Where Jennifer can help:

• Advising on customer insight and strategy: customer discovery, customer experience, customer success, and product-market fit.
• Reviewing opportunities and strategies for productizing and commercializing existing service offerings.
• Advising B2B and SaaS companies
• Providing guidance on establishing or stabilizing systems and processes to support growth.
• Advising on key account / partner management strategies.

Successes:

• CMO at a US$14billion company, overseeing customer experience, marketing, digital, omni-channel, pricing, analytics and communications.
• Led and executed a turnaround strategy positioning a start-up for acquisition.
• Drove 75% of revenue growth for a B2B consultancy.

Where Laurie can help:

• Reviewing business models and making recommendations on revenue generation, distribution etc.
• Evolving business from the customer discovery stage to MVP and initial traction.
• Fundraising strategy and pitch preparation, particularly for angel/pre-seed investment rounds.

Successes:

• Previously held executive roles at Nortel, including VP of Product Development and VP of Advanced Technology.
• COO and CEO experience at a SaaS startup.
• Founder of Capital Angel Network, one of the most active angel groups in Canada.

As past President of Chipworks, Julia Elvidge has extensive experience growing a company in the high tech industry. Her strengths include industry experience with Intellectual Property (IP) issues, international sales, strategic planning and product management best practices. Julia retired after the sale of Chipworks to its largest competitor, TechInsights, in June 2016. Chipworks and TechInsights are Ottawa based companies that sold or sell technology and patent related intelligence products and services to large Asian, American, and European electronics companies. Prior to joining Chipworks, Ms. Elvidge worked at LSI Logic Canada, a company that designed and manufactured semiconductor chips.   

Julia is an electrical engineering graduate of University of Waterloo and a member of the Canadian Institute of Corporate Directors, and has attained the Institute’s ICD.D designation. Her interests include leadership skills development and mentoring girls and women in STEM careers or business growth.

Where Shahzad can help:

• Advising on product visioning, market validation and product strategy, including how to be scrappy without incurring a fatal amount of technology debt.
• Reviewing technology strategy and ensuring alignment with overall business strategy.
• Support with developing Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, or Data-First based products.
• Transitioning a firm from a consulting/services model to product or platform focused business.
• Special interest in helping at the beginning stages of the firm – including the wilderness period for bootstrapped firms prior to product-market fit.

Successes:

• Has supported dozens of companies to realign their strategy around AI/ML.
• Taken several firms from founding, through the entire bootstrapped value-creation lifecycle, until exit (or shutdown!).
• Deep technology experience, including ~40 peer-reviewed research papers, 5 granted patents, PhD from Univ of Cambridge (UK) in AI and several years as a university professor.

Where Rob can help:

• Funding strategy at all stages – from bootstrap to exit.
• Understanding how to develop an investor pipeline and manage a fundraising process.
• Crafting an investment pitch, devising appropriate content, working on the investor “story” and tips on delivery.
• Navigating the due diligence process, including how to approach term sheet negotiations, valuation discussions, and final closing.
• General growth strategy including team building (from first employee to 100+ people), sales strategy, partnerships and channel development, marketing and business development.

Successes:

• Founded and exited four startups.
• Raised over $100M in venture financing to date.
• Built B2B, B2C and SaaS companies in sectors including technology, retail e-commerce, digital media and consumer goods.
• Held positions in several Fortune 500 companies in North America and Europe.

Where Erin can help:

• Building and executing customer-led, growth-focused marketing strategies.
• Demand generation via unpaid methods.
• Using content marketing to build your brand and capture attention in a noisy market.
• Social media marketing and building a community of raving customers.
• Hiring and training new marketing team members.

Successes:

• Founded one of Canada’s first virtual assistance businesses.
• Helped first client – a startup in Silicon Valley – grow to acquisition by Ancestry.com for $100M.
• Provided services to leading global brands, including Disney, Microsoft, Ford, and Alliance Films.
• Featured in publications such as TechCrunch, The Globe & Mail, The Wall Street Journal, and AdWeek.

Where Margo can help:

• Mentoring CEOs, leaders and teams from formation through to high growth.
• Workforce and talent strategies and structure.
• Compensation, executive & sales comp plans, developing and managing ESOPs.
• Founder, leadership, and employee relations.
• Foundational and scaling HR strategies and issues.

