by evaluating, consolidating, and managing many education suppliers globally.

e-Support, Training & Services Director, including all eLearning 

Dean Witter

Built the technology training department in order to increase broker, staff and executive technology skills.

Training Specialist/Manager

*Creative Productions*

Created and led an extremely successful training company, clients included: Dean Witter, Coopers & Lybrand, Pfizer, American Cyanamid, Merck, WNET, L&F Products, Scandinavian Tourist Board and Brooklyn Union Gas.

President, Instructional Designer, L&D Head for all Technologies

Westinghouse Electric Company

Various roles in legal, training, research and showroom management at Westinghouse Furniture Systems and Group W Satellite Communications.

Various roles

Williams Distributing

Administrative

NJ: 1-908-304-4954 (mobile)

A Procurement Head, with over 25 years of leadership and management experience in developing strategy and operations in diverse industries bringing together marketing, travel, meetings, digital & virtual, payment solutions, and learning & meeting engagement, along with over 50 LinkedIn recommendations,  Debi works with international stakeholders to build, transform and implement solutions that drive results.  

Full time, she has worked at Teva, Novartis, PwC, American Express, Scholar Consulting Group, Dean Witter, and Westinghouse. As a consultant, she has worked with hundreds of organizations. 

Debi is an expert in Global Procurement and Indirect Operations. Debi's"10,000 foot level" vision and her operational "roll up your sleeves approach"  steers her passion for delivering exceptional quality service with her worldwide Stakeholders.  Debi enjoys developing strategies and implementing operations to gain visibility, improve operations, optimize budgets, and reduce risks. Today, she leads Global Procurement for Travel, Meetings, and Card Services. 

In Debi’s spare time, she writes books, blogs, and coaches on industry strategy and operations. She has authored several books with more to come. She was one of five women in the Meetings Industry named as a “Perennial Leader” by M&C Magazine in 2017, after receiving the “Top 25 Women in the Meetings Industry” for previous three years. She was named as one of the 25 Most Influential People in the Meetings Industry in 2013 by Successful Meetings, a Mover and a Shaker in the Industry in 2010 by Corporate and Incentive Travel Magazine, a Top 20 Changemaker in 2008 by Corporate Meetings & Incentives Magazine, and Best Meeting Practitioner (while at PwC) in 2007 by Business Travel News. 

Debi served on the elite group of Meetings Competitive Advantage Forum (MCAF) from 2003-2008, served on the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA) Foundation Board from 2008-2010 and was on the GBTA Groups & Meetings Committee for several years, and operated as the Co-Chair of that group from 2004-2008. 

Debi has 10 designations.

taplio

The Battle

Yifat Birenbaum

Debi Scholar, HMCC, GLP, GTP, CMM, CMP, DES, SSGB, CTE

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