After starting out on the production line, Parkinson moved into IT at Nissan before rising up the ranks to his current role overseeing digital across Africa, the Middle East and India. Along the way, he has been intimately involved with some of the automaker's biggest marketing successes, including the Qashqai Europe launch — which fused social media and digital to compelling effect. Parkinson has demonstrated a knack for driving strong results at scale, such as the developing a centralised cross-functional social media team for Nissan across three different continents, and setting up a global listening platform that has translated into stronger insights for social management. And, it's probably worth noting that Parkinson must be one of the few 'social media experts' that has actually built cloud and internet solutions for a company of Nissan's size. @daveparkinson