Courtney Peterson has had a varied career with high tech companies and as an executive coach and management consultant, but now she relishes working for a nonprofit.
“It will be rewarding to apply my business experience to the worthwhile mission of the Foundation for California Community Colleges. I know I’m going to really enjoy supporting the 108 California community colleges, the other 1700-plus members of the collegebuys.org purchasing consortium nationwide, and California K-12 schools through the schoolbuys.org purchasing program,” said Ms. Peterson. “I look forward to getting input from purchasing directors and buyers at the colleges and school districts, as my experience has been on the other side of the fence as a vendor contracting with educational institutions.”
As the first Director of Purchasing Programs for F.C.C.C., Ms. Peterson will lead the collegebuys.org and schoolbuys.org purchasing programs to new levels. Those programs were initiated soon after F.C.C.C. was founded in 1998 and they were developed thus far primarily by the President/C.E.O. and other F.C.C.C. staff who lack both the focus and the professional background that Peterson will bring to them.
“Courtney brings a wealth of experience in developing, planning and implementing programs. I believe she will be able to use her communication and analytical skills in working with district purchasing agents to develop strong cooperative contracts.” said Les Littman, Contra Costa CCD Director of Purchasing —who served on the interview panel.
Immediately prior to joining the F.C.C.C. executive team, Ms. Peterson had been an executive coach and management consultant working with the C.E.O.s of small businesses ($1 to 40 million annual budgets), including several companies selected to the San Francisco and East Bay Business Times list of fastest growing companies. She led two C.E.O. think tanks on business strategy and problem solving for The Executive Committee, an international association for C.E.O.s. She also served as the Vice President of Marketing for a venture capital-backed start-up company providing customer relationship management services.
From 1988 to 1995 Ms. Peterson held critical positions with Octel Communications, Inc. of San Jose, CA and with VMX, which merged with Octel. She was Director of New Business Development and Strategic Marketing with Octel and focused on the education market. Before that she was President of the VMX Mid-Atlantic Systems Company, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary, and she started and managed the federal government sales division as VMX’s Vice President of the Government Systems Group.
She was with Xerox Corporation from 1975 to 1988, rising to Senior Program Manager for the Systems Integration Group, a new business unit, which she helped initiate.
Ms. Peterson will be working closely with F.C.C.C. Director of Facilities Programs Art Chen—who was a member of the interview panel—to continue to develop the new facilities volume purchasing program. “Perhaps I’ll finally be able to apply some of what I learned in earning my B.S. in housing and commercial design from the University of Maryland,” she quipped. Peterson minored in business administration and later completed the executive management program for smaller companies at Stanford University.
The Foundation for California Community Colleges, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation, is the official auxiliary for the system of 108 California Community Colleges. F.C.C.C. manages the collegebuys.org and schoolbuys.org purchasing programs and many other programs.
