PLATFORM
Transparency
its important to the health of any association that its leaders are honest, transparent and always working in the best interest of its members. Any organization that operates on elected representation should have transparency to this process. It is my goal to increase this transparency by asking the board to approve my CFESA Transparency and Accountability Plan within the first quarter of the new board.
Partnership
Greater cooperation with our Manufacturer, Dealer and Rep Partners is the key that many of us service agents sometimes forget. We all have the same goal of serving our mutual customers as quickly and cost effectively as possible while maintaining healthy profit margins to ensure our long term success.
Expanding the reach of the association across international boundaries.
Provide tools to our membership that allow them to add value to their service offering, strengthening our partnerships with end users.
Technology
Leveraging technology to keep our business's competitive and able to offer greater value in the service we provide
Find ways to provide our customers with the same level of reporting and asset tracking that Third Party's provide giving CFESA Members a competitive edge
Continuing our development of an LMS system that provides the association with state of the art education platforms to further train our employees both in the field and in the office.
People First
If Covid taught us anything its that we must take care of our people. Bringing opportunity to the association so our members have access to the best resources to take care of their teams is a priority for me and the board.
Expanding education offerings through the association, teaming up with industry leaders to provide insight into best practices. These are just a few of the ways we can move our association forward and increase opportunities for our members.
CFESA Transparency & Accountability Plan
Transparency
&
Accountability
The Transparency and Accountably Plan is intended to update our By-Laws to take into account recent changes to the membership structure of the association with the intent of bringing greater accessibility and participation in the operation, growth
Elections
Campaigns: When a member wishes to seek election from the membership it's important for them to reach out and speak with the membership. Creating a platform to run on, explaining who you are and what you stand for are key elements to transparent elections.
Contact list of voting members provided to each candidate running for the board so they have an opportunity to communicate with the voting member.
The roadblocks currently in place to communicate with members directly make it very difficult to get messaging out.
A platform for the candidates to craft their message and explain to the membership why they should be elected. This platform should accommodate the various popular mediums for communication ie video, written.
This can be a website based platform where our candidates can post their messaging and content for easy viewing by the members.
Create a modern election process that allows for an online/digital voting process
The association is growing, adding dozens of members each year, some of which are in countries thousands of miles apart. As we continue to grow it becomes harder for a large portion of our voting members to get together for conferences where elections have traditionally taken place.
Election Results: Published election results with total numbers of voters participating and individual candidate results.
This list should be provided at the announcement of the election results so both the membership and the candidate have visibility.
These statistics should also be made available through the membership portal
Transparency here allows for the board and the membership to steer actions to encourage participation in the election process
Board Action
Minutes of board meetings should be inclusive of agenda items, actions taken and tasks assigned to committee/board members/staff
Minutes should be available to the membership on the membership portal
Committee Action
Minutes of committee meetings should be inclusive of agenda items, actions taken and tasks assigned to members/staff/board
Minutes should be available to the membership on the membership portal
Letter from the Executive Director
The Executive Director should pen a letter through the current popular medium, quarterly, to the membership, updating on the current projects that HQ is undertaking and Committee/Board updates.
This provides transparency and accountability of HQ
By-Laws Committee
Scheduled, annual, review of the By-Laws by a committee of board members appointed by the Board President
Review of all actions performed by the association if the action is covered by the By-Laws, this review would only verify that the action being taken complies with the by-laws
BIO
I come from a family business where this industry has been part of my life since birth. My dinner tables growing up were filled with stories of kitchens, customers and equipment. 2 days after my 16th birthday I applied for a job in a quick-serve restaurant in my hometown, Portillo’s. I started as a cashier working customer service; face to face interaction with restaurant patrons showed me that two things are very clear. They expect what they order to be correct and their time respected. From this I realized just how many facets of the kitchen play into giving the customer what they want. I moved from cashier to the expo line which had me playing mediator between the kitchen and the customer. Keeping a positive attitude while making sure the kitchen knew the urgency and my customers saw a friendly face to diffuse the always present “how much longer” conversation. This peeked my interest in cooking, I begged and pleaded with my manager to move to the kitchen, where I learned a great deal of respect for cooks and chefs. Being under the gun to make the dish, keep the standards the customer and my employer expected while maintaining a safe environment were a challenge. I had a whole new understanding of “our oven is down again and I need you here now”. I remember my time at Portillo’s every day, that sense of urgency and customer satisfaction have carried with me in my current position. After high-school I attended a local community college with the intent of becoming a Police Officer. I spent one semester in school and took a job in the family business to pay my way through. I started with CSI doing equipment installation, cleaning of customers equipment in our warehouse and in their stores, and fixing equipment on the bench in our shop. A few years later I moved into the office where I took over the task of warranty billing. I learned the ins and outs of a proper workorder, the expectations of the OEM’s and grueling process of getting paid for our work. While handling the Warranty Processing I also helped move our company into the internet age. I maintain our IT infrastructure which gives me a vantage point on operations that most do not see. For the past 10 years I have been the Director of Operations. In my position I am responsible for the process’s we use to affect the level of customer service we are known for. I have instituted both policy and technology that have made it possible to support branch operations a thousand miles away from our corporate office. During my tenure as Director of Operations I have facilitated year over year double digit growth, while maintaining a solid cash flow and keeping our efforts profitable.
My first exposure to CFESA started at a Regional Meeting, my uncle Mike Coker brought me with and said, just listen to what these guys have to say. The who’s who of the Midwest got in a room and discussed their business like they were sitting in their own board rooms. Freely sharing best practice and trends they are seeing without a care in the world that the room was filled with their competition. This is when I knew this industry is where I wanted to be. At my first conference, there was a tiny burly man named Tony Rapanotti, who introduced me to an amazing group of people. He took me under his wing, invited me to dinners and put me in positions to meet and be seen by our industries top players. I attended the business meetings of CFESA from my first conference to present. Having spent time in Marketing, Education, Business Technology and having the pleasure of being the committee co-chair of the newly named Industry Trends Committee. I have served as the current Region 2 Leader and have planned/executed two regional meetings to date. I have served on the Board as a Director for 4 years and Vice President for 2, that said, my experience so far has taught me to learn from those that have come before me, embrace the knowledge they have while bringing fresh ideas to the board and membership. I believe we can continue the great work started by previous boards while engaging our membership to provide new, fresh ideas. My role as Vice President should be to not only innovate and progress our agenda but truly listen to the membership, hear what they say and ask them the questions that spur debate.