The Founders and Leads Behind the Top Zendesk Implementation Partners (2026)

The 12 at a glance

Ranks and scores come from our ranking of Zendesk implementation partners for AI agents, which scores 31 firms out of 10 on public pages only. This post adds no scores of its own.

How we picked

From the 26 partners ranked when we chose these people (the list has since grown to 31) and the leaders a B2B people database returned for them, we kept people who meet one of two tests, plus three borderline picks we name below.

1. They teach the job in public. We read the post samples from a read-only check of each person's LinkedIn activity over 90 days, plus anything their firm's blog credits to them. Posts about Zendesk projects, AI in support and day-to-day operations counted. Holiday photos and hiring posts didn't.
2. Their firm names them as the person doing the build. A founder who "heads delivery" on the team page, or a director of delivery, is the name that turns up on your kickoff call.

Fame didn't count. We also skipped anyone without a LinkedIn profile we could tie to the firm, which is why Jan Müller, named as Geschäftsführer on the about page of first-ranked OPEN Digitalgruppe, isn't here.

Three picks are borderline. Paul Bichsel and Jason McDonald are founders their firms name, but we found no writing credited to either and neither firm names them as the delivery lead; we kept them because each firm's ranking entry rests on a promise its founder answers for. Isabela Fernanda Oliveira holds the implementation title per LinkedIn only and posted once in 90 days, a job ad; we kept the entry because BCR.CX names no one else for Portuguese-language delivery. Separately, half of Kurt Pinoy's recent posts are team and family news.

Titles are checked on the firm's own site where it names the person, and marked "per LinkedIn" where it doesn't. Posting counts appear only at 4 or more in 90 days, and never affect a score.

The people

Dominic Brasoveanu, ROCA.WORK

ROCA.WORK ranks 2nd with 9/10 in our Zendesk partner ranking. Its homepage lists Dominic Brasoveanu as "Founder & CEO", and its about page describes him as a customer experience expert who founded ROCA and runs an "8 People Team (& growing)".

He writes the firm's blog, and every one of the eight most recent posts is credited to him. The AI ones are the useful ones for a buyer: "5 Customer Service Mistakes Companies Make With AI" went up on October 29, 2026, and "Why AI in Customer Service Fails and How to Actually Make It Work" on August 19. He wasn't in our LinkedIn activity check. LinkedIn profile.

Why follow him: ROCA.WORK is one of five ranked partners that publish a price, and its founder writes about where AI support projects go wrong, so you can test his views against your own plan before a call.

Dave Hobbs, CX Experts

CX Experts ranks 3rd with 9/10. Dave Hobbs is Head of Customer Success and Optimisation, per LinkedIn; the CX Experts site doesn't name its team.

Dave Hobbs has posted 17 times on LinkedIn in the last 90 days, mostly about Zendesk projects and automation in South African customer service. The samples include a Zendesk rollout for a South African client framed around customer wait times measured in days, a post on support agents toggling between the CRM and other tools on every ticket, and one on whether South African CX leaders should automate to scale or train people into new roles. LinkedIn profile.

Why follow: CX Experts says it earns from software vendors instead of charging customers for implementation, and Dave Hobbs's posts show what that model delivers on real client projects.

Chad Susa, Gravity CX

Gravity CX ranks 5th with 8/10, partly because it publishes the clearest timeline in the ranking. Its about page lists Chad Susa as "Founder, Head of Service" and says "he heads delivery and does the senior technical work on every engagement". The same page describes over 20 years in IT, service management and customer experience, including senior roles at Zendesk.

Gravity CX's blog credits no posts to him. LinkedIn profile, linked from Gravity CX's own site.

Why follow him: His firm puts in writing that he does the senior technical work on every engagement, which is the commitment to check in a statement of work.

Jonathan Keane, CustomerHD

CustomerHD ranks 7th with 8/10 and is one of the five partners that publish a starting price. Its Our People page lists "Jonathan" as "CEO & Co-Founder", by first name; his full name comes from LinkedIn.

Jonathan Keane has posted 18 times on LinkedIn in the last 90 days, mostly about Zendesk for employee service and why deflection isn't resolution. One sample puts it plainly: "Deflection simply keeps a ticket out of the human queue. Resolution means the employee's issue is actually fixed." LinkedIn profile.

Why follow him: If you're measuring an AI agent, his distinction between deflected and resolved tickets is the right one to bring to any partner's pitch, because a vendor paid per deflection has an incentive to blur the two.

Katie Miles, Envoy

Envoy ranks 9th with 7/10 and has the most directory reviews of any US partner in the ranking. Its about page lists Katie Miles as "Director, Onboarding & Delivery". The same page names Laura Ragsdale as founder, who started Envoy in 2015 after working at Salesforce and Zendesk.

We found no writing credited to Katie Miles on Envoy's site. LinkedIn profile, linked from Envoy's about page.

