Connecting Ideas. Expanding Opportunity.
Influential Voices in Technology™ — Where Technology and Infrastructure Empower Human Potential™
As another fall conference season approaches, I find myself looking forward not only to the conversations ahead, but also reflecting on the conversations that brought me here.
One of the unexpected benefits of serving as a strategic editorial advisor, moderating industry discussions, interviewing leaders, and spending much of my career bringing people together is that I rarely experience our industry from a single point of view. Instead, I’ve had the opportunity to listen across organizations, disciplines, and events. Over time, that broader perspective has changed the way I think about broadband and, perhaps more importantly, the conversations shaping our connected future.
For many years, I experienced conferences one at a time. Looking back now, I realize they were never really separate conversations.
An idea introduced at one event often resurfaces months later in an entirely different setting, viewed through a different lens and enriched by people approaching the same challenge from another discipline. Rather than isolated discussions, I began to see them as chapters in a much larger story.
Earlier this year in these pages, I wrote about the growing convergence of broadband, energy, data centers, and digital infrastructure. That perspective wasn’t shaped by a single event. It emerged over time.
Last fall, while attending SCTE TechExpo, I found myself thinking differently about the future of broadband after hearing CableLabs President and CEO Phil McKinney challenge us to think beyond speed and toward intelligence and coherence. With Mark Bridges about to lead CableLabs into its next chapter, those ideas continue to shape the industry’s direction.
Just weeks later, at Broadband Nation Expo, Comcast Executive Vice President and Chief Network Officer Elad Nafshi’s keynote reinforced that many of those changes were already becoming operational realities. Taken together, those conversations revealed something larger than either presentation alone and became the foundation for what I explored in my previous Broadband Futures column.
At MetroConnect, conversations about investment increasingly intersected with discussions about power and infrastructure. At NRECA PowerXchange and TechAdvantage, broadband was no longer simply a communications discussion. It had become part of broader conversations around energy resilience and critical infrastructure. Across several discussions this year, including FBA Fiber Connect, conversations that began around middle-mile broadband naturally expanded into governance, partnerships, financing, long-term sustainability, and community collaboration.
From observation to action
While moderating a panel at Fiber Connect, I had the privilege of speaking with Eric Bathras, Chief Technology Officer for Infrastructure for the State of Maryland, along with several outstanding panelists. We began by discussing rural collaboration and affordable, high-performance middle-mile broadband. The discussion quickly expanded beyond network infrastructure into community collaboration, governance, partnerships, and the long-term decisions that shape opportunity.
As I listened, one thought kept coming back to me. The questions hadn’t really changed. The context had.
The conversations I found most valuable rarely ended when the conference concluded, or the magazine was published. A discussion from one event often helped me better understand something I heard months later at another. New perspectives filled in pieces I hadn’t considered before. The learning continued long after the closing keynote, and I began wondering how those conversations could continue throughout the year, reaching people who may never have the opportunity to attend every conference or meet many of the remarkable people shaping our connected future.
Why I created a new podcast platform
Influential Voices in Technology™ grew from a simple realization: some of the most important ideas shaping our future don’t fit neatly into a single conference, publication, or discipline.
I wanted to create a place where busy professionals, students, community leaders, policymakers, and decision-makers could better understand the trends reshaping our world by learning directly from the people doing the work. Not simply to talk about technology, but also to better understand what technology makes possible for industries, communities, and most importantly, the people they serve.
Through executive interviews, educational shorts, Ask Me Anything conversations, and discussions with leaders across industries, the goal is simple: to make complex topics more understandable, encourage curiosity, and connect ideas that too often remain confined to a single discipline or event.
The platform is designed to complement the important work already happening through Broadband Library, our industry associations, and the many outstanding conferences that bring us together each year. My hope is that it helps extend those conversations, makes them more accessible to a broader audience, and helps connect ideas across disciplines long after an event has concluded.
