Guilty by Association: The Vantaca Podcast: Recent Episodes
Vantaca
Welcome to Guilty by Association, your podcast for all things in the community association management industry with discussions ranging from HOA horror stories to how technology is changing the CAM landscape. Hosted by the Vantaca team, this podcast will dive into the emerging trends and news in community association management, as well as chatting with CAM industry leaders, banking and tech partners, and association managers from around the country. Regardless of their CAM connection, all guests are Guilty by Association.
After experiencing the difficulties of hiring and retaining qualified staff while running a community association management organization, Rob Buffington of Gordian Staffing became his own first customer when he deciding to scale his business using remote team members. Now, five years and 300 employees later his company is focused on helping other community association management companies address their staffing needs with remote team members. Guilty By Association cohosts Shelly DeAntonio and BD Snow pick Rob’s brain on all things staffing, how to get the most out of a remote team member, and the best ways to set new employees up for success.
In a change of trajectory, Vantaca CEO Ben Currin went from serving as a nuclear engineer on an attack sub in the U.S. Navy to piloting the rocket ship to the moon that is Vantaca. Guilty By Association Co-Hosts Shelly DeAntonio and B.D. Snow spend time with Currin chatting about his time in the military, the transition to civilian life, and what attracted him to Vantaca and the community association management industry. Currin also discusses where he sees certain trends in the industry going and Vantaca’s vision, along with some great book and podcast recommendations.
Balancing the Old with the New How do you balance processes that have worked in the past with new emerging technologies that help a community run more efficiently? Ricky Zilem, VP of Business Development with PS Property Management in Austin, Texas, stops by the Guilty By Association studio to chat about the questions community management associations are asking themselves, and new tech solutions emerging in the CAM industry. Cohosts Shelly DeAntonio and BD Snow also become the interviewees when answering Zilem's questions about how Vantaca approaches our relationship with community association management companies.
Vantaca Customer Success Manager Stacey Kruse joins Guilty by Association: The Vantaca Podcast to chat with co hosts Shelly DeAntonio and BD Snow about her experience with Vantaca both as a customer and an employee. Having personally experienced the implementation process for Vantaca while working at a community association management company, Kruse talks about how understanding where our clients are coming from has helped her in her role as a customer success manager. The Vantaca team also dives into change management, working through the different laws in each state, working remotely, and the best HOA violation she's seen.
Customer service can mean many things to many people. To Chris Morales, Director of Workflow at Heritage Property Management Services in Atlanta, Georgia, customer service is of the utmost importance when working in the community association management industry. Guilty by Association cohosts Shelly DeAntonio and BD Snow sit down with Chris to chat about her career journey, her customer service philosophy, and the importance of education in the CAM industry at every level—from community managers to homeowners and board members.
On this episode of Guilty by Association, cohosts Shelly DeAntonio and BD Snow are joined by James Bradley, Director of Business Development Strategy with Association Prime. Having spent time in many sectors of the community association management industry, banker Bradley provides his unique look at the trends and insights around the relationship between community association management companies and their banks. Guilty by Association: The Vantaca Podcast is available for streaming on Spotify, Amazon Music, Apple Podcast, and More!
Anyone who has spent time around a Vantaca employee will tell you -- we're big on company culture. Vantaca Director of People and Culture, Graham Elmore, stops by the Guilty by Association studio to chat with hosts Shelly DeAntonio and BD Snow about the lengths to which the Vantaca team has gone to build that winning company culture and the importance of finding the right people. As someone who was previously an elementary school principal, Graham also chats about his path to Vantaca and how some of the people management strategies he learned in the classroom apply to the corporate world as well. Learn how Vantaca employees like Graham strive to embody our core principles of: win as a team, always growing, responsibility starts with me, an unwavering commitment to the customer experience and no big company BS, each and every day.
Guilty By Association and host Shelly DeAntonio have a special guest on this week — Vantaca co-founder Dave Sweyer. In addition to being the co-founder of Vantaca, Dave is also the co-owner of CAMS, an industry leader in community association management since 1991. CAMS is headquartered in Wilmington, NC, with locations across the Carolinas. An engineer at heart, Dave chats with Shelly about everything from what led him to the CAM industry, to the founding of Vantaca and valuable lessons learned along the way about facilitating change management, building successful teams, and the importance of asking the right questions.
How did Vantaca come to exist? What deficiencies were there in the community association management industry that led our founders to build a better solution? Two of Vantaca’s original employees—Greg Rohde, Chief Growth Officer, and Lauren Godwin, Chief Customer Officer—talk about the early days of Vantaca, the impetus to create the software, and their own journeys within the CAM industry. Host Shelly DeAntonio dives into the past, present and future of Vantaca with Greg and Lauren.
How can your previous career in a different industry help you become successful in a different industry? Scott Wolf, owner of Brigs in the Greater Boston Area, has a rich history in the hospitality industry that has molded himself and his company's core values. From learning customer service standards from one of the leading hospitality chains in the world he believes that understanding how to service the client and provide top quality service is what has allowed Brigs to evolve year after year while acquiring other companies. Scott chats with BD and Shelly about the transition of acquiring a company and maintaining a positive culture and exceptional customer service.
Evelyn Dufford with Association Services of Washington joins BD Snow and Shelly DeAntonio to chat about how the pandemic affected our industry, board education, areas of focus, and the infamous “Book of Komatsu.” Learn how the Association Services of Washington pivoted during and after the pandemic with their employees and their clients. How has the pandemic changed the landscape for where people live, and will they commute to work? How were receivables impacted due to the pandemic? While the day-to-day hustle of running a management company embodies many moving parts, Evelyn and her team came up with a creative way to record some of the most memorable and outrageous HOA stories.
What is it like to be the first client on new software in the industry? Lisa Turner with Silver Leaf Management Company in Loganville, Georgia sits down with BD Snow and Shelly DeAntonio to peel back the layers of the transition and evolution of Vantaca. Lisa takes us through Silver Leaf’s 5-year journey with Vantaca and how it has impacted her company, employees, and board members. Lisa also lets us in on some of her strangest violations yet, HOA after dark….
From IT to property manager, to Executive of PRM Chicago; Niall Dempsey taps into the importance of technology in the Community Management industry. Technology has allowed PRM Chicago to have an employee work-life balance, efficient training, analyzing data, and recruiting. Vantaca’s software has allowed Niall and PRM Chicago to customize workflows, and dictate the software for his company and not have the software dictate the company.