Michelle K Trejo

I started my career in municipal government early on, working at Pinal County government as a trainer. I was a certified instructor for the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and other courses in human communication management. The county manager asked me to be part of a new initiative in strategic planning and performance management, where I developed the training program that would work hand-in-hand with this new performance management approach. That's where I began in this line of work. When the recession hit, I was laid off and went to do strategic planning for the county school superintendent's office, where she made me the CEO of her nonprofit organization. After that, I worked for the state helping with STEM education event planning. Then I became a consultant for a small Hawaiian food restaurant group in Utah that needed help. I discovered they didn't need training but were operating on a much smaller scale when they needed to expand. I was offered a position as their Chief Organizational Development Officer and began the process of acquisition preparation and all that it entails to include strategic planning, HR standardizations, processes and policies. We built formalized finance and budget components needed for informed decisions and built their fourth store to model and scale out expansion. 15 years later, Mo' Bettahs Hawaiian Style Food Is almost 80 stores strong and one of the most successful Native Hawaiian startef businesses in the United States. As a Native Hawaiian myself, I am most proud of being a part of the early years of Mo Bettahs. After that, I took a turn at retail for a big box home decor company which was extremely beneficial in learning more about large business operations to include freight, buying and front line staff management. I had the great fortune of getting married to my wonderful husband Toby where I acquired 5 more children in addition to my 3. I took a professional pause to focus my that part of my life. About 5 years later I felt impressed to take my business savvy and experience to start and grow something of my own. Hawaiian Style Bakery, which grew from my home to a commercial bakery became the dessert vendor for all the Mo Bettahs Restaurant chain. Unfortunately, Post-COVID business conditions caused for a volatile drop in profit margins and I had to close the business. I did so with success in taking care of my staff in the process and maintaining excellent vendor relations. From their I embarked on Post Secondary education with Maricopa Community Colleges, the largest community college system in the country, where I lead their Center of Employee and Organizational Development and began a performance management program there. I left there just last year and started at the City of Mesa for a better opportunity, where I'm at now.

• Certified instructor for the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

• Arizona State University - Interdisciplinary degree (Business and Communications) with minor in Asian Pacific American Studies