Our Team

Put names to faces. Use this directory to find out more about the Gradient team, including but not limited to a person’s timezone, preferred work schedule, address, chakra’s and ocean profile.

Tom Vladeck was inspired to start Gradient by the cutting-edge market research performed by his advisors at Wharton, where he received his MBA in marketing and statistics. Prior to Wharton, Tom received a master’s degree from the London School of Economics and studied math at Pomona College. In a prior life, Tom produced quantitative models for global climate policy reports.

Kyle Block is a global market researcher who studies behavior using a wide range of methodologies. He has designed hundreds of population and consumer studies in more than three dozen international markets, and his work has influenced global ad campaigns in emerging markets. An aficionado of maps and spatial data, Kyle holds a master’s in Spatial Analytics from the University of Pennsylvania and studied International Relations and Spanish at Claremont McKenna College.

Stefan Musch holds a master’s degree in Marketing and Management from Tilburg University. After Tilburg, Stefan went into industry where he applied state-of-the-art marketing science methods to business challenges. Stefan partners with client teams to translate advanced analysis to easy-to-implement recommendations, guiding managers along the way.

Brendon Ellis earned his master’s degree in Positive Organizational Psychology & Evaluation from Claremont Graduate University and is currently pursuing his PhD in Positive Organizational Psychology. He applies his background in survey research methods on a daily basis to help clients develop instruments that measure anything from attitudes and preferences to intentions and behavior.

Cory Manento holds a master’s degree and PhD in Political Science from Brown University, specializing in experimental survey research on voter attitudes, behavior, and electoral preferences. Coming from a background in which success is achieved through rigorous causal inference and sharp research design, Cory thrives on translating client needs into testable questions that yield actionable results.

Iaroslav Domin earned his master’s degree in Applied Mathematics from V. N. Karazin Kharkiv National University. He started his career as a statistical programmer working in the field of clinical trials. Iaroslav is a passionate R programmer who loves working with data and helping other programmers by being a top contributor on StackOverflow.

Emmanuel Ugochukwu holds a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Electronics Engineering from the Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Nigeria. He is a data scientist who enjoys connecting the dots, be it ideas from different disciplines or applications from different industries. He is an R lover who enjoys analyzing data and creating stunning visualizations.

Amy Dennis has nearly a decade of experience in operations and project management. She is driven to keep systems running smoothly and predictably to empower team members to focus successfully on essential tasks. She holds a degree in New Media Communications from Oregon State University.

Mislav Zorko is a passionate data scientist with over seven years of experience in predictive intelligence and advanced analytics. He received his master’s degree in Mathematical Statistics from the Faculty of Science of the University of Zagreb, Croatia and is currently enrolled in the Postgraduate Specialist Study of Actuarial Mathematics. He loves coding in R and contributing to open source projects.

Brian Goolsby is a consumer insights specialist with 15+ years of experience in understanding the intricate factors that influence consumer perceptions and uncovering the “why” behind consumer choices. Brian has led hundreds of custom research projects across diverse industries, tackling a wide range of business challenges using a variety of research methods. He earned his Ph.D in Cognitive Psychology at Northwestern University and further honed his expertise through his post-doctoral research in the Experimental Consumer Psychology Lab at Bangor University, UK.

Eva Rios holds a PhD in comparative politics from Brown University, where she used international survey methods and causal inference to study how certain identities shape political attitudes and behaviors. She brings that background into client work by guiding projects toward strong, evidence-driven conclusions.