Matt Dixon, a managing director of strategic research at Corporate Executive Board, has an unrelenting drive to find the answers to questions senior executives often take for granted. For more than 15 years, Matt has worked to uncover truths behind many pillars of conventional wisdom that is costing companies dearly in terms of wasted money and lost market opportunity. As a senior member of CEB's global research team, Matt has overseen dozens of original quantitative and qualitative research studies on all aspects of customer service strategy and sales productivity. Matt has presented these compelling findings to hundreds of senior executives and management teams around the world, including those for many Fortune 500 companies.In a landscape dominated by motivational speakers offering little more than personal anecdotes and reinforcement of conventional wisdom, Matt challenges leadership dialogue with presentations packed with data and insights wrapped in a story-telling format that keeps his audiences scratching their heads and questioning long-held assumptions. Matt's quest for answers help organizations chart new paths forward that they often have never before considered. The work of Matt and his research team has been featured in Harvard Business Review ("Stop Trying to Delight Your Customers," July-August 2010) and most recently in his newly published book, The Challenger Sale: Taking Control of the Customer Conversation (Penguin USA, forthcoming November 10, 2011). He is also a frequent contributor on sales and customer service topics on Harvard Business Review's blog as well as both the Corporate Executive Board's Sales Executive Council and Customer Contact Council blogs.Matt holds a Ph.D. in political economy from the University of Pittsburgh and a B.A. with honors from Mount Saint Mary's University in Emmitsburg, Md. He resides with his wife and four children in Silver Spring, Md. Visit Matt on LinkedIn at http://www.linkedin.com/profile/edit?trk=hb_tab_pro_top