My responsibility is to ask thoughtful questions, create space for different perspectives, and help people learn from one another. Every conversation leaves me seeing something I hadn’t considered before, and those lessons often become the starting point for the next one.
Three lenses for understanding change
Reflecting on the convergence we are seeing across the industries that shape our connected future, the podcast platform is organized around three editorial themes.
Broadband Future™ explores the infrastructure, technologies, and innovations connecting people, places, and possibility.
Energy & Connectivity™ examines how power, communications, and digital infrastructure are becoming increasingly interconnected.
The Opportunity Layer™ explores how technology creates pathways to workforce development, economic opportunity, and stronger communities.
Together, these themes help tell a larger story than any one conversation can capture.
No one builds something new alone
Independent ideas rarely become reality without people willing to believe in them early. I’m deeply grateful to our founding sponsors and supporters who believed in this vision from the beginning.
Thank you to NCTI, Founding Sponsor of The Opportunity Layer™, whose commitment to preparing today’s and tomorrow’s technology workforce reflects the spirit of this platform.
Thank you to ATX Networks, Founding Sponsor of Energy & Connectivity™, whose leadership in broadband infrastructure, connectivity, and next-generation network solutions reflects the innovation shaping many of the conversations ahead.
And thank you to Broadband Library, our Founding Supporting Media Sponsor, for believing in this vision and helping introduce it to the industry.
I’m equally grateful to the mentors, colleagues, clients, friends, and industry leaders who have invested in and encouraged me throughout my career. Your confidence and support helped make this possible.
The conversation continues
I’m looking forward to seeing where the conversations continue at this year’s SCTE TechExpo, Broadband Nation Expo, and the many industry gatherings that bring us together each fall.
I’ll also have the privilege of moderating two discussions at Broadband Nation Expo. One will explore what different broadband delivery models can teach us as communities work to expand connectivity. The second will be part of the new Data Center Excellence Summit, a focused conference within Broadband Nation Expo dedicated to the opportunities and challenges surrounding data centers and AI infrastructure. I’ll be moderating a discussion on the interconnected roles of power, land, capital, and talent in shaping the pace of expansion.
More than anything, I’m looking forward to discovering what new connections emerge.
If the past year has taught me anything, it’s that the most valuable insights rarely belong to a single keynote, panel discussion, or event. They emerge over time, shaped by different voices, different disciplines, and a willingness to listen.
That’s the spirit behind Influential Voices in Technology™, and it’s the perspective I’ll continue bringing to these pages.
I hope you’ll join me on that journey, because I believe some of the best ideas emerge when people from different backgrounds ask thoughtful questions, share what they’ve learned, and help one another better understand the opportunities ahead.
The conversations may begin in different places, but increasingly, they’re helping us better understand the connected future we’re building together.
Help shape what comes next
If there’s a topic you’d like to see explored, a leader you’d like to hear from, or a question you think needs to be asked, I’d love to hear from you. Whether it’s an idea for an educational short, a podcast guest from within or beyond our traditional industry, or a challenging Ask Me Anything question for a CEO or industry leader, your input can help shape future episodes, educational shorts, and discussions. Feel free to email me at Kimberly@InfluentialVoices.com.
Kimberly Maki
Strategic Advisor, Broadband Library
Kimberly Maki is a seasoned executive and veteran communicator of technology with over 35 years in cable, broadband, and ICT. Kimberly has built her career around translating complex technologies into strategic communications, high-impact member engagement, and record-setting events across five continents. She served as Corporate Vice President/Chief Communications Executive at Bright House Networks, Vice President of Public Affairs at Time Warner Cable, and Executive Director of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers. She also held Vice President roles at SCTE and BICSI. Earlier in her career, she served as Director of Public Affairs for a statewide cable association and as an account manager and published author at a public policy think tank, advancing legislative understanding of cable technology through strategic communications and technical advocacy. As CEO of Influential Voices, LLC, Kimberly advises organizations across the technology sector on strategy, communications, and growth.
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