Company: ThinkTank
Company Description: ThinkTank software has been used to launch astronauts safely into space, draft the constitutions of countries, and create billions of dollars in value for Fortune 500 companies. ThinkTank is a patented crowdsourcing, crowd computing, and group decision support platform that inspires breakthrough thinking, accelerates alignment, and builds commitment across teams.
Nomination Category: Products & Product Management Categories
Nomination Sub Category: New Product or Service of the Year - Software - Collaboration/Social Networking Solution

Nomination Title: ThinkTank 5

1. Tell the story about this nominated product or service (up to 525 words). Describe its function, features, benefits, and performance to date:

ThinkTank develops structured collaboration process software designed specifically with the needs of large organizations in mind. We back it up with a comprehensive training and support program that has helped improve and speed up decision making for a diverse group of global corporations, government agencies, and NGOs, including the US Navy, IBM, Boeing, Proctor & Gamble, the Centers for Disease Control, and many others.

ThinkTank clients have used our software to launch astronauts safely into space, draft the constitutions of countries, and create billions of dollars in value for Fortune 500 companies. We work with an extended partner community, including Deloitte, PwC, and EY, to help them provide new classes of strategic decision-making services to their clients.

ThinkTank 5, released in 2013, and is a cloud-based solution that enables organizations to make better, more informed decisions based on the input of large numbers of participants. The software supports both synchronous and asynchronous participation; the system’s asynchronous capabilities allow people working in multiple time zones to interact effectively with each other in ThinkTank sessions. The system supports all major browsers, devices, and operating systems. ThinkTank developers have distilled over 30 years of academic research and real-world experience into a comprehensive software suite that enforces best practices for sharing ideas and making decisions without limiting the methods used by clients to achieve results.

The company offers a comprehensive training program for ThinkTank Facilitators and Practitioners that allow clients and partners to come up to speed quickly on how to configure and conduct effective ThinkTank sessions.

ThinkTank 5 incorporates a number of significant advancements over previous versions, including:

• New enterprise class server and database for improved scalability and performance.
• Streamlined administrative console to make it easier to manage deployments, including configuration involving multiple servers.
• New Advanced Reports function that allow users to collect, organize and publish findings generated during ThinkTank sessions, as well as participation metrics for all session members.
• Improved HTML5 user interface makes it easier for first time participants to interact effectively in ThinkTank sessions and to reduce the amount of time required to configure and initiate sessions.
• New “drop the curtain” function that allows session leaders to make changes to session data and configurations without exposing those changes to participants until desired.
• New “Follow Me” magnet function that causes participants to automatically switch to the session screen or subsection indicated by the leader.
• New session designer console that provides permissioned users with all the tools they need to design new sessions, including specialized crowdsource, assessment, visual, and matrix activities tools.
• New voting functions allow session leaders to conduct faster anonymous polls and display results quickly in heatmaps.

The ThinkTank 5 suite is available through a full range of hosting options, including SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) and term or perpetual enterprise licenses for proprietary hosting.

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2. Provide a brief (up to 125 words) biography about the leader(s) of the team that developed this nominated product or service:

Matt Wenger leads the global growth of ThinkTank, human process software that accelerates and enhances the work of teams through structured collaboration as the company’s CEO. Matt’s passion is commercializing Internet ventures that change the way people live, work and play. Selected in 2004 by Canada Connects magazine as one of Canada’s top 20 Internet visionaries, over the past 20 years Matt has launched and grown community development foundations, software companies, global broadband vendors, and Internet service providers. Before joining ThinkTank in 2009, he served as President, Americas for PacketFront, a maker of advanced telecommunications network equipment and software, and as president of OpenGlobal, a management consulting firm based in San Francisco focused on next generation broadband networks.