Joanne Kimball, Senior VP of Research and Planning

Get Joanne talking about strategy and you can actually see the adrenaline rise. She gets truly jazzed about the insights quantitative or qualitative research can unearth, and the breakthrough creative it can inform.

Joanne started her career as a copywriter, even gracing the cover of Adweek as Rookie Copywriter of the Year. After writing for both agencies and corporations, she ran her own successful healthcare marketing consulting firm for nearly 15 years.

Since joining Adams & Knight, Joanne has continually expanded the agency’s strategic services, and has worked on major branding initiatives for a variety of clients, including Prudential, The Travelers, Masonicare, Hartford Hospital and Conning & Company.

Gary Griffin, Director of Public Relations

Don’t expect an activity report from Gary. His team generates results reports.

They don’t stop until they’ve developed the best buzz-building strategy and the most engaging pitch to get clients in the spotlight, whether that’s on the air, in print or online.

Foresaking a career in baseball, Gary was drawn to the fast pitch world of journalism after college. His newsroom experiences honed his instincts for “angles” that get the ears of newsmakers, trendspotters and audiences of all types.

After a stint in nonprofit community relations, Gary joined Adams & Knight. Propelled by his successes, he’s risen quickly at the agency to now lead its growing PR team. He’s gotten his clients press in all kinds of outlets—from top blogs and online newsletters to such icons as Business Week, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, CNN and USA Today. And just to clear his head, Gary does triathlons.

Jill Adams, Agency Principal

Jill is the president and majority owner of Adams & Knight. She’s the “tough love” of the firm, concurrently enforcing the standards and encouraging the team.

After a checkered past that took her from PR on Capitol Hill and teaching in Madrid to client-side and agency-side advertising experience, Jill joined her partner in an agency that’s grown beyond their wildest dreams. She now oversees the agency’s strategic services, and focuses on ensuring that the management team continues to bring the best and brightest ideas to the agency’s clients.

Jill has worked with a who’s who of industry giants—including Fidelity Investments, ING, The Hartford, Prudential, Sun Life Financial, MassMutual and M Financial.

Marc McFarland, VP of Account Services

Marc is an encyclopedia of expertise when it comes to financial service products.

Before joining Adams & Knight, he led a variety of industry-leading sales and marketing teams for financial services organizations. He holds Series 6, 63 and 65 licenses, and is currently pursuing a CLU designation.

A former client of the agency, Marc has invested his career in the financial services industry. Both on the agency side and in his prior client lives, he has worked with such household names as MassMutual, Prudential, John Hancock, New England Financial, Allmerica Financial and Protective Life.

An all-state college wrestler and Cornell graduate, Marc tackles every challenge with determination and grit, a sense of humor and an uncompromising will to succeed.

Bill Knight, Chief Marketing Officer

Bill founded the agency back in 1988 in an attic studio with low ceilings that cracked many a skull and orange shag carpet that offended many a sense of design. A living example of the power of visualization, Bill posted a picture of the diner that would one day serve as the centerpiece of his hot agency above his drawing table. Twenty years later, that diner is surrounded by one of the coolest agencies in New England and a fast-growing team of like-minded big thinkers.

Bill began his career as an art director for leading local agencies and corporations, as well as BBDO. He has an incurable sense of curiosity and loves delving into all kinds of businesses. His biggest thrill is seeing his team turn an understanding of a client’s business into creative work that gets people to sit up and take action.

Don Carter, Creative Director

No one would call Don a prima donna. But then he doesn’t need to posture; his work speaks volumes about his talent. He’s won wheelbarrows full of awards, from Clios and Effies™ to accolades from the New York One Show, the Boston Ad Club, the Boston Hatch Awards, the Connecticut Art Directors Club, and the Connecticut Ad Club. His work has also been featured in Communication Arts, Photo District News, Art Direction and PhotoDesign magazines.

Don’s work is as diverse in style as it is connected by purpose. He never stops trying to get to the “essence” of a brand, the spark of a campaign—the impetus for action. He’s created award-winning campaigns across all media and industries.

When he’s not creating campaigns, Don is illustrating children’s books. His luscious, colorific work is featured in great bedtime books on everything from trucks to jazz.

Larri Cochran, VP of Interactive Strategies

When she isn’t biking the trails, Larri eats, breathes and drinks the Internet. She is passionate about helping clients adopt new business models to leverage its power.

Over her 20-year career, Larri has developed hundreds of successful Internet sites and online marketing programs across the financial services, manufacturing, retail, technology, education and nonprofit worlds. In her relentless pursuit of maximizing the performance of those programs, she deftly slices and dices the data to continually cook up new strategies for increasing traffic and transactions.

In addition to developing and enhancing Web sites, Larri’s team focuses on user experience modeling, content management systems, search engine optimization and marketing, e-mail and database marketing, and online advertising programs.

Larri is a frequent speaker on Interactive marketing and often trains business groups on a wide range of Web 2.0 topics.

Brian McClear, VP of Interactive Services

Brian specializes in turning sound interactive strategies into the coolest online experiences, the kind you forward to a friend. A trained illustrator by trade, he took to new technologies like a fish to water. He currently leads the agency’s team of interactive designers and programmers.

Brian has a keen ability to translate the complex into the compelling, whether he’s focused on developing a new interactive tool, an online marketing campaign or enhancing a Web site. One of the agency’s first employees, Brian has experience working with a who’s who of industry leaders, including The Hartford, ING, Travelers, Prudential and Fidelity.