Careers at Center for Social Dynamics
Mission
The Center for Social Dynamics provides a range of evaluation, treatment and support services to children suffering from autism. The Company seeks to enable children and individuals to reach their full potential by helping them to develop new skills and maximise their ability to learn from natural environments, through a range of innovative solutions.
History
The Center for Social Dynamics as founded in 2012 by Pete Pallares (“Pallares”), a specialist in autism and developmental disorders. Pallares established the Company with a view to providing support and a safe place for families and children, seeking to provide services that enable children in local communities to thrive socially. Pallares, in particular, identified that Latino families face significant difficulties in finding diagnosis and therapy services for their children on the autism spectrum.
The Center for Social Dynamics began its life as a one-man operation, with Pallares working alone. The Company, however, has expanded relatively quickly, growing to 100 employees in its first year, and now employing around 175 people. The Company hopes to grow its workforce to around 300 by the end of 2016. The Center for Social Dynamics currently serves approximately 600 patients across its network of eight facilities across California, including in Oakland, Vallejo, Santa Clara, Gilroy, San Bruno, Sacramento, Modesto, and Los Angeles.
The Center for Social Dynamics has managed this rapid expansion without any investor funding. The Company remains a relatively low-profile operation, and does not have a published valuation.
Business model of Center for Social Dynamics
Customer Segments
The Center for Social Dynamics provides a range of evaluation, treatment, assessment, and support services to children, and the families of children, that suffer from a range of developmental and behavioural conditions. In particular, the Company provides treatment and transition programs for children on the autism spectrum. In addition to providing treatment and services directly to children, the Company also helps the parents of autism sufferers cope with the condition on a daily basis.
The Centre for Social Dynamics operates exclusively in the US, helping children across California, including in Los Angeles, Vallejo, Oakland, Santa Clara, Gilroy, San Bruno, Sacramento, and Modesto. The Company does not appear to have any imminent plans to expand its current base of consumers to reach other US states or international jurisdictions.
Value Propositions
The Center for Social Dynamics provides value to its customers in the following ways:
- Its trained therapists and specialist staff, with the Company employing teams of trained applied behaviour analysis therapists, and specialist behaviour analysts, as well as a team of experienced industry executives;
- Its broad range of services, with the Company offering a divers set of services, including assessment and evaluation services, treatment plan development, and ongoing family support, as well as various social skills and transition programs;
- Its personalised care, with the Company providing a significant degree of personal care to its customers, responding to evolving child and parent needs and being sensitive to family dynamics and beliefs; and
- Its evidence-based methods and commitment to ongoing research, with the Company implementing a data and evidence-driven approach to its services, and participating in ongoing behavioural analysis research.
Channels
The Center for Social Dynamics operates a website at www.centersocialdynamics.com, through which it provides information on its various services, programs, and locations. While the Company does not operate an online sales platform, it does provide an online contact form on its website through which customers can register an interest in its services. The Company’s website also includes payment portal through which customers can pay for various services and programs.
The Center for Social Dynamics operates a network of facilities across California, spanning Los Angeles, Vallejo, Oakland, Santa Clara, Gilroy, San Bruno, Sacramento, and Modesto. Through these facilities, the Company’s teams of trained applied behaviour analysis therapists and specialist behavioural analysts provide treatment and conduct program events with patients in person. The Center for Social Dynamics’s facilities also serve as sales outlets, where parents can sign their children up for treatments and programs.
Customer Relationships
The Center for Social Dynamics does not operate an online, self-service sales channel. The Company’s website, however, does allow for customers to register an interest in the Company’s services without interacting with members of the Company’s sales or support staff. The Center for Social Dynamics also provides an online payment portal that enables customers to pay for services independently online.
Through its regional network of facilities, The Center for Social Dynamics provides a greater degree of personal care. The Company’s staff are available to provide advice and guidance on the Company’s various treatment and analysis options, consulting directly with parents and families as to the most appropriate course of action. The Company’s therapists and analysts also work directly with children to treat, and evaluate their conditions, and improve their sociability.
The Center for Social Dynamics provides ongoing support to its customers, who are able to contact the Company’s staff either over the phone at its various facilities, or through an online contact form. The Company also operates several social media accounts – including with Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn – through which it is able to interact directly with customers.
