Tonya Oaks Smith has spent most of her adult life smoothing frayed edges, herding wet and hungry cats, breaking down silos and perfecting the #facepalm – all while dancing backwards and in heels with a big smile on her face. A former reporter who sold her soul and then redeemed it by moving to communication for a public university, Smith is a fan of the words “y’all” and “malheureusement” – not necessarily in that order, and prefers the em dash to commas. She’s currently the executive director of marketing and communications at Henderson State University.

Mykl is the Digital Platform Development Director at BringMeTheNews, designs engaging web experiences, and speaks about social media, WordPress, and typography. He is the director of Social Media Breakfast – Minneapolis/St. Paul, the largest SMB chapter in the US. He co-organizes the Minnesota Blogger Conference, co-founded and coordinates the activities of Ignite Minneapolis and UnSummit, and runs the local chapter of TechKaraoke Minneapolis. Mykl has a special passion for the social web and its power to educate and inspire. He blogs at myklroventine.com.

Ruth is a senior project manager and analyst at Clockwork with a defining curiosity about how things work. So much so that she’s asked for access to a client’s database just to better understand their data. Her past gigs in teaching and linguistics have been unexpectedly helpful in doing her job. Teaching helps her to read a room quickly and switch gears easily. Linguistics has taught her to break down an issue into smaller parts to better understand it as a whole.

She likes to quote Einstein when looking at problems: “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” In non-working hours, you can find Ruth in the garden, on a bike, or reading a book.

Mahtab is Principal and CEO at Crux Collaborative. She has spent nearly two decades as a user experience designer, researcher, strategist, leader, and mentor. She has worked on user experiences for companies ranging from startups to the Fortune 50. She has a loud laugh and a lot of shoes. She also has a lot of strong opinions and has been known to say “think about it until you agree” after expressing one of them.

Dave Olsen has been a developer and project manager with the University Relations-Web unit at West Virginia University (WVU) for the last twelve years. Over that time he has worked on and led projects that range from developing a university-wide CMS to creating award-winning marketing websites. Dave’s primary role is to help find the balance between tech, content, and design for many of the university’s biggest projects. For the last four years he has also been responsible for implementing mobile solutions for the university. These include SMS-based services, WVU’s central mobile web portal, as well as a number of responsive design-based websites.

In addition to his work at WVU, Dave actively participates in open source projects and writes as well. This past year his project, Pattern Lab, was nominated for the Net Awards Open Source Project of the Year. In 2013, Dave contributed a chapter on web performance to Smashing Magazine’s “The Mobile Book.” He shares what he’s learned about mobile, as well as his reactions to mobile trends, on his personal blog.