With 28 years of Facilities Management experience working for such companies as General Electric, General Motors Acceptance Corporation, Ally, Comcast, and most recently Brookfield Global Integrated Solutions (BGIS) managing the US TD Corporate Campus and Headquarters in North America, Marcella consistently drives best practices, innovation, and sustainability initiatives to create the state-of-the-art work environments.
Marcella believes giving time to mentor and coach are essential to success and demonstrates that by volunteering for First Robotics as well as having served on the Board for the IFMA Greater Philadelphia Chapter as Program Chair 2010 to 2013, Vice President in 2014 and President in 2015. Marcella also brought back the IFMA Golf Outing in 2016-2018 to raise scholarships for Temple University and the Community College of Philadelphia in the field of Facilities Management, Architecture, and Environmental Preservation.
A graduate from the University of Florida with a degree in Journalism and Communications with a minor in Business Administration and French. Marcella also holds the prestigious Certified Facilities Manager (CFM) and Sustainable Facilities Professional (SFP) credentials from (IFMA) giving her proven leadership and strategy skills to drive positive change.
How did you get into Facility Management?
I am definitely an accidental FM. I started my career managing a small cable tv business as an office manager and all I did was have to chase after cable tv installer messes which included soiled carpets, damaged landscaping, wall repairs, sprinkler repairs, the list was unending so I partnered with local vendors negotiating deals with them to respond within so many hours and worked out preferred pricing. My first actual job in Facilities Management started when I worked for Kelly Temporary Services. Kelly needed someone to fill in as an Facilities Administrator back in 1994. It was only supposed to be for three weeks but turned into five years with GE Capital creating a position for me as an official Facilities Manager. I loved it so much that I never looked back and continue to grow in my career because that is the thing about Facilities, it is ever changing with sustainability, technology, and innovation plus I love to problem solve and that is basically all you do. Today, the world is a very different place and FM is finally being recognized as a critical role in making sure buildings operate efficiently.
Tell us about a favorite project.
By far, I would say the very high profile project while working at GMAC. We took the old Expo Center building located at 1100 Virginia Drive in Fort Washington down to studs and built a 450,000 Sq Ft facility all open plan with only 14 offices in total with the best amenities including an Olympic size basketball court, a Starbucks Cafe, a high-end Cafeteria serving very good food. The cafeteria also had a beautiful outdoor patio and a lot of glass including large skylights over eating areas. The project consisted of consolidating six buildings in PA and NJ into this one large facility saving 2 MM a year in operating expenses. In 2009, this building won BOMA’s Office Building of the Year Award (TOBY) in the Corporate Category.
What is your greatest success story?
I have many success stories but I think the one that resonates the most is when I started working for Comcast in 2011, the culture was clearly a run to fail model. The organization had no preventative maintenance program or any interest in asset management to the point that finally our transformer for the Engineering HQ’s in Mt Laurel began to fail and obviously that is not something that you can pull off the shelf and install so I had to drop a temporary transformer out back and it took a lot of planning and almost five months to replace it. The project was expensive and could have been avoided if the right preventative maintenance program was followed. It was a successful high profile project that got me the right attention allowing me to sit at the table when making strategic financial decisions. After that, I was able to introduce an asset management program that could forecast five, ten 15 even 20 years out for capital planning and forecasting. I was even able to convince them to add a second transformer for resiliency. Finally, we were not the janitors any longer. We were valued.
Tell us about a challenge or obstacle that you faced in the Facilities field and how you overcame it.
I would say that 2021 was a really tough year. My husband passed away that January and then Comcast eliminated my position of eleven years in October. It was hard at first even humbling but I realized that it was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. In fact, there are so many fascinating jobs in FM right now. I had fun applying and looking at what was out there. Do you know they even need FM’s to manage Cannabis Factories! When pursuing my new chapter, I decided to put a list together of what I wanted in my new role and one of the things I looked for in a company was their standing on sustainability and innovation and I am thrilled to report that both BGIS and TD Bank take environmental stewardship very seriously. TD Bank is huge on driving sustainable practices by creating SMART buildings, introducing landscaping indigenous to the area requiring little or no water to grow, and enforcing a comprehensive recycling program. Solar is also on the horizon as well as electric fueling stations. Sometimes, I have to pinch myself because I truly found my dream job.
What is something that most people do not know about you?
Not many people know this but I know how to disco dance very well not because I chose to but my Mother used to practice on me before she went to the disco clubs back in 1975. I was only twelve years old and really hated it but it does come in handy especially recently when I celebrated a friend’s milestone birthday and we went to Boogie Nights in Atlantic City where disco dancing is highly popular.
What learning experience would you pass onto future FM’s?
Obtain as many credentials as you can, volunteer, and network! You will reap the results tenfold.
With 28 years of Facilities Management experience working for such companies as General Electric, General Motors Acceptance Corporation, Ally, Comcast, and most recently Brookfield Global Integrated Solutions (BGIS) managing the US TD Corporate Campus and Headquarters in North America, Marcella consistently drives best practices, innovation, and sustainability initiatives to create the state-of-the-art work environments.
