2024 Top CEO
CEO Overview

Passionate about creating value, driving growth and building organizational capabilities, Paul Bedell excels at crafting and executing business plans that deliver results. He richly blends visionary, strategic, and tactical operational expertise to advance the direction of the business, while enabling continuous growth, business turnarounds and sustainable change.

As an intelligent, driven and highly curious forward-thinker, Paul is known for figuring things out and getting things done! In challenging markets and through financial crises, Paul has triumphed in attaining strong revenue, profit, and EBITDA gains. He is known for sound decision-making talents borne of thoughtful and balanced analysis, business acuity, and big picture vision.

Paul possesses deep expertise in leading sales, marketing, strategy, and corporate development functions. As a results-focused operations leader, Paul realizes efficiencies by driving operational excellence, streamlining and enhancing legacy processes, eliminating inefficiencies, and designing smart business plans.

Paul’s intuitive business sense and an instant grasp of evolving business landscapes underpin his dedication to ensure long-term organizational vitality. Most importantly, he displays verifiable success in the formation and management of businesses.

Currently, as a Board Member of Connexus Resource Group (CRG), Paul guides business strategy and corporate governance. As the Executive Chairman of CRG, Paul focused on strategic growth initiatives and led M&A efforts to acquire platform and tuck-in companies. He transitioned into the CEO role to navigate the company through COVID, helming strategies to protect and grow the business with full accountability for P&L, sales, marketing, operations, etc. Here, Paul transformed a historically brick-and-mortar business into a 100% virtual/remote operating model, growing revenues at 17% CAGR with strong EBITDA performance and free cash flows.

Previously, as the Chief Operating Officer at Trellis (formerly TG, Texas Guaranteed Student Loan Corporation), Paul led transformational change initiatives to rebrand, restructure and revitalize the business.  Paul unlocked new opportunities and created additional profitability by introducing new product offerings, divesting non-core business units, and  establishing a start-up entity from the ground up. Emphasizing operational excellence led to material cost reductions, increased operating margins, and higher levels of efficiency.

Earlier as the CEO of Binocular Inc., Paul prepared the business for exit and sale to BLIPPAR, which acquired Binocular in 2015.

Paul launched Korbella, LLC, an online/e-commerce jewelry start-up from inception to success.  Paul  expanded offerings and personally secured valuable media coverage in USA Today, Forbes, Men’s Health, and numerous business journals/magazines. He successfully secured product placement at the prestigious Four Seasons George V in Paris.

At Prudential Assurance Co., Paul served as Chief Marketing Officer, where he led successful new product launches, introduced decision science analytics, and diversified distribution channels to drive revenue growth.  He is credited with garnering new business premiums through customer segmentation, propensity modeling, and innovative marketing campaigns. Under Paul’s stewardship, the business moved up from #3 to #2 ranking in Hong Kong.

Operating as the COO of LandAmerica Financial Group, Paul built a performance-driven sales culture, unified brand architecture and transitioned from 80 disparate brands to 1 overarching brand and 3 sub-brands, strengthening market presence. The organization ranked #1 in mortgage services by Fortune: “Americas Most Admired Companies.

Paul’s early career comprises progressive Corporate VP, Senior VP and President roles at Citigroup. Prior to this he served as the Vice President of American International Group for Central & Eastern Europe (based in Poland), and various executive roles as part of General Electric Capital Corporation – from CA, CT, GA, and TX, to Jakarta, Indonesia.

Outside of the office, Paul spends quality time with his wife and 21-year old daughter. Paul is a fitness enthusiast and enjoys hiking & reading. He loves to travel, especially to Europe. To date, Paul has visited 39 countries and counting.

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