Successes:

• Established and sold telecom startup company.
• Helped with raising $75M in venture capital.
• Founded high growth professional services company.
• Experience with M&A and post-acquisition integrations (US, Europe, Canada).
• Has contributed to business expansion into US, China, UK, Europe, Singapore, South America.

Where Rob can help:

• Funding strategy at all stages – from bootstrap to exit.
• Understanding how to develop an investor pipeline and manage a fundraising process.
• Crafting an investment pitch, devising appropriate content, working on the investor “story” and tips on delivery.
• Navigating the due diligence process, including how to approach term sheet negotiations, valuation discussions, and final closing.
• General growth strategy including team building (from first employee to 100+ people), sales strategy, partnerships and channel development, marketing and business development.

Successes:

• Founded and exited four startups.
• Raised over $100M in venture financing to date.
• Built B2B, B2C and SaaS companies in sectors including technology, retail e-commerce, digital media and consumer goods.
• Held positions in several Fortune 500 companies in North America and Europe.

Where Kevin can help:

• Advising on product strategy, including finding/measuring product-market fit.
• Reviewing pricing and unit economics.
• Providing guidance on communicating the product roadmap and strategy with internal and external stakeholders.
• Reviewing alignment between technology roadmap and product roadmap.
• Advising on managing and executing on product requirements (processes, tools, methodologies).
• Aligning customer feedback processes to the overall market.

Successes:

• Co-founded a company that has grown to over 200 employees and raised over $100 million.
• At Mivision, oversaw all aspects of product management, including strategy, pricing, roadmaps, market fit and more.
• Opened European sales office in Germany.
• Currently a Partner at Graphite Ventures – a Canadian seed stage venture capital firm.

Where Susan can help:

• Advising on budgeting and cash flow planning.
• Reviewing current financial practices and providing suggestions for improvement.
• Supporting fundraising activities.
• Improving the efficiency of business processes.
• Introducing and tracking key performance indicators.

Successes:

• Has helped companies raise over $50M in venture capital.
• Has held several CFO roles with public companies.
• Contributed to several successful M&A events.

Where Donna can help:

• Guiding executive teams through strategic vision, operational planning, and corporate governance sessions.
• Conducting audits of combined marketing and sales activities.
• Reviewing go-to-market strategies for new international markets.
• Conducting assessments of product-market fit and opportunities for long-term demand.
• Optimizing inbound marketing/revenue engines and teams.

Successes:

• Built inbound marketing & revenue engine that accounted for 100% of sales and drove 30% CAGR for 10 years.
• 25+ years running marketing, sales and business development teams in high tech companies like QNX & Bitflash.
• Founding CMO at Halogen Software taking it to a global market leader with 500+ employees, $70M ARR, double-digit growth, and eventual exit for $293M.
• Experience raising funds, working closely with VCs, and managing boards.

Where Steve can help:

• Evaluating, choosing, and using marketing technologies to help capture, convert, and track leads.
• Building digital experiences in line with the buyer journey.
• Setting up campaigns for lead generation, onboarding, and customer engagement.

Successes:

• Redesigned the digital channel for several global B2B technology brands.
• Founded the Marketing Technology consultancy within one of North America’s premier B2B agencies.
• Has led teams of creatives and developers to deliver leading-edge and award-winning digital programs.

Where Markus can help:

• Building a successful sales process/playbook.
• Developing an inbound/outbound sales strategy.
• Developing a revenue model and appropriate pricing.
• Hiring, training and coaching new sales team members to build a high performing team.
• Ensuring seamless integration of sales and customer success functions.

Successes:

• First sales leadership hire at two tech start-ups, bringing a valuable early-stage perspective to navigate the sales function at different stages of growth (from $0 – 10M).
• Grew start-up revenue from $0 to 7 figures in ARR in one year as VP of Sales.
• Has sold into various industries, from Fortune 500 companies like Google, Salesforce & Meta to more traditional industries like banks & credit unions.

Where Lauren can help:

• Guidance on creating or growing a Customer Success function.
• Mapping the end-to-end customer journey.
• Onboarding and training new customers.
• Segmenting customers and assessing their health.
• Increasing customer lifetime value, reducing churn.
• Supporting development of customer success metrics as well as guidance on how to perform customer listening and incorporate feedback.

