Welcome to Business Innovators Magazine…Please introduce yourself and a brief thumbnail sketch of your background.
KC: My name is Kevin Celisca and I am Haitian-American decent. I am the first person in my family to graduate from Fairleigh Dickinson University with an Accounting Degree. My love for entrepreneurship occurred when I did my study abroad in England, Italy, and China.
BI: What would you say is the area in business that you are most passionate about and why?
KC: My passion is in Innovation. I am a passionate person inspired by ideas that can challenge what we know, change how we think, and improve how we live. I left my comfortable job at one of the big 4, for an idea that I strongly believed in because I know it can help improve people’s lives in a way that I could have never done sitting behind a desk.
BI: How are you different than your competitors?
KC: The three big things that we are doing to set ourselves apart are: seamless integration of all important educational applications into one easy to use platform, blocking out all outside distractions, and lastly, using state of the art artificial intelligence to provide a customizable learning experience for students and data analytics for educators.
BI: Please tell me about any recent business accomplishments that you are most proud of and why?
KC: On top of being the CFO of a successful non-profit called College Lingual, and the co-founder of Integrate, and all the progress that we have made, I am most proud of what I have learned from the experience of being an entrepreneur. I have failed a lot, gotten laughed at, quit my job, and it has all made me a better person. I have used every failure as a lesson, and it has gotten me to where I am today.
BI: What Leadership qualities in Leaders do you most admire and why?
KC: Compassion and Understanding. Just because a leader can manage a job and get it done in a timely manner doesn’t mean that they are respected or liked by their employees. Empathy is needed to understand their struggles, make sure they feel happy, and a part of a team environment. This is something that you cannot fake; it has to come across genuinely; which requires a social intelligence. I find this to be a rarity, and that is why I admire it so much.
BI: What has been a key element of your success?
BI: Success is very multifaceted, but I would have to say my keys to my success are my innate drive for more, and my passion for social media. There are a lot of very talented and smart people out there that are just as successful as me, yet we don’t know about them because unfortunately they don’t promote themselves. Another strength of mine is knowing my weaknesses and finding people through social media who can complement my weaknesses to join my team.
BI: What are some of the business projects that you are currently working on that you are excited about and why?
KC: I am very excited about integrate because of the impact it can have on so many people’s lives. Integrate will change the way we look at education in the future, impacting all socioeconomic backgrounds, and education levels. We plan on doing this by increasing academic standards through a customized student experience, while making teaching more efficient.
BI: What are 1 or 2 things you would like to say to a prospective client who stumbles across this interview?
KC: By being one of the first schools to adopt our software, you will be a part of a revolution that has the potential to redefine education in America forever.
To show our appreciation, our company Integrate will offer significantly reduced rates for the first schools looking to pilot the program.
BI: To wrap this up, what are you most excited about in the upcoming months in your business?
KC: We are very excited to continue growing and contracting with more schools.
