Céline Felan – Vice President of Business Transformation at Community Brands

In this edition of “State of Readiness”, I interview Céline Felan, Vice President of Business Transformation at Community Brands, a software company that provides a suite of offerings for membership-based organizations, private schools and churches.

Being born in Paris, France and raised in the Netherlands, Céline now calls Austin, Texas home – where she quickly learned and understood the phrase “grabbing the bull by the horns”.  In her role, she has help guide the company through 28 acquisitions over the past two (2) years.  Yes, you read that right (I even asked her to repeat that during the podcast because it seemed like quite a bit – and it is).  As such, Céline’s days are non-standard and she never really knows for certain how each day (or each acquisition) will play out.  This proved to be a considerable challenge for Céline, who is a self-professed “Type-A Perfectionist”.  She had to learn and understand that “80 is the new 100”.   Over time, Community Brands has created an “acquisition checklist”, but it is imperfect so it’s more of a guideline than a checklist.

Most of the acquisitions are of small(ish) companies.  As such, the corporate culture is that of their founders.  Community brands strives to maintain the individualism of the company from a cultural perspective – keeping in mind to preserve what might keep the employees happy such as having taco-Tuesdays or allowing pets to come to the office, but making sure that the companies learn the “team colors” and fight under the corporate flag.  The acquired companies are also expected to remain where they are geographically with consolidations being mostly in the General and Administrative functions where services can be shared.

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Host: Joseph Paris, Founder of the;  XONITEK Group of Companies,  Operational Excellence Society & Readiness Institute

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Guest: Céline Felan

About Céline Felan Dedicated to expanding business capabilities, fostering innovation, driving operational efficiencies and adding value to clients, the organization and investors. Known for optimizing productivity, revenue, service levels, and employee performance through comprehensive organizational development strategies. Inspiring communicator and change agent motivating employees to go beyond set job descriptions. Energized, enthusiastic, and tenacious with exceptional mentoring skills and global business experience. PHILOSOPHY I enjoy every opportunity to define and drive strategy to meet our company objectives as one organization. I approach a business objective from multiple perspectives, understanding all aspects and dependencies, working across teams to define a strategy. This all-encompassing approach unifies the different departments around a common goal and path forward, driving close collaboration and accountability. Once accomplished, I work side-by-side with the teams to assure successful adoption and ownership of the new business processes; allowing the team to be self-sustaining and driving a culture of continuous improvement. About Community Brands Website; www.communitybrands.com Headquarters; St. Petersburg Florida Year founded; 2017 Company type; Software Company size; 3000 employees Specialties; Software suite provider for Membership based organizations, Private Schools and Churches.