Why follow: Envoy names Katie Miles as the owner of onboarding and delivery at a partner whose about page counts 50 experts, so ask for Katie Miles by name when you want to know who runs your project after the sale.

Kurt Pinoy, Premium Plus

Premium Plus ranks 10th with 7/10 and works only on Zendesk. Its Meet our experts page lists Kurt Pinoy as "CEO", alongside Ana Luisa Santos as Head of Projects.

Kurt Pinoy has posted 19 times on LinkedIn in the last 90 days, mostly about client projects, new hires and Zendesk events. The most useful sample is a client story: Qobee, a procurement software company, moved off a support tool it had run for 15 years, and Kurt Pinoy writes that a software release "used to mean 80 ticket replies. Now it means one." LinkedIn profile.

Why follow: Premium Plus works only on Zendesk, and Kurt Pinoy's feed is where it announces new consultants and the Zendesk events its team speaks at, so you can see who might staff your project before the first call.

Paul Bichsel, SuccessCX

SuccessCX ranks 12th with 7/10. Its about page lists Paul Bichsel as "Founder and CEO" and Hamish Lang as "Service Delivery Manager".

The SuccessCX blog runs practical AI pieces such as "How to put AI into practice within CX Operations", but the listing doesn't credit an author, so we can't say he wrote them. LinkedIn profile, linked from SuccessCX's about page.

Why follow him: His firm's ranking entry rests on Zendesk AI agents tuned by the team that built them, and he's the founder accountable for that promise.

Isabela Fernanda Oliveira, BCR.CX

BCR.CX ranks 15th with 7/10 and publishes an AI agent timeline for Brazil. Isabela Fernanda Oliveira is Head of Implementation, per LinkedIn; BCR.CX's site doesn't name its leaders.

Isabela Fernanda Oliveira posted fewer than 4 times in our 90-day check, and the one recent post was a job ad for a QA analyst at BCR.CX. LinkedIn profile.

Why follow: Isabela Fernanda Oliveira holds the implementation title at BCR.CX, per LinkedIn, so for a Portuguese-language rollout that's the delivery lead to ask about by name.

Lumi Fagbure, advoCX

advoCX ranks 20th with 6/10; its site doesn't describe an AI service yet. Lumi Fagbure is founder, per LinkedIn; advoCX's site doesn't name its leadership.

Lumi Fagbure has posted 5 times on LinkedIn in the last 90 days, mostly short pieces about how support teams handle customer email. One sample opens with "Two people reply to the same customer. Nobody replies to the next." Another, the first of a "Friday Fwd" series, describes teams whose only system for managing customer email is one person's memory. LinkedIn profile.

Why follow: advoCX sells ongoing Zendesk admin as a fixed number of hours a month, and these posts show the inbox problems a buyer would want those hours spent on first.

Garrett Bowne, LaPlante Management

LaPlante Management ranks 21st with 6/10 and runs an outsourced Zendesk admin team. Its about page doesn't give titles for most staff, but says Garrett Bowne "has been a Zendesk administrator for years, and now uses that knowledge to manage implementation and optimization projects for our clients."

The site credits no writing to him. LinkedIn profile, linked from LaPlante's about page.

Why follow him: If you're buying ongoing admin help, the person who has run Zendesk as an admin and now manages implementations is the one who'll understand your triggers and views.

Jason McDonald, Kilted Consultant

Kilted Consultant ranks 25th with 6/10: it configures AI agents in new UK builds but has no directory reviews yet. Its about page lists Jason McDonald as "Founder", says he "started Kilted Consultant in October 2023", and says "He's led the Zendesk User Group for the UK and Ireland since 2022."

He wasn't in our LinkedIn activity check. The site offers a newsletter of "Bi-weekly emails on getting more out of Zendesk and Aircall", without naming its author. LinkedIn profile, linked from the about page.

Why follow him: Running the UK and Ireland Zendesk User Group puts him in the room where admins compare notes, which is useful context for a UK buyer.

Brandon Tidd, 729 Solutions

729 Solutions ranks 28th with 4/10; it does integrations and custom development, and its Zendesk page names little AI work. 729's own blog calls Brandon Tidd "our Lead Zendesk Architect" in its Zendesk Relate 2024 recap. On LinkedIn the title is Professional Services Consultant and Lead Zendesk Architect.

Brandon Tidd writes the most practical Zendesk admin material of anyone here, on a 729 author page. "Why Zendesk Turning On AI Agent Tickets by Default Matters (Really)" (February 3, 2026) tells admins to audit their AI setup, adjust views and reports, and "set up retention or deletion routines for AI tickets you don't need long term." "Zendesk Is Making Sender Authentication Mandatory" (September 10, 2026) tells teams to check how email reaches Zendesk and who reviews suspended messages. Brandon Tidd has posted 11 times on LinkedIn in the last 90 days, mostly about putting AI to work and notes from the MAICON 2026 conference. LinkedIn profile.