Successes:

• 20-years CS/CX experience with companies spanning startup to enterprise.
• Proven track record of delivering multimillion-dollar revenue growth and reduced churn.
• While at Kinaxis, directly contributed to 10x revenue growth over 3 years through adoption programs.
• Founded SaaSCan to empower Canadian SaaS startups and scaleups through credible, Canadian-focused SaaS metric research.

Where Danny can help:

• Accelerating time-to-revenue by optimizing sales strategies, pricing structures, forecasting capabilities and the performance of various sales channels.
• Developing sales teams’ roles and compensation plans to align with broader strategy and business objectives.
• Sharpening the development and execution of direct & channel strategies to expand global presence.

Successes:

• Defined roles, assisted in recruiting, developed compensation plans for multiple sales positions (BDR, SDR, Account Executive, Account Manager) at various SaaS organizations.
• Served as Interim VP Sales to position organization(s) for acquisition (closed).
• Led Klocwork’s global expansion efforts which accounted for over 65% of revenue when firm was acquired.

Where Jeff can help:

• Conducting audits of customer onboarding, success management and support activities.
• Leading Customer Journey Mapping exercises with client experience teams.
• Reviewing firm processes to identify gaps and opportunities.
• Guiding teams through planning and roll-out of client success management frameworks and methodologies.
• Improving net customer retention and maximizing recurring revenue.

Successes:

• Restructured sales organization to create customer success teams focused on client retention and growth.
• Over 50 advisory clients served and multiple successful M&A transactions supported.

Where Ella can help:

• Leading Strategic Planning sessions.
• Building clear, manageable execution plans, budgets, and methodologies.
• Identifying global growth strategies and go-to-market plans.
• Building processes, methodologies that drive organizational evolution and enable growth.
• Helping scaling firms deliver successful international customer deployments.

Successes:

• Member of executive team that took CrossKeys and Espial public.
• Led successful new product and services commercialization and over 500% growth.
• Optimized PS processes & methodology to grow margins by 100%.
• Drove Innovation and Intellectual Property Management program delivering 10 new patents within a single firm.

Where Donna can help:

• Guiding executive teams through strategic vision, operational planning, and corporate governance sessions.
• Conducting audits of combined marketing and sales activities.
• Reviewing go-to-market strategies for new international markets.
• Conducting assessments of product-market fit and opportunities for long-term demand.
• Optimizing inbound marketing/revenue engines and teams.

Successes:

• Built inbound marketing & revenue engine that accounted for 100% of sales and drove 30% CAGR for 10 years.
• 25+ years running marketing, sales and business development teams in high tech companies like QNX & Bitflash.
• Founding CMO at Halogen Software taking it to a global market leader with 500+ employees, $70M ARR, double-digit growth, and eventual exit for $293M.
• Experience raising funds, working closely with VCs, and managing boards.

Where Sarah can help:

• Guiding customer experience strategies to drive high adoption, less churn, more revenue, and a bigger addressable market.
• Creating industry leading customer journey maps with embedded learning.
• Scaling knowledge generation and learning/onboarding programs for customers, partners, and employees.
• Building multi-channel programs that generate revenue.
• Aligning organizations and departments to ensure joint go-to-market approaches.

Successes:

• Won an industry education innovation award for new digital knowledge network that used AI.
• Achieved multi-million dollar subscription revenue growth by digitizing and scaling learning.
• Trained 100,000+ customers, partners, employees per year in 8 languages.

Where Lynn can help:

• Mentoring HR leaders and their teams as they build their capability in-house.
• Leading culture, leadership and board reviews.
• Building founder, executive and employee relations.
• Enhancing talent management strategies and practices.
• Assisting in the development of talent recruitment and training plans for new markets.

Successes:

• Built & delivered several leadership programs such as Strength Finders, and certified Fierce Conversations facilitator.
• Most recently Lynn developed and launched a course called The Impact Method which teaches critical business skills to HR professionals.

Where Paulina can help:

• Advising on near- and long-term business and financial planning.
• Providing strategic financial recommendations to the management team.
• Providing guidance and input to financial modelling for debt and equity financing purposes.
• Reviewing current financial reporting and providing suggestions for improvements/enhancements.
• Support with government funding initiatives.

Successes:

• Closed several successful debt and equity financing rounds.
• Provided strategic, financial, and legal advice to executive leadership teams during financing and merger and acquisition discussions.
• Developed high performing finance teams.

Where David can help:

• Product strategy, new product introduction, product-market fit, and product/user behaviour analytics.
• Creating roadmaps, requirements, prioritizing work, user interviews, and engaging with key stakeholders.
• Positioning/messaging, market sizing/analysis, competitive analysis, and feature benchmarks.
• Pricing, value levers, pricing sensitivity, and tracking growth.
• Best practices, processes, and tools to help measure outcomes and impact on product-led initiatives.
• Customer onboarding, activation, conversion, and retention strategies and metrics.

Successes

• 15+ years as a product executive leading various teams including product management, product marketing, software engineering, UX design, UX writing, DevSecOps, and research.
• Introduced two new products at Klipfolio and helped grow new product revenue over 181% YoY.
• Part of the executive team responsible for the successful sale of Halogen for $293M along with the successful acquisition of Lumesse by Saba.
• Introduced a new line of business at Acquia that helped grow revenue from $60M to $150M annually, helped the company raise over $170M in VC, and sold for $1B.

Where Arlen Can Help:

• Generating initial traction with customers – including pilot projects and first sales.
• Building effective sales campaign strategies.
• Establishing unique value in competitive markets.
• Creating impactful go to market plans.

Successes:

• Built & sold technology startup to Getty Images.
• Scaled Corel’s global sales division with personnel and partners.
• Expansion of the Royal Conservatory’s Exams & Publishing divisions.

Where Dane Can Help:

• Commercializing biopharmaceutical and medical device products.
• Go-to market strategy and business model development for life sciences firms.
• Strategic planning, budgeting, sales & marketing.
• Growth strategy development and execution.
• Preparation for funding, and how to navigate funding sources within the life science ecosystem.
• Internal process development and partnering.

Successes:

• Held executive leadership positions with Genzyme Corporation and Johnson & Johnson.
• Have led inside start-ups and billion-dollar organizations.
• Built and maintained product market leadership.
• Developed strategies for obtaining 50%-90% margins.
• Have hired, managed and grown complex teams.

Where Jaipreet can help:

• Supporting client companies to develop strategies and best practices for intellectual property.
• IP valuation for technology companies.
• Technology commercialization strategy for scaling companies in information, communication and Healthcare IT.
• Creating commercialization models.

Successes:

• Has developed strategies and commercialization models for 5G and AI technology.
• Has 15+ years of experience in intellectual property management.
• Has collaborated with the House of Commons on the “Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer: Promoting Best Practices.”.
• Developed the model for the national service line for Ernst & Young.

Where Maura can help:

• Intellectual Property Management (drafting & prosecution, National & Regional filing strategy, IP due diligence, Patentability & FTO analyses) in the life sciences/biotech industry.
• Financing (seed, series A+, reverse merger, IPO).
• Licensing technology (in- and out-).
• Corporate structure (Canada & US) and Contracts & Agreements (MSAs, SAs, MTAs etc.).
• US/CDN cross-border tax issues (including CFC & PFIC).

Successes:

• 30+ years of commercialization experience across all key sectors of biotech.
• Helped spin out Turnstone Biologics from Intellectual Property (IP) developed at three Ontario academic institutes.
• Had a significant role in raising over $370 million (U.S.) through private financings and pharma-licenses.
• Current President & CEO of Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization (OBIO).

Where Cecile Can Help:

• Developing SEO strategies to increase online visibility, organic traffic and conversions.
• Auditing websites and making recommendations to improve their on-page, off-page and technical SEO.
• Evaluating content and making recommendations to solidify or develop a content marketing strategy.

Successes:

• Bilingual SEO Specialist with 5 years experience in digital communications and marketing.
• 2022 Canadian Search Award applicant for Best Use of Search – B2B and Best SEO Campaign.

Where Rachel Can Help:

• Guidance on developing a PR strategy for early-stage firms – how to promote, enhance, and protect your brand identity, reputation, and stakeholder experience.
• Understanding how to build connections with media stakeholders, develop pitches for communication outlets, writing press releases and other internal and external communications material.
• Advising on optimizing company talent, resources and budget to achieve a high ROI on PR investment.
• Support to deal with crisis situations in a time-sensitive and appropriate manner.

Successes:

• 10+ years of news media and PR experience.
• Has helped companies from various sectors and stages leverage PR to get investment, sales, and brand awareness.
• 5-years of experience in journalism with her work appearing in the Globe & Mail, CTV News, and Ottawa Citizen.
• Founded Third Door Marketing, a social media marketing franchise company.

Where John Can Help:

• Evaluating technology investments.
• Advising on hiring, recruiting and interview processes for technical roles.
• Scaling technology and the teams building it.
• Expertise in Rails, iOS development and engineering leadership.

Successes:

• Part of Shopify from 50 to 2500 employees as a developer, team lead and engineering director.
• Led Product Engineering group of ~150 developers.
• Responsible for hiring, onboarding, staffing and engineering culture.

Where Ron Can Help:

• Leading and facilitating strategic planning for product definition, and product direction.
• Leading and facilitating customer research.
• Conducting analysis of existing products and provide recommendations for improvements.
• Leading and supporting product concept work that aligns with product strategy.
• Keeping teams focused on the “user experience” as a core value.

Successes:

• Built and contributed to more than 10 design teams.
• Delivered award winning design solutions in healthcare, telecom, business analytics and HR.
• Delivered high impact design training to core teams.

Where Mary Can Help:

• Finding and applying to Government funding opportunities.
• Partnership development.
• Defining value proposition and understanding where your solution fits on an environmental leadership scale.
• Market strategy and market research.

Successes:

• Senior federal policy advisor in the pre-launch stage of numerous social and environmental programs.
• Helped raise $25M for a national Indigenous ecological Guardians program.
• Seasoned expert advisor in the sustainability field over three decades.
• Key role working across diverse partnerships to protect numerous ecologically sensitive areas.

Where Lucy Can Help:

• Government relations, influencing policy, and regulatory affairs.
• Fundraising and investor relations.
• Crisis and change management.
• Market positioning, expansion, and strategy for rapid scale.

Successes:

• Seasoned leader and operator with 20+ years of global experience focused on climate action and sustainability in tech, politics, the UN, OECD, and private foundations.
• Trusted and sought-after climate strategy advisor to senior public and private sector leaders.
• Former Chief of Staff to Canada’s Associate Minister of Finance.
• Currently leading Corporate Affairs & Climate Policy at Patch, a Series B funded, San carbon markets software firm based in San Francisco.

Where Andre Can Help:

• Early commercialization of clean technologies (including spin-out from academic setting).
• Customer discovery and securing early customers/partners.
• Large-scale cleantech project management and pilot demonstration.
• International expansion and business development in global markets.

Successes:

• 15+ years of senior management experience that spans the international cleantech/sustainability marketplace.
• Corporate leadership expertise in challenging environments throughout the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa including Afghanistan, Kuwait, Iraq and Djibouti.
• Instrumental in helping Afghan clients win over $150 million in engineering projects, while creating hundreds of jobs, and attracting two high-profile Canadian companies to expand into the region.
• Most recently, served as regional manager for Fortescue Future Industries (FFI) one of the world’s largest green hydrogen companies.
• Experienced startup advisor with Foresight (Canada’s leading Cleantech Accelerator) and Lab2Market.

Where Kerry Can Help:

• Developing and implementing social selling strategies to enable sales teams to use social media platforms, primarily LinkedIn, in their sales tactics.
• Helping marketing teams mobilize employees to become brand ambassadors/company advocates.
• Supporting HR teams to develop employer branding and recruitment marketing that attracts and retains top talent.

Successes:

• 25+ years marketing and sales experiences spanning startup to enterprise in multiple sectors, including internationally recognized brands.
• Conceived and launched social selling programs for Air Canada, United and Lufthansa Group delivering workshops and training to their global sales teams with a combined total over 3,300 team members.

Where Andrew can help:

• Bringing your product to market quickly and profitably.
• Developing niche strategies & business models for advantageous market fit and to dominate market segments.
• Navigating national or international sales channels.
• Growing & scaling at virtually any level in any sector.

Successes:

• Advised LightspeedPOS through their initial funding and expansion (now valued at $3B) with Kingsford Consulting.
• Developed & delivered an SME training program for Apple’s North American independent retail network.
• Worked with YOU-I.tv to build their strategy leading to international market success.