Will Overstreet, Founder and CEO
Starting as a true freshman, Will played college football for the University of Tennessee, helping lead the team to an NCAA National Championship in 1998.  Will was drafted in the third round by the Atlanta Falcons, where he started as a rookie, attracting a great deal of fan attention.  

During his career with the Falcons and subsequently in television and radio sports broadcasting and analysis, Will formulated the concept that would become Voices Heard Media.  As a player and on-air personality, he saw the branding and revenue potential of making personal connections with fans.  The challenge, however, was how to give individual fans amongst an audience of thousands, or even millions, the one-to-one access they crave.

Shortly after filing his first patent, Will co-founded Voices Heard Media in April 2007 to commercialize the software platform that solved the challenge of creating personal connections that would scale to meet the demands of large audiences.

Will’s primary responsibilities are defining the company’s vision and direction and securing growth capital.  He also takes an active role in business development and sales.

 Stephen Newman, EVP Sales
Stephen is a veteran of 30 years in broadcasting and now leads sales for Voices Heard Media.  He spent 9 years as General Sales Manager at KGW-TV in Portland, Oregon.  During that time Steve was on the NBC Marketing Advisory Board for 3 years and spent two of those years as the Board Chairman. 

Scripps recruited Stephen for the Executive launch team for a cable television network to be known as Home and Garden Television (HGTV).  He ran Advertising Sales of HGTV and, after the purchase by Scripps, also ran Ad Sales for The Food Network.  During Stephen’s tenure, Scripps’ revenue grew from $0 to $180 million in revenues.  HGTV achieved record revenue during this time and allowed HGTV to be the fastest Cable Network to reach profitability. 

Stephen left Scripps to join a start-up Internet measurement company known as MeasureCast in Portland, Oregon, which was sold to Nielsen Ratings Company.  Stephen returned to Knoxville to become the CEO of Eonstreams, an Internet streaming media company.  During that time, Eonstreams created Internet streaming products such as Ad Insertion for Radio companies.  Clear Channel, Citadel and ABC Radio were customers of Eonstreams, which was sold to VitalStream, a California-based streaming media company.

 Chris Van Beke, Founder and COO
Chris brings ten years of startup operations experience with specialties in growing early market adoption and capital formation.  Chris’s primary responsibilities lie in capturing early customer adoption, raising growth capital, expanding resources and the management team, and securing strategic partners.

Prior to co-founding Voices Heard Media in April 2007, Chris held senior management positions in venture-backed startup companies.  As COO for a startup developing a national network of franchised stores offering eBay selling and shipping and packaging services, Chris was responsible for all aspects of corporate commerce support operations as well as franchise operations.

As Vice President, Business Development, for a $30 million venture-backed startup creating an innovative reverse logistics and e-commerce solution for the electronics industry, Chris was responsible for identifying, building and managing strategic partnerships as well as leading sales, process improvement and strategic partnering initiatives.  Chris was instrumental in growing ReturnBuy’s annualized revenues from $0 to over $20 million in two years.

Prior, Chris worked in finance and Investment Banking in New York and Washington, DC.  Chris earned a BA from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from Duke University.

 Tony Runyan, VP Sales and Operations
Tony originally began working with Voices Heard Media in August 2008 as a consultant while completing his MBA at the University of Tennessee.  Challenged to develop new applications and define new markets for the company, Tony was able to make initial connections that led to sustainable relationships with  major media companies such as Disney and AOL.

Immediately after graduating in December 2008, Tony became a full-time employee of Voices Heard Media with the primary responsibilities of acquiring new customers and managing the relationships with current customers.  In addition, Tony has played a vital role in developing the sales process, pricing, product road map and defining valid target markets and their values.

Prior to becoming a part of Voices Heard Media, Tony worked as a consultant for multiple companies in both the private and public sectors performing a variety of tasks from developing business plans to designing and conducting CRM surveys for an emerging technology company.  As a consultant for a privately owned security and engineering company, Tony was responsible for developing and restructuring the overall strategy of its most profitable segment.       

 Ned Morgan, Corporate Counsel and VP Relationship Management
Ned serves as Corporate Counsel and Vice President of Relationship Management for Voices Heard Media.  His primary responsibilities as Corporate Counsel include contract negotiations, risk management, managing Voices Heard Media’s IP portfolio and drafting and implementing internal employee and external user policies and procedures.  As VP of Relationship Management, Ned builds and services customer relationships and strategic partnerships, coordinates internal product development and usability improvements, and oversees customer management and service.

Prior to joining Voices Heard Media, Ned spent several years practicing complex commercial litigation dealing with issues such as intellectual property, contracts, securities and employment law.  He then founded and served as President of a company dedicated to identifying, analyzing and re-licensing cutting edge government technology to the private market.

Ned earned both his JD and MBA from the University of Tennessee.

Adrian Carr, Director of Software Development
Adrian leads the software development team at Voices Heard Media. In addition to hands-on development activities, Adrian helps to bridge the gap between the business and technical teams to help translate ideas and problems into technical solutions. Adrian also tries to ensure that the development team is working on the most important things first so they can deliver business value as quickly as possible with very high quality.

Adrian is a huge proponent of Agile Software Development and lean software processes because he believes it's a better way to work, and provides better value to the company and the customers. He is also a fan of User-Centered Design, and likes for software to be as simple as possible, both inside and out.

Before joining Voices Heard Media, he worked for several years as a Software Engineer for Jewelry Television, while filling in from time to time as a Project Manager and Business Analyst. Prior to that, he worked for almost five years in Atlanta for Alltel Information Services and Fidelity National Information Services as a development team lead on a  large consumer loan origination system. The primary customers were mid-sized banks and Toyota Financial Services. The loan system served all of the Toyota and Lexus dealers in the United States.

Adrian earned his Bachelor of Science in Geographic Information Systems at Appalachian State University in Boone, NC.

Stephanie Hardy, Creative Director

Stephanie Hardy, our newest addition, is the Creative Director at Voices Heard Media. Stephanie partners with each team at Voices Heard Media to provide end-to-end creative services, from strategy to concept and execution of traditional and interactive media. Her commitment to progressive and effective creative solutions will lead the Voices Heard Media brand to the top of it's game.

Prior to joining the Voices Heard Media team, Stephanie worked with the Food Network as a graphic designer. Stephanie was responsible for network logos, various print collateral, interactive designs, and in-house promotional materials. Her love of clean designs and brand identity blossomed at Food Network and lead her to work as the lead designer at Stella Creative with offices in both New York City and Nashville, TN. Stephanie has worked with NYC Record Labels, professional artists and musicians, small businesses, private fitness facilities, NYC clubs and events, and more. 

Outside of her Graphic Design career, Stephanie has also had successful art shows in NYC. Her collection of paintings have been featured at premier events in the city and she has been a featured artist amongst various non-profit events. Stephanie upholds her love of fine arts by devoting time to herself in the studio and on occasion accepting commissioned work.  

Stephanie has a BA from Seattle University and a BFA from O'More College of Design in Franklin, TN.