JULY/AUGUST 2017 BCBUSINESS 119 BCBUSINESS.CA
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up economic development in Greater
Victoria.
SIPP's Business Connector pro-
gram works with established companies
to help them scale up and grow employ-
ment. "When we did the research, we
found that the majority of your job cre-
ation actually comes from helping scale
companies that already exist," explains
executive director Emilie de Rosenroll,
whose organization is funded by local
municipalities, post-secondary institu-
tions, First Nations, businesses, non-
pro†ts and industry associations. "And
if you look at Greater Victoria's market,
we don't have a lot of companies that
are over 250 employees. So what we did
is we designed the program around the
needs of those companies."
Valerie Foster is general manager of
JSF Technologies, a Saanichton-based
maker of solar-powered traŽc signals
that joined
SIPP's connector program.
Her desk sits squeezed on the side of a
garage-like room where workers assem-
ble
LED lights, solar panels and elec-
tronic control boxes.
JSF, which has 11 full-time employees,
is struggling with a problem that many
companies would like to have: sales
are growing faster than management
can handle. It produces durable, well-
constructed products that Foster says
are among the most expensive in the
industry. "But that hasn't stopped us
from seeing increasing sales year after
year," she notes. "And particularly in the
past six months, we've seen our busi-
ness almost double."
Nobody at
JSF has an MBA or experi-
ence in scaling a manufacturing busi-
ness. For her part, Foster juggles two
jobs requiring completely di˜erent skill
sets: she oversees production as well
as business development and sales.
SIPP has brought in three consultants
who are working with
JSF to improve
aspects of the business, including sales
tracking, branding and marketing. With
their assistance, Foster hopes she can
focus on fewer tasks while making the
company more eŽcient.
Foster says
JSF needed help, but
nobody had time to look for it. "I'm too
busy day-to-day just getting stu˜ out the
door," she explains. Fortunately,
SIPP
approached the company to join Business
Connector. "Yes, bring me free help,"
Foster says. "I love free help!"
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