Key Activities
The Center for Social Dynamics is a behavioural analysis and treatment company. It operates a network of facilities across California that offer a range of services and programs to children suffering from developmental disorders, most notably autism.
The Company employs teams of applied behaviour analysis therapists, and behaviour analysts, who specialise in the evaluation, assessment and treatment of behavioural conditions. The Company seeks to meet the developmental needs of each individual child.
They are incorporating behaviour analysis, occupational, speech, and psychological therapies, providing personalised and cutting-edge diagnostic and therapy services. The Center for Social Dynamics also provides ongoing support to parents and families that are dealing with behavioural disorders in their households.
Key Partners
The Center for Social Dynamics works in close partnerships with a variety of companies and organisations in developing and implementing its treatments and services. These partners include:
- Supplier and Vendor Partners, comprising suppliers of services, tools, equipment, and technologies that are utilised across the entirety of the Company’s operations, as well as companies to which certain functions can be outsourced;
- Research Partners, comprising a range of academic and institutional partners that assist the Company in developing new approaches and treatments for various developmental disorders, including autism; and
- Technology Partners, comprising various technology and software providers that assist the Company in managing, analysing, and utilising data and information across its network of facilities.
Key Resources
The Center for Social Dynamics’s key resources are its intellectual properties and brand, its supply chain and equipment, its network of facilities, its IT and communications infrastructure, its partnerships, and its personnel – in particular its behavioural therapists and analysts.
The Center for Social Dynamics depends in large part on having spaces at which it is able to provide treatment and analysis. This includes the Company’s network of owned and or leased properties across California, including in Los Angeles, Vallejo, Oakland, Santa Clara, Gilroy, San Bruno, Sacramento, and Modesto.
Cost Structure
The Center for Social Dynamics incurs costs in relation to the development of its services and treatments, the procurement of supplies and equipment, the operation of its physical facilities, the maintenance of its IT and communications infrastructure, the management of its partnerships, and the retention of its personnel.
The Company incurs occupancy costs – including rental and utility fees – across its network of facilities, as well as costs associated with the payment of salaries and benefits to its employees.
Revenue Streams
The Center for Social Dynamics generates revenue through the provision of various analysis, evaluation, treatment, assessment, and support services. The Company appears to charge a fee to customers for its services and enrolment in its various programs. The Center for Social Dynamics, however, does not provide a pricing guide on its website.
The Center for Social Dynamics continues to operate as a privately-owned company, and as such does not disclose its financial results on its website. There is little coverage The Center for Social Dynamics, and research identified no reference to its recent revenue figures.
Our team
info: Pallares has served as Chief Executive Officer at The Center for Social Dynamics since founding the Company in 2012. He is responsible for directing the Company’s corporate strategy, and overseeing the Company’s team of therapists and analysts. According to a corporate biography, he has been active in the field of autism and developmental disorders for more than 15 years, specialising in assessing and analysing certain social and cultural dynamics that affect individuals differently. Pallares is an active member and presenter for the California Association for Behavioral Analysis and has also been involved in important autism research studies conducted by the Department of Public Health and Kaiser Permanente.
info: Brad Kerstetter (“Kerstetter”) has served as Chief Financial Officer at The Center for Social Dynamics since joining the Company in 2015. He is also the owner of educational toys retailer Learning Express Toys San Ramon. Kerstetter has held a number of senior financial roles. He began his career at Bay Alarm Company in 1990, where he worked his way up to the role of Assistant Controller and Branch Manager. He moved to CampSix in 2000, where he served as Controller for a year, before joining Clear Channel Outdoor as a finance manager. After several years in this position, he joined TapRoot Systems as Controller, and in 2001 he was named Controller at Easter Seals Bay Area. This was his final role before moving to The Center for Social Dynamics.
info: Gurpreet Kaur (“Kaur”) has served as Regional Director at The Center for Social Dynamics since 2015. She first joined the Company in 2013, serving initially as a program supervisor, before being promoted to the role of Lead Program Supervisor for All Regions. Kaur has served in the health and medical field for her entire career. She served as a lung health program assistant with the American Lung Association from 2009 to 2010, before taking on a master of public health internship at the Southern Nevada Health District, where she was responsible for updating and revising the Nutrition Resource Directory, reviewing current health programs, and developing program reports.