FULL CAPACITY MARKETING
About Us
We love what we do
Marian Anderson once said that leadership should be born out of the understanding of the needs of those who would be affected by it. Here at FCM, we do the work we do in workforce and education because fundamentally those involved in these fields seek to make lives better. We invite you to get to know our diverse team that is driven by their life experiences to make others’ lives better.
OUR FOCUS
FCM is a national consultancy specializing in brand storytelling and strategic communications for those in the workforce, education and entrepreneurship sectors.
Our thought leadership builds the capacity of public and private sector organizations and nonprofits to make informed choices in how to best communicate the value of their respective brands and engage customers, partners and funders with their important missions.
Through our eFCM Learning Hub we ensure that our customers have the right skill sets to elevate the exposure, awareness and status of their brands and streamline efforts to gain higher returns on publicity and marketing investments.
FULL CAPACITY MARKETING
CEO/Founder
Celina Shands, M.S.
Born and raised in North Carolina, Celina approaches business like a true southerner—relationships first, business second—and surrounds herself with a great team that is committed to excellence on each and every project. As a communications expert, Celina has helped more than 500 workforce development and K-12/postsecondary education organizations across the nation build high-performing outreach campaigns that empower vulnerable populations, students and job seekers to embrace their potential and motivate employers to be part of the process. She has earned 75 global awards, including a 2021 Stevie® Business Award for Communications Campaign of the Year, and is a former American Marketing Association Marketer of the Year and a two-time
Women Who Mean Business finalist.
VP Public Relations
Anika Jackson, B.A.
As a marcom executive and instructor at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, Anika’s knowledge of the intersections between public relations, branding, and digital media management is a perfect match to elevate results for FCM customers. She serves on the advisory board for the UC Santa Barbara Women in Leadership executive program, is a member of the QuickBooks Small Business Council and contributes her knowledge and thought leadership for the benefit of multiple local, national, and global organizations. Anika launched her marketing and business podcast in 2020, and it now has 50,000 monthly listeners and more than 5,500 5-star reviews (and growing).
Director of Marketing
Emma Kessner, B.A.
Graduating one year early with a degree in Economics from the University of California, Santa Cruz, Emma is on a fast track to become FCM’s youngest Chief Marketing Officer. A digital native, she plays a pivotal role in crafting data-driven, impactful brand identities and spearheading community-focused marketing strategies. Emma founded a successful Student Apprenticeship Program in her senior year of high school, and in that same year, was selected as the captain of her all-girls robotics team, leading them to win the Los Angeles Regional Championship as well as a judged award at the World Championship in Houston. She is a passionate advocate for underrepresented groups in STEM, teaching computer coding workshops to students impacted by childhood chronic illness.
When the National Association of Workforce Boards chose a new communications firm, we did a thorough review of our choices and could not be happier with FCM. Their dedication to us as a client is exceptional, and their eye for what we need has been superb. The measure of their excellence is demonstrated through our selection for the International Davey Award for our integrated campaign
Ron Painter – Chief Executive Officer
National Association of Workforce Boards (NAWB)
Without a doubt, FCM provided our organization with the right re-branding strategy and solutions. Using a collaborative approach to engage our stakeholders resulted in an expanded awareness and understanding of our mission.
Bruce England – Executive Director
Susquehanna Workforce Network
Full Capacity Marketing has a distinct and effective style of collaboration that is highly successful in bridging gaps and finding common ground between various stakeholders. Their public awareness campaign was highly successful in improving our brand awareness, but most importantly laid the foundational groundwork for building partnerships with our most important community stakeholders within the public workforce investment system, economic development and community colleges.
Shanee Smith – Senior Planner
Virginia Employment Commission – Workforce Investment Act Division
FCM is masterful at bringing a brand strategy to fruition. Our project benefitted greatly from their expertise and we ended up with very effective, professional, on-time and on-target communication tools to engage the community with our mission.
Jason Cameron – Project 5002 Supervisor
Workforce Institute – San Jose/Evergreen Community College District
FCM has an energetic, professional, smart team that understands the world of community colleges. What I appreciate most about FCM is their responsiveness and ability to deliver quality products and services very rapidly. Our brand strategy and subsequent marketing and communications tools developed by FCM are outstanding and have helped our team achieve great success. I would recommend FCM without hesitation to any community college.
Audrey Reille, Ed. D. – Director
Center of Excellence and CTE Hub
California Corporate College hired FCM to help one of our customers with understanding their market position and how to best sell their products and services. We were so impressed with FCM’s approach, analysis and the presentation to our customer. It has far exceeded what we were contracted to do and I know the information will help our customer make an informed decision on how to best position their organization. Thanks FCM!
