Gleason promoted to new role as ex-Pepsi IRO takes up IR reins
Pentair, a diversified industrial company, has promoted IRO Todd Gleason to the newly created position of vice president of strategy and marketing, and tapped PepsiAmericas’ Sara Zawoyski to take over the IR duties at the Minneapolis-based company.
In a sign of the strategic importance of IR and the career options a stint in IR can open, Gleason’s new role combines global marketing and brand management, strategic planning and corporate communications for the $2.7 bn company, reporting to chairman and CEO Randall Hogan. Gleason is also responsible for market analysis and commercialization of new growth initiatives and go-to-market strategies for new technologies.
‘Todd has been instrumental in shaping and advancing our investor relations activities and building a solid analyst and investor base,’ says Hogan in a prepared release. ‘He has also been very close to all our strategic growth activities so this is a natural transition to more fully support our commercialization and strategic functions across our global organization.’
The new position combines several functions that previously had been spread throughout the company, explains corporate spokesperson Betsy Day. ‘Marketing was never centralized before,’ she says; it resided within Pentair’s different business units, where the function remains. ‘Now we have a person at the corporate level,’ Day adds.
Zawoyski was previously vice president of IR for PepsiAmericas, the $4 bn global manufacturer, seller and distributor of PepsiCo beverages, a role she took on in 2005. She now reports to John Stauch, Pentair’s executive vice president and chief financial officer.
Prior to her role in IR, Zawoyski worked as PepsiAmericas’ director of financial reporting and compliance, and had a stint at PricewaterhouseCoopers. She received her BSc degree in accountancy from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. No search firm was used in filling the IR role, according to the company.
Gleason joined Pentair in 2007 as IRO. Prior to that, he held executive finance, strategy and business development positions for American Standard, Honeywell, Deloitte & Touche Consulting and QPS Services. He received a master’s degree in management from Carnegie Mellon University and his bachelor’s degree in international studies from Wesleyan University.
Pentair is a Minneapolis-based global diversified industrial company providing water treatment and filtration systems, thermal management and enclosures systems for sensitive electronics.
