CRISTINA IONESCU

Jan 2015 – Present

Deutsche Telekom is one of the world's leading integrated telecommunications companies, with approx. 151 million mobile customers, 30 million fixed-network lines, and more than 17 million broadband lines.

Deutsche Telekom provides fixed-network/broadband, mobile communications, Internet, and IPTV products and services for consumers, and information and communication technology (ICT) solutions for business and corporate customers.

The Group Deutsche Telekom is present in more than 50 countries with more than 228,000 employees throughout the world. In Romania, Deutsche Telekom has recently set up a Shared Service Centre in Bucharest - Deutsche Telekom Services Europe Romania (DTSE Romania) which delivers support function services like: HR, Accounting, Reporting, and Finance for the whole European Deutsche Telekom footprint under the Deutsche Telekom Services Europe umbrella.

In this role I am responsible for the Internal & International Communication part of DTSE as well as for coordinating the Ambassadors Project, which is an employer branding project. On top of that, I am also in change of developing the DTBS Employer Branding and of setting up it's Social Media presence.

 Oct 2013 – Present

EQUILIFE ASSOCIATION is a non-profit organization based in Romania, which promotes balance in life.

EQUILIFE works to raise the level of life quality for people and their communities, through information, education and encouragement for the development of the individual, family and society, towards a balanced lifestyle.
Among its activities, EquiLife Association promotes artistic and cultural diversity, national traditions and the successful initiatives of Romanians.

We are confident about life and the future and we envision a world where all humans live in harmony with themselves and with their community.

Jul 2011 – Present

Cristina Ionescu Consultancy is a marketing & communication consultancy boutique focused on creating exquisite branded customer experiences with high return on loyalty and sales.

Aug 2011 – Aug 2012

At a first glance we deal with money, but Western Union does so much more than simply transfer money. Every day we help people connect with loved ones around the world by offering a fast, reliable and convenient means of transferring money.
The Western Union Company provides consumers fast, reliable and convenient ways to send and receive money around the world, as well as send payments and purchase money orders. We operate through a network of approximately 510,000 Agent locations in 200 countries and territories. And we're getting better and better every day.
I this position I am managing the marketing activities for the sub region Romania and Bulgaria, this including:

• preparing the market plan and aligning the marketing 4Ps to the global and regional imperatives and participating to the local and regional strategic planning process;
• developing and building the relations with all our agents from all class of trade (banks, retail chains, sub-agents, etc.) this involves organizing events for them, planning sessions for developing the strategy and workshops on each campaign in order to achieve the targets;
• actively participating in new product development and launches for the ROBU sub region;
• managing the relations with the creative, PR, media, merchandising & research agencies;
• concluding researches, analyzing the results together with the Business Intelligence department, transforming consumer insights into consumer benefits and proposing action plans for the ROBU sub region;
• coordinating and implementing the local, regional & global campaigns;
• using my creativity and innovation skills in all the stages of the marketing activities in order to keep a fresh image of the brand and always come up with something new for our consumers.

I do all these in a fantastic environment, a multicultural one, where I am exposed on a daily basis to an international team, which values leadership and empowers its employees to obtain the best results.

Mar 2005 – May 2011

ALPHA BANK ROMANIA was founded in 1993 by Alpha Bank Group together with the EBRD and a limited number of Greek entrepre-neurs and started its activity in 1994 as Banca Bucuresti. In early 2000 was renamed to Alpha Bank Romania to underline its links with the parent Group. Now, with a staff currently exceeding 2500 employees, the Bank offers a wide spectrum of products and services for individuals and corporations through a network of branches located in Bucharest and in other major cities.
In this position I was in charge with:

• coordinating the Advertising Department activity; 
• managing a team of 3 people and coordinating also the Merchandising Desk;
• was responsible for the communication strategy - developing communication platforms based on qualitative and quantitative researches; 
• coordinating all the advertising campaigns (briefing the agency, choosing the best concept in order to reach better the target, supervising the production process, preparing the media plan, negotiating contracts and monitoring the effects of the campaign); 
• maintaining the relation with the advertising and media agencies and negotiating the fees and contracts; 
• managing the brand image, following and improving the Brand Manual;
• keeping a close relationship with Alpha Bank Greece International Division, a relationship based on informing them on our activities, preparing several types of reports and most important acting as a liaison between the two teams and sustaining the Romanian’s interests and projects in front of the Greek team and obtaining their support;
• preparing together with the rest of the team the new Retail Concept of Alpha Bank; 
• proposing and developing new products and promotions; 
• preparing all the promotional materials of the bank; 
• developing loyalty programs for existing and potential customers;
• involved in the Research and CSR activity of the bank;
• maintaining coherence in the communication.

Apr 2003 – Mar 2005

The banking group was first known as Finansbank (Holland) N.V. and rebranded into Credit Europe Bank N.V. in 2007, after Finansbank AS (the Turkish branch of Finansbank and the 5th biggest bank of Turkey) was sold to the National Bank of Greece. The brand 'Finansbank' was also included in the deal, leading to all branches (except the Turkish one) were renamed into Credit Europe Bank. The bank is under full supervision of the Dutch Central Bank and is offering easy-to-use retail banking and SME products as well as private banking through more than 200 branches and more than 11,000 sales points. It also offers trade finance and corporate banking services through its network, as well as in China and the United Arab Emirates. At the end of 2010, Credit Europe Bank N.V. employed over 6,000 professionals working in the countries Belgium, Germany, Malta and the Netherlands as well as in China, Dubai, Russia, Romania, Switzerland, Turkey and Ukraine, serving more than 3 million customers worldwide.

