He joined FMS in 2005 as an account executive. Sixteen years later, he became one of its owners - a career built around the patient work of helping banks find their voice.

After more than 25 years in tech marketing, the Brazilian operator has a blunt prescription for the empty pipeline: stop treating marketing and sales as neighboring countries.

Before he helped steer marketing strategy at Nutanix, Mike Higashioka was engineering tissue with an inner zone, an outer zone and a stubborn interface. His career since has been a study in making unlike parts work together.