Delivering Excellence
Introducing Paychex's Andy Childs and Antonio Lizano
By: Latino Leaders Staff
Paychex, Inc. is a recognized leader in the payroll, human resource, and benefits outsourcing industry, with a steadfast commitment to success and a record of achievement that continues a tradition of delivering excellence.
The company was founded in 1971 by B. Thomas Golisano. Paychex now has more than 12,000 employees serving more than half a million small- to medium-sized businesses nationwide. Paychex serves approximately 605,000 payroll clients as of May 31, 2016.
In an exclusive interview with Latino Leaders magazine, Andy Childs, vide president marketing and Antonio Lizano, corporate multicultural marketing manager share their professional expertise and the values Paychex is bringing to the small businesses and Latino-owned business?
ANDY CHILDS
A senior executive with more than 30 years of marketing and business development experience, Andy Childs joined Paychex as the vice president of marketing in February 2011. Currently he leads leads the marketing, corporate development, and strategic planning functions for the company. Childs previously held marketing leadership positions at Pitney Bowes, Mercer, and ADP. Childs holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in chemistry from Harvard University.
Please share with us some facts about your background, family, early education.
I am the oldest of three children. I was born in Alexandria, Virginia, and also lived in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Maryland, Kentucky and Connecticut growing up. My father grew up in Brooklyn and was an economist (now retired). He started his career teaching at Dartmouth University and Rutgers University and later worked for the federal government and in industry, for many years as Chief Economist of BP Americas, before returning to education late in his career. My mother grew up in the Boston area and started a career as an elementary school teacher, but stopped working when she had children. My brother lives in the New York City area and is a pediatrician. My sister owned a print brokerage business in New Jersey, but has since retired and lives in Jacksonville, Florida. I graduated from Andrew Warde High School in Fairfield, Connecticut, and attended college at Harvard University, where I earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, with honors, in chemistry. I have been married to my wife, Cindy, for 30 years, and we have a daughter, Zoe, who lives in New Jersey and teaches preschool.
What was your first job and the start of your career?
My first job was as a Brand Assistant at the Procter & Gamble Company, helping to market Frymax deep-frying shortening to restaurant operators. I switched over to marketing consumer health care products when I joined Whitehall Laboratories and continued with positions at Adria Laboratories, The Upjohn Company and Becton Dickinson. I also was a strategy consultant with McKinsey & Company for five years early in my career. Since 2000, I have held a range of CMO roles (corporate, business unit, geographic) marketing business and professional services, first for ADP then Mercer, Pitney Bowes, and now Paychex, Inc.
What made you choose the career path you have worked until now?
From the very beginning, I enjoyed the challenges inherent in marketing and finding ways to use marketing strategies and tactics to solve business problems and grow businesses. Marketing is (usually) all about growth and thinking about new ways to reach and influence prospects and customers.
ANTONIO LIZANO
Antonio Lizano is the corporate multicultural marketing manager at Paychex. Lizano joined the company in May 2014. Lizano is in charge of discovering, defining, developing and deploying a Multicultural & International Marketing Strategy for PAYCHEX Corp. Lizano has implemented and verbalized segment business plan across the organization leadership. He also formalized the Multicultural initiative compressed of Hispanic, Asian and African American segmentation efforts. Lizano has a MBA, MINI MBA from the University of St. Thomas - Opus College of Business.
Please share with us some facts about your background, family, early education.
I am the fourth of five children in my family. I was born in San Jose, Costa Rica, and grew up there until age 17. That’s when I decided to pursue my education in the U.S. and moved to Chicago. My parents were both educators in Costa Rica, my father on the administration side of the department of education and my mom a psychologist, Spanish teacher and a passionate opera singer. When I first arrived in Illinois, I entered a community college in a Hispanic neighborhood, Triton College, and I completed my associate’s degree and earned enough credits to transfer into a bachelor’s program that I completed at the Universidad Latina in San Jose, Costa Rica. I completed my MBA there as well.
What was your first job and the start of your career?
It is hard to identify my first job. As a humble Latino, paying my own way through college, I had to do all kinds of jobs to get through – busboy, cleaning, lifeguard, cook. But it was not until my second year in Triton that I started a career in the airline industry and I learned the corporate environment at the headquarters of United Airlines in River Grove, Illinois. I stayed there for five years, and had multiple roles in accounting, human resources, and customer service.
What made you choose the career path you have worked until now?
In the mid ’90s, I started working in the graphic arts and printing industry. I developed an e-commerce platform and marketing materials for the organization I was working for at the time. That experience led me to participate in major event trade shows in Germany, the U.S. and Latin America – I knew right then that was the path I wanted to follow. From there, I developed businesses relationships that prepared me to lead the sales development in Latin America for a major branding consulting organization, Addison Whitney. I also learned how to develop business strategy, sales and how to build and conduct a full marketing campaign. That eventually took me to another organization, where I led the Hispanic and multicultural efforts across the nation in the banking industry at U.S. Bank in Minnesota. Eventually I started a marketing consulting firm, Marco Polo Advertising, that specializes in multicultural marketing.
To finish the interview, check out our Digital Edition!