Working under the direct coordination of the Corporate Marketing Vice-President I was in charge with coordinating the marketing activities of the bank by keeping a very close relationship with all the Branch Managers, collecting reports from them and making approaches for drawing customers and developing the relation with the existing ones, supervising and continuously monitoring the branches both from Bucharest and from the rest of the country, collecting Call Memos, weekly and monthly reports from the branches and preparing reports for the Bank’s Management; periodically preparing internal/external reports typical for the department’s activity, doing research on the competition and proposing the Marketing Strategy to the bank’s man-agement. Working together with the Relationship managers from the branches I also had to identify new opportunities on the market, promoting, negotiating and structuring the banking products according to their needs.

Jun 2000 – Nov 2001

Founded in 1978, Forever Living is now a multi-billion dollar company, based in Scottsdale, Arizona, that manufactures and sells dozens of wellness and beauty products. With over nine and a half million distributors in over 145 countries, Forever Living offers the opportunity of living a healthier, wealthier life.
As a Market Developer I participated in several marketing research activities: gathering information based on questionnaires, designing and presentation booklet for new products; translating marketing and accounting reports from Romanian to English or from English to Romanian; the electronic correspondence with the head office from the USA; hosting and being involved in the organisation of several major events like “Johnatan’s Day” and “The Annually Rally” from September 2000; organising presentations; other office related jobs.

2014 - 2015

Of all the companies in the world (outside North America) that train men and women to be magnificent life and executive coaches Noble Manhattan are the longest established, since 1993 and have been training great coaches since 1998.
NM has a very dedicated team based in their Head Office in Weymouth, Dorset, England – the engine room of the business. But in addition to this they have a vast infrastructure of people working around the world. These include trainers, mentor coaches, coach supervisors, assessors, markers, support group leaders, divisional heads and licensed partners.
Today they have trained well in excess of 9000 men and women in 27 countries around the world and have offices in Warsaw, Bucharest, Istanbul, Sofia and Atlanta-USA, with regional representation in many other countries.

2002 - 2004

Graduation paper: "Children influence over the buying decitions of the family." - grade 10 (where 10 is maximum).

ROMANIAN-AMERICAN UNIVERSITY

Bachelor Diploma: Domestic and International Commercial and Financial – Banking Relationships 1998 - 2002

Activities: • English Communication Session at the Romanian – American University from May 2000, the 3rd place for the paper “Romanian Economy”
• English Communication Session at the Romanian – American University from May 2001, the 2nd place for the paper “An Approach on Virginia”.

Graduation paper: "Marketing launching campaign for a new Braun toaster." - grade 9.80 (where 10 is maximum).

• Certificate Grade C in the Examination for the Business English Certificate 3
• Certificate Grade B in the Examination for the Certificate in Advanced English
• Certificate Grade B in the Examination for the First Certificate in English
• New International Business English (N.I.B.E.) by Leo Jones & Richard Alexander

• Curso B 2.1 nivel avanzado de lengua Espanola - Instituto Cervantes Bucarest

• Cultural Manager in Contemporary Visual Arts - Ministerul Culturii si Patrimoniului National
• Certification as Photographer - Ministerul Muncii, Familiei si Egalitatii de Sanse & Ministerul Educatiei, Cercetarii su Tineretului
• Certification as Trainer - Ministerul Muncii, Familiei si Egalitatii de Sanse & Ministerul Educatiei, Cercetarii su Tineretului

• Competitiveness through strategic planning - INSEAD Marketing University

• Seth Godin's Freelancer Course 2015

• Social Media Essentials - SPADA Agency

• Time Management - TMI Romania
• Emotional Intelligence - TMI Romania
• Project Management - TMI Romania

• Leadership Training - WU Academy

• Certificate for participating at the Adobe Photoshop CS4 basic training - Adobe Certified Partner 

• “Pro Management Technical Education Center” Diploma Grade 10 (where 10 is maximum) in the Examination for the “Web Pro-gramming – HTML, DHTML, Site creation” course

• Branding Masterclass professional training course conducted by Andy Milligan and Shaun Smith

• "WTI Executive Program 2005" : Strategic planning in Marketing

• Excellence in Entrepreneurship Management by Prof. George Blomstrom Ph. D. - James Madison University of Virginia

• NLP Practitioner International Association for Neuro-Linguistic Programming

• Brand identity & customer experience creator
• Overseer of multi-million euro budgets
• Highly creative marketer
• Sharp strategic planner
• Social Media promoter
• Customer loyalty driver
• Project management

• Leader & enthusiastic mentor
• Relationship building expert
• Life & business coach
• Certified trainer
• Time management
• Emotional intelligence skills
• Smooth negotiator
• NLP practitioner

"I am pleased to recommend Cristina Ionescu, my business partner, Co-Founder of EquiLife Association. I have a great appreciation for her business thinking, oriented towards excellency, and also for her strong organizational skills which she brings in our partnership. I also admire Cristina’s creativity, empathy and communication skills.
I am grateful for having her as a business partner, as she is very reliable and we complete each other in a very productive way. I would readily endorse and embrace any venture with her."

"I would like to appreciate Cristina's energy, enthusiasm, as well as her strategic approach of key business issues.
I also observed her excellent approach to challenge the status quo and to look for cerative solutions."

"Cristina is one of the most energetic and self-motivated marketing experts I've had the privilege to work with. Her marketing knowledge & business understanding, as well her determination and enthusiasm to motivate the team recommend her as high valuable professional. A great team-player with a brilliant mind and very fun to work with because she is always surprising and effective."

“Cristina is one of the most creative and passionate people I know, with a high attention to details, building up fairytales and unique customer experiences at every event we organized.”