Catherine Swenson – Director
California Corporate College
Part of our Board’s strategy in looking at future trends and creating solutions for our community requires engaging the many public/private workforce, economic and educational partners. FCM has greatly supported this strategy that provides a two-way communication mechanism for our community stakeholders to weigh-in on our funding, our strategies, and key initiatives.
David Hollars – Executive Director
Centralina Workforce Development Board
FCM has a unique customer-centric model in approaching brand strategies. We were highly impressed with the market research and upfront strategy sessions that enabled us to tap into the needs of our ultimate users. Working with FCM was an outstanding investment, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend the team at FCM. I hope to work with them again in the future.
Carolyn Jeskey – Director
Joblinks Employment Transportation Center
FCM provided thoughtful recommendations that have been instrumental in the brand awareness of the Institute. FCM was responsive, creative, and made us feel like we were their only client throughout the entire process.
Phil Jordan – Executive Director
Economic Advancement Research Institute
By far, Celina Shands is one of the most talented PR professionals that I have ever met in my 20 years in broadcast. Thinking out-of-the-box is the norm for Celina as evidenced by her cause-related marketing projects.
Leslie Groza – Noon News Producer
KFMB TV 8 – San Diego
Celina and FCM is an exceptional talent. Her ability to perceive the intellectual concept and the parameters of a problem or challenge and artfully apply solutions and expertise is astounding. She has powerful and effective interpersonal skills and consistently delivers outstanding products and service on time and without cost over runs. I strongly endorse her company and the work performed.
Booker Graves – Former Executive Director
State of Colorado – Office of Workforce Development
FCM is a resource that other workforce boards should tap. As a result of our work with FCM, we have completely re-branded our Board and restructured our customer service and communication processes. I would recommend their services without hesitation to any of my workforce colleagues.
Adam Peck – Executive Director
Workforce Investment Board of Tulare County
We worked with FCM to teach employees consultative sales techniques and to think differently about service delivery for our employer customers. In a time constrained environment, FCM kept in regular contact with our office, developed marketing materials and trained all our staff. The staff enjoyed the training while they were learning and were pleased with the professional marketing materials.
Shannon Munro – Executive Director
CPWDC
The FCM team is bright, professional, creative and highly strategic. The brand strategy and outreach materials they developed exceeded our expectations, and have been instrumental in helping us meet our goals and objectives.
Sharon Sewell – Director, Program Operations
Workforce Professionals Training Institute
The plan developed by FCM has helped position CRY-ROP to clearly communicate its benefits to each of the target groups based upon evidence of impacts. CRY-ROP would not hesitate to hire/contract with FCM in the future. Working with the responsive, professional FCM support team has been a pleasant reminder of how powerful and effective the blending of industry leading professionals and progressive educators can be.
Stephanie Houston, Superintendent
Colton Redlands Yucaipa ROP
FCM was instrumental in helping our Foundation kickoff a critical giving campaign by focusing on the development of a long-term re-branding strategy. I’d highly recommend FCM to any nonprofit looking to be more strategic and focused about their image and fundraising strategies.
Brett Lundstrom – Chair
Elgin Community College Foundation
I’ve learned in our re-branding journey with FCM that there has to be a clear alignment from all of our business processes to our brand strategy. Their organizational ecosystem is a highly effective model that has propelled our organization to the next level of performance. I’d highly recommend their talented team.
Todd Gustafson – Executive Director
Kinexus
FCM has decades of experience in workforce and education and understands the dynamics in our Strong Workforce environment in California. Their experience, coupled with innovative and cutting edge branding, marketing and communications strategies are executed effectively and result in elevating the work in our regions.
Jim Caldwell
Sector Navigator, Energy, Construction & Utilities Sector
We are so proud of the six Davey awards for our national campaign and credit Full Capacity Marketing for mobilizing both leadership and educators in all 50 states to reposition our important mission. Their team is consistently strategic, on time, and on or under budget. I highly recommend FCM in developing and executing complex education and workforce campaigns that need targeted results. We have rehired them for future phases of our project.
Sharon Bonney, Executive Director
COABE
Full Capacity Marketing is exceptional at understanding the market and knowing how to create the right strategies to engage students. They are responsive, available and highly strategic in working with our many stakeholders. Our region is very excited about their work to date and we look forward to continuing our relationship.
West Coast
East Coast