Salesforce.com Powers Obama's Change.gov Citizen's Briefing Book

Paul Greenberg has no investments in any firms that have CRM related or enterprise related applications or solutions, nor does he have any investments in any stock or other form of ownership in a consulting firms that does any form of enterprise application consulting or CRM consulting. However, at one time or another Paul has had almost all the significant CRM vendors as clients performing services as a consultant who would view and review and suggest product enhancements, changes or suggest how to cure product deficiencies; possible engagements to suggest go to market strategies for each company as they launched a new CRM solution. He has been engaged as a speaker at public events by these companies covering a mutually agreed upon topic and has written white papers sponsored by the vendors - which have no mention of the vendor and do not endorse the vendor’s products- but instead are based around thought leadership and ideas. None of these engagements whether they are consulting or works for hire, ever has impacted Paul’s thinking good or bad, on any of these companies. Paul is in fact known for his honest straightforward public assessments of these companies. They are not immune to his public critique even when they are clients. When it is germane, Paul will disclose his relationship, if any, to a company that he might be writing about in either a positive or negative way.

In addition to being the author of the best-selling CRM at the Speed of Light: Essential Customer Strategies for the 21st Century Paul Greenberg is President of The 56 Group, LLC, a customer strategy consulting firm, focused on cutting edge CRM strategic services and a founding partner of the CRM training company, BPT Partners, LLC, a training and consulting venture composed of a number of CRM luminaries that has quickly become the certification authority for the CRM industry.

His book, CRM at the Speed of Light: Essential Customer Strategies for the 21st Century, now in its third edition, is in 8 languages and been called "the bible of the CRM industry". It is used by more than 70 universities as a primary text. It was named "the number 1 CRM book" by SearchCRM.com in 2002 and is one of two books recommended by CustomerThink. The Asian edition of CIO Magazine named it one of the 12 most important books an Asian CEO will ever read. Paul has also authored two other books including "E-Government for Public Officials" (Thompson Publishing, 2003).

Currently, he is working on the 4th Edition of CRM at the Speed of Light which is due for publication by McGraw-Hill in March 2009.

Paul is also the co-chairman of Rutgers University's CRM Research Center and the Executive Vice President of the CRM Association. He is a Board of Advisors member of the Baylor University MBA Program for CRM majors, a unique national program.

Paul is considered a thought leader in CRM, having been published in numerous industry and business publications over the years and having traveled the world speaking on cutting edge CRM and topics geared to the contemporary social customer. He has been called "the dean of CRM" and "the godfather of CRM" and even the "Walt Whitman of CRM" by analysts and organizations throughout the industry. In fact, at the end of 2007, he was the #1 non-vendor influencer, by InsideCRM in their annual "25 Most Influential CRM People" announcement. He was also named one of the most influential CRM leaders in 2008 by CRM Magazine. He is known particularly for his work on the use of social media, such as blogs, podcasts and wikis and social networks in CRM as tools for customer collaboration with a company. He is seen often as the "voice of the customer" and is well known within the CRM industry for this work. His blog, PGreenblog was named the winner of the first annual CRM "Blog of the Year" in 2005 by SearchCRM and the 2007 "Whatis" Award for CRM Blogs, by their parent company, TechTarget. He also received the #1 CRM Blog Award from InsideCRM at the end of 2007. The blog is also the central focus of KnowledgeStorm's CRM Blog community. He also has a podcast, Experience on the Edge, that has garnered a myriad of industry kudos.

Paul was also named one of the most influential people in CRM by CRM Magazine in August 2008.

He is a member of the Destination CRM Board of Experts and the SearchCRM Expert Advisory Panel as well as a member of the Board of Advisors for GreaterChinaCRM for many years. He also sits on the Board of Advisors of the CIE Institute and and multiple other companies.

Currently, Paul lives in Manassas, Virginia with his wife and two cats. To reach Paul, please email him at paul-greenberg3 at comcast dot net. You can follow him at Twitter or join up with him on LinkedIn or Facebook.