Marcella believes giving time to mentor and coach are essential to success and demonstrates that by volunteering for First Robotics as well as having served on the Board for the IFMA Greater Philadelphia Chapter as Program Chair 2010 to 2013, Vice President in 2014 and President in 2015. Marcella also brought back the IFMA Golf Outing in 2016-2018 to raise scholarships for Temple University and the Community College of Philadelphia in the field of Facilities Management, Architecture, and Environmental Preservation.
A graduate from the University of Florida with a degree in Journalism and Communications with a minor in Business Administration and French. Marcella also holds the prestigious Certified Facilities Manager (CFM) and Sustainable Facilities Professional (SFP) credentials from (IFMA) giving her proven leadership and strategy skills to drive positive change.
How did you get into Facility Management?
I am definitely an accidental FM. I started my career managing a small cable tv business as an office manager and all I did was have to chase after cable tv installer messes which included soiled carpets, damaged landscaping, wall repairs, sprinkler repairs, the list was unending so I partnered with local vendors negotiating deals with them to respond within so many hours and worked out preferred pricing. My first actual job in Facilities Management started when I worked for Kelly Temporary Services. Kelly needed someone to fill in as an Facilities Administrator back in 1994. It was only supposed to be for three weeks but turned into five years with GE Capital creating a position for me as an official Facilities Manager. I loved it so much that I never looked back and continue to grow in my career because that is the thing about Facilities, it is ever changing with sustainability, technology, and innovation plus I love to problem solve and that is basically all you do. Today, the world is a very different place and FM is finally being recognized as a critical role in making sure buildings operate efficiently.
Tell us about a favorite project.
By far, I would say the very high profile project while working at GMAC. We took the old Expo Center building located at 1100 Virginia Drive in Fort Washington down to studs and built a 450,000 Sq Ft facility all open plan with only 14 offices in total with the best amenities including an Olympic size basketball court, a Starbucks Cafe, a high-end Cafeteria serving very good food. The cafeteria also had a beautiful outdoor patio and a lot of glass including large skylights over eating areas. The project consisted of consolidating six buildings in PA and NJ into this one large facility saving 2 MM a year in operating expenses. In 2009, this building won BOMA’s Office Building of the Year Award (TOBY) in the Corporate Category.
What is your greatest success story?
I have many success stories but I think the one that resonates the most is when I started working for Comcast in 2011, the culture was clearly a run to fail model. The organization had no preventative maintenance program or any interest in asset management to the point that finally our transformer for the Engineering HQ’s in Mt Laurel began to fail and obviously that is not something that you can pull off the shelf and install so I had to drop a temporary transformer out back and it took a lot of planning and almost five months to replace it. The project was expensive and could have been avoided if the right preventative maintenance program was followed. It was a successful high profile project that got me the right attention allowing me to sit at the table when making strategic financial decisions. After that, I was able to introduce an asset management program that could forecast five, ten 15 even 20 years out for capital planning and forecasting. I was even able to convince them to add a second transformer for resiliency. Finally, we were not the janitors any longer. We were valued.
Tell us about a challenge or obstacle that you faced in the Facilities field and how you overcame it.
I would say that 2021 was a really tough year. My husband passed away that January and then Comcast eliminated my position of eleven years in October. It was hard at first even humbling but I realized that it was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. In fact, there are so many fascinating jobs in FM right now. I had fun applying and looking at what was out there. Do you know they even need FM’s to manage Cannabis Factories! When pursuing my new chapter, I decided to put a list together of what I wanted in my new role and one of the things I looked for in a company was their standing on sustainability and innovation and I am thrilled to report that both BGIS and TD Bank take environmental stewardship very seriously. TD Bank is huge on driving sustainable practices by creating SMART buildings, introducing landscaping indigenous to the area requiring little or no water to grow, and enforcing a comprehensive recycling program. Solar is also on the horizon as well as electric fueling stations. Sometimes, I have to pinch myself because I truly found my dream job.
What is something that most people do not know about you?
Not many people know this but I know how to disco dance very well not because I chose to but my Mother used to practice on me before she went to the disco clubs back in 1975. I was only twelve years old and really hated it but it does come in handy especially recently when I celebrated a friend’s milestone birthday and we went to Boogie Nights in Atlantic City where disco dancing is highly popular.
What learning experience would you pass onto future FM’s?
Obtain as many credentials as you can, volunteer, and network! You will reap the results tenfold.
IFMA Philly Newsletter Winter 2025 Upcoming Events, Past Event Highlights, New Members, and much, much more! Click on the image below to view newsletter.
IFMA Philly Newsletter Fall 2024 Past Event Highlights, Upcoming Events, Learning Opportunities, FM Spotlight Highlights, and much, much more! Click on image to view newsletter!
IFMA Philly Newsletter Summer 2024 Past Event Highlights, Upcoming Events, Learning Opportunities, FM Spotlight Highlights, and much, much more! Click on image to view newsletter!
