Biography

Renee Patton is the global leader of the Education and Healthcare Industries at Cisco. She and her team help education and healthcare institutions envision the future of learning and care and execute on their vision today. With over 25 years of business, management, sales, and marketing leadership experiences in both small start-ups and large corporations, Renee has managed through adversity and diversity to help organizations realize technology solutions that drive business outcomes.

Renee has spent 23 years in education, giving her a clear perspective to address business issues and changing landscapes. Always a curious learner herself, it was after earning her undergraduate degree that she became a high school English and French teacher. She then spent four years on the district side managing policy and a $20M budget for Los Gatos-Saratoga JUHS Board of Trustees, learning firsthand how a district runs and understanding regional challenges.

Prior to joining Cisco full time, she ran her own marketing consulting firm for seven years, working with agility to develop strategy and customize marketing programs and projects to meet client needs.

After seven years at Siemens serving as the key global marketing interface with Munich and managing national sales programs, Renee joined Cisco to lead US Education Field Marketing and manage their national E-rate Program. She then served as Global Industry Vertical Team Manager and Marketing Education Lead within Cisco Corporate Marketing where she was responsible for content marketing, positioning, and strategy. Later, she developed and executed the education industry strategy for Cisco within US Public Sector and led an international cross-functional team to expand Cisco’s influence across the globe. In her current role, she is the primary spokesperson for Education and Healthcare at Cisco and leads a global team, helping deliver $5B of education and healthcare sales per year.

Renee is excited about the future of both education and healthcare and the trends driving massive shifts in how always-connected people are learning and delivering care today. Working with customers, Renee helps deploy technology that addresses new approaches and supports ways to better engage people, expand access, prepare providers, secure institutions, and improve efficiency.

She is particularly interested in the role of culture in organizations and taking integral coaching approaches that help leaders, teams, and companies to succeed. 

Renee is a Lions’ Club Member, a mentor for the Nasdaq Entrepreneurial Center, and involved in her local community. She holds a B.A. degree in English with a minor in French from Santa Clara University and an M.A. in Education from Stanford University.