CEO Today USA Awards

CEO Today USA Awards 2019 www.ceotodaymagazine.com 27 - M A R Y L A N D - Charlie studied Applied Economics and Business Management and Cornell University, but he was always interested in writing software. Growing up, while friends played video games, Charlie got a Basic cartridge to plug into his Atari and wrote code. He wrote his first business software application when he was sixteen on an IBM PS 2. His first job out of college was as a Financial Analyst at a Fortune 100 company, where tons of paper data needed to be analyzed to create weekly and monthly reports. It was long hours and tedious work, so he requested that the 400-page financial reports be printed to disks instead of to paper, and then wrote a software program that parsed all the data, put it into a database, and created a complete financial management system with reporting, projections and charts. Back in 1991, this was a pretty big deal. Work that once required about 70 hours per week now took less than an hour. Charlie’s new job would be to lead a team to further develop and roll out the new FMS system he created across all other major projects at the company, and this FMS system would be used for the next 15 years. However, Charlie left after two years to go to graduate business school at the University of Texas at Austin, where he was part of a very small, hand-picked program (only 30 students were admitted, and the program had its own dedicated “classroom 2000”) called Information Systems Management (ISM). The ISM program delved deep into technology while also providing access to the general MBA program where students learned how to build and run businesses. Upon graduation Charlie joined a leading management consulting firm. As a management consultant, two key areas that Charlie focused on were Data Warehousing and Customer Relationship Management. Both of these technologies were in their early stages. Seeing the positive impacts these technologies (when coupled with streamlined business practices) had on corporations, Charlie believed they could be instrumental in improving other organizations, and non-profit organizations in particular. Living in Washington, DC at the time, nonprofits were everywhere and therefore created a large local market, which was important because a 56k modem was the fastest connection you could get!). Hence, Euclid was founded to bring the latest technology and best practices to nonprofit organizations. Euclid began focusing exclusively on building Association Management Software in 1999 when Charlie’s spouse Susan and Euclid’s first employee joined the team (both still work at Euclid). Jump forward 20 years and Euclid is now a leading provider of Association Management Software to organizations across North America and the software is used by millions of people across the world every day (it’s multi-language and multi-currency). Euclid’s SaaS platform powers just about everything associations and nonprofits need to do: Euclid’s clients build their websites using Euclid’s content management system; all of their key processes are supported, from event management to fundraising to membership management; all of their financial transactions are processed; and multiple other core technologies, including customer relationship management, data visualization and reporting, and integrated email marketing, further empower Euclid’s clients to achieve their missions. As the President and CEO of Euclid, Charlie is responsible for the direction and overall performance of the company. He has implemented a strong management team that he delegates most daily decisions to. This allows him to focus on business development and his personal favorite, product design. To date, Charlie has led the design teams for all of Euclid’s products, even creating most of the initial prototypes. Recognizing the incredible talent on his product design and development teams, Charlie recently appointed product design leads for each of Euclid’s products and these individuals will take the lead going forward. This will ensure that Euclid’s unrivalled innovation continues every day going forward, and Charlie can focus on Euclid’s growth. ABOUT CHARLIE VINAL (CONT.) :