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What I offer, both short-term and long-term, is my demonstrated ability to drive organizational change, develop new concepts, new ways of doing things, and my track record of creating relationships and partnerships. In his announcement of my appointment as President and CEO of CIPA Ltd. in 2002, Paul Jones, the Chair of the organization, said, “Bob brings vision, energy and an easy manner in dealing with people. He has also been an advocate for the value of breakthrough technologies throughout his career.” While heading up CIPA (see resume for details), I had personal contact with the senior management of a number of IT companies in Canada. While Publisher of Canadian Business Magazine, I had to know our clients’ businesses well enough to persuade them that we could help them grow their business in Canada. In the process, I got to know senior management at many of the same companies I later worked with at CIPA, plus others outside the IT industry. I had no difficulty returning to Canada after 14 years, taking charge of a major magazine and immediately meeting with top agency and client personnel. The fact that I arrived with no real contacts did not inhibit my progress: we set new records in advertising revenue in my first year. There are people who worked for me, with me and to whom I reported who will attest to my strategic vision, my ability to adapt to and implement change and my success at building teams and getting results. As a consultant, I think like an entrepreneur and function as an innovator. In the corporate world, I brought an entrepreneurial mindset to the job. In my work with children’s indoor playgrounds, I responded to a great entrepreneurial opportunity, and the timing was right. When my former employer, Rogers Publishing (part of Rogers Communications Inc.), sold its half interest in the business I was running, CIPA Ltd., I took advantage of the severance agreement in my contract and had both the time and the financial means to start KidsWorks, subsequently acