With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/1510895
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2023 BCBUSINESS.CA 35 F I N A L I S T Ali Tajskandar F O U N D E R A N D C E O , W I S H P O N D n T H E K I C K O F F : "I sold my first piece of software to one of my classmates when I was 11 or 12," recalls Ali Tajskandar with a chuckle. Tajskandar grew up in Iran, where his friend's dad had a manufacturing plant. "He asked if I could build an inventory management software. So I wrote it and threw it on a CD-ROM. It probably wasn't very good, in hindsight." n A C T I O N P L A N : When Tajskandar moved to Vancouver with his family at the age of 16, he used those technical roots to forge his path. After graduating from SFU with a degree in computer science, Tajskan- dar worked at a number of different startups under serial entrepreneur Hossein Malek. Tajskandar eventually got an MBA from UBC and started his own venture in 2009—an all-in-one marketing platform for businesses called Wishpond Technologies. Malek was the firm's first investor and still sits on its board. "It's been interest- ing; I was programmer No. 1 at our company," he says. "To let go of that and focus on things only I can do as opposed to things other people can help with has been important. I should have done it sooner—the company does better when I focus on the busi- ness side." n C L O S I N G S T A T E M E N T: Vancouver-based Wishpond is publicly listed on the TSX Venture exchange and has close to 300 employees across the globe. The company is operating at an annual recurring revenue of about $23 million and serves more than 4,000 business across the world, including brands like ESPN and Lululemon. "The fastest way to run your business into the ground is by doing all the good things," he says. "There's a limited amount of time and resources you have. You have to pick the most impactful things and let a whole bunch of good things go... in a startup, it's always wartime, never peacetime."–N.C. Q & A W H AT D OE S S UC C E S S L O OK L I K E T O YOU ? It means my family is happy and healthy, that's a big part of it. That our team members are growing, making money, doing well. And that the impact we're having on our customers is great. D O YOU H AV E A N Y E M B A R R A S S I NG OB S E S S IONS ? I'm kinda geeky in that if I ever have free time I like to build things. One of those things recently was auto- mating irrigation in my backyard. F I N A L I S T Stefan Fletcher C E O , R E B A L A N C E M D n T H E K I C K O F F : I start the interview with Stefan Fletcher by acknowledging his tremen- dous wealth of experience and exper- tise in the world of health care. "Yeah, I know, I'm an old fart," he responds. Fletcher came to Canada from New Zealand in 1987 with a background in engineering, but ended up pivoting to physiotherapy, including a stint work- ing with the Canadian national rugby team in 2003. When the squad played against the New Zealand All Blacks at the Rugby World Cup, Fletcher felt conflicted about working against his hometown squad. "That was a bit challenging," he says. The game itself could also probably be described that way: the All Blacks won 68-6. n A C T I O N P L A N : After growing a chain of physio- therapy clinics (later acquired by Ontario-based health-care giant Lifemark) from five locations to 15, Fletcher became disillusioned with the Canadian health-care industry and how it worked (or didn't). So it felt serendipitous when he was approached by a group of Victoria orthopaedic surgeons in 2011 who wanted him to join their venture and try to transform health care in the region. "It was the right stage in my career to do something different," he says. "It was a leadership opportunity, a transformational opportunity to really get my teeth into something I was complaining about. I had no idea what I was getting into." n C L O S I N G S T A T E M E N T: RebalanceMD launched in 2013 with the goal of creating a multidisciplinary care team that unifies physicians and health professionals in a single allied group practice. Put another way, if you go into Rebalance with a knee issue, the company handles the assessment, education and pre- and post-surgery support. "Public care is in crisis," says Fletcher. "Nobody is really doing what we do. We have better integrations, systems, team approach, layers. Patients have a home they can go to." Rebalance has some 250,000 patients in its registry and about 175 employ- ees across its two locations, both of which are located in Victoria.–N.C. Q & A DE S C R I B E YOU R DR E A M E M P L OY E E I N T H R E E WOR D S : Passionate, loyal and cheeky. W H AT WOU L D YOU R C O -WOR K E R S S AY I S YOU R G R E AT E ST ST R E NGT H ? My height. No, I listen. I think I find rational, logical solutions and I don't back down from the difficult conversations.