Staff

Sharon Markus, CMP, Founding Partner

Ms. Markus is a founding partner of PlanIt Now LLC and has more than 20 years experience in the meeting planning field.  She has considerable experience in overall program supervision and takes the lead in managing PIN’s larger conferences. She holds a graduate degree from Harvard University and an undergraduate degree from Case Western Reserve University.

 

Betty McDonald, CMP, Founding Partner

Ms. McDonald is a founding member and managing partner of PlanIt Now LLC.  In addition to PlanIt Now LLC core capabilities, her responsibilities include negotiating vendor contracts; developing and maintaining company and client web sites and databases; procurement of software and hardware and training of staff in new applications; management of project flow, and general meeting planning responsibilities.  She holds a graduate degree from the University of Maryland and an undergraduate degree from Goddard College.

 

Barbara Zweig, CMP, Senior Meeting Planner

Ms. Zweig has over 20 years of experience in meeting planning and conference administration.  She has been a member of the PlanIt Now staff since 1996 and has primary responsibility for working with our federal government clients.  She has extensive experience in all aspects of meeting planning and takes the lead with many of our small to mid-size conferences.  She holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Maryland.

 

Susan Wilson, Meeting Planner

Ms. Wilson has been working with PlanIt Now LLC since 2004.  She provides customer support for meeting registration, manages inventory and distribution of materials and assists with developing, testing and conducting online and onsite registration.  She holds a bachelor’s degree from Belmont Abbey.

 

Shannon Ross, Meeting Planner

Shannon has over 15 years of experience working with professional associations and non-profit organizations. Since joining PlanIt Now LLC, she focuses primarily on Federal Government clients managing pre-meeting activities and registration services. She provides on-site registration support including attendee check-in and distribution of conference materials. She holds her master’s degree from Columbia University and her bachelor’s degree from The University of Michigan.

 

Hallie Werbel, Meeting Planner

Hallie provides pre-meeting support and registration services as well as customer assistance for PlanIt Now conferences. Her responsibilities include the oversight of group registrations together with the management of invoicing. She coordinates on-site registration at larger conferences, including attendee check-in, issuing payment receipts, and generating badges. She holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Georgia.

 

Jessica Flo McDonald, Meeting Planner

Jessica is a meeting planner with over 5 years experience soliciting venues, working with clients and executing small and large scale food and beverage programs. She holds a bachelors degree from the University of Colorado and currently resides in San Francisco, CA. Jessica serves as PlanIt Now’s west coast affiliate and on-site travel director for events around the country. She has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado.

 

Jim McDonald, Software Technology

Jim has overall responsibility for managing the technical requirements for PlanIt Now conferences. He has a bachelor’s degree from San Diego State University and 35 years experience in software development. He developed and maintains the PlanIt Now Meeting Management Tool (MMT) web application that PIN uses to manage conferences. Jim custom tailors MMT to meet the needs of PIN client conferences. In addition, Jim works with PlanIt Now meeting planners on the development and oversight of the technical aspects of all conferences including databases, online registration, and generation of automatic email confirmations.