Why follow: Brandon Tidd's posts read like change notices for Zendesk admins, so following them is a cheap way to hear about platform changes that affect an AI agent before they reach your queue.

What the list says about buying from a partner

Four firms near the top publish through their founders or leaders (ROCA.WORK, CX Experts, CustomerHD, Premium Plus), and three name who runs delivery (Gravity CX, Envoy, LaPlante Management). A founder's posts tell you how the firm thinks about AI; a named delivery lead tells you who will touch your triggers. Where a site shows neither, ask for the delivery lead's name and put it in the statement of work. Our guide to choosing a Zendesk implementation partner has the full question list. If you're still deciding between a partner and Zendesk's own agents, Zendesk's native AI agents versus third-party agents lays out how each one bills.

What we ask a partner's lead before an AI agent goes live

Macha builds AI agents that run inside a team's existing Zendesk, and a lot of those accounts were set up by a partner first. When one reaches us, we ask the partner's lead the same questions before anything answers a customer.

• Which ticket fields matter, and what do they mean? If a partner built custom fields, we need to know which ones routing depends on, because the agent reads and writes them.
• Which triggers fire on the tickets the agent will touch? Our trigger tags each ticket it fires on and excludes that tag so it can't loop, and a partner trigger that rewrites tags can break that.
• Which categories show up in past tickets? The first category comes from past tickets, and we replay those tickets through the agent before launch. Our post on testing agents on real data shows how.
• Internal note or public reply? We confirm this before any autonomous mode. In safe mode, drafts land as internal notes and nothing reaches a customer until the team approves.

The setup we follow on Zendesk is on Macha on Zendesk, and the wider project shape is in our Zendesk AI implementation guide.

Which person to follow for your situation

This list suits teams already on Zendesk that are shortlisting a partner for AI agent work and want to hear from the people before the sales call.

• You're comparing AI agent pitches. Follow Jonathan Keane for the deflection-versus-resolution argument and Dominic Brasoveanu for where AI support projects fail.
• You run Zendesk yourself and want early warning on platform changes. Brandon Tidd's author page at 729 Solutions.
• You want proof from client work. Kurt Pinoy and Dave Hobbs both post about named or described client projects.
• You need to know who'll do the build. Chad Susa, Katie Miles, Garrett Bowne and Isabela Fernanda Oliveira are the named delivery people.
• Your support runs in Portuguese. Isabela Fernanda Oliveira at BCR.CX.
• You're a UK team that wants admin help after launch. Jason McDonald at Kilted Consultant (retainer tiers) and Lumi Fagbure at advoCX (fixed monthly admin hours).

FAQs

Who is Brandon Tidd?

Brandon Tidd is the Lead Zendesk Architect at 729 Solutions, as 729's own blog describes the role. Brandon Tidd writes practical posts for Zendesk admins on 729's site, including pieces on AI agent tickets becoming the default and on mandatory sender authentication, and posted 11 times on LinkedIn in the 90 days we checked.

Who runs the top-ranked Zendesk implementation partners?

At the top three: OPEN Digitalgruppe's about page names Jan Müller as managing director, ROCA.WORK is run by its founder and CEO Dominic Brasoveanu, and CX Experts' site doesn't name its leaders. The full "Who runs it" line for all 31 is in our ranking.

Does posting on LinkedIn make a partner better?

No. It doesn't affect any score in our ranking. It tells you who shows their thinking in public, which helps you prepare questions, but delivery quality shows up in references and in who's named on the statement of work.

How did you check people's titles?

On each firm's own team or about page, read October 29, 2026. Where the site names someone, its title wins. Where it doesn't, the title comes from a B2B people database built from LinkedIn and is marked "per LinkedIn".

<div class="docs-callout"><div><p class="docs-callout-title">Are you listed here?</p><p class="docs-callout-body">People and partners can send corrections with a public source to [email protected]. We fix facts within a week. Picks follow the method above, not requests.</p></div></div>

How we researched this

We read the live Zendesk partner ranking on October 29, 2026 and took every rank and score from it. Names and LinkedIn URLs came from MoltSets and QuickEnrich, two B2B people databases, or from the profile link a firm prints on its own team page. We checked every title on the firm's site that day: 729 Solutions' blog, ROCA.WORK's homepage and about page, Gravity CX's about page, CustomerHD's Our People page, Envoy's about page, Premium Plus's Meet our experts page, SuccessCX's about page, LaPlante Management's about page and Kilted Consultant's about page. The CX Experts, advoCX and BCR.CX sites name none of these people, so their titles are per LinkedIn.

Posting counts and quoted samples come from a read-only check of each person's own LinkedIn posts over the 90 days to October 29, 2026. We didn't contact anyone or use emails, phone numbers, locations or photos.

Disclosure: Macha makes AI agents for help desks. Nobody paid to be listed, and Macha isn't a Zendesk partner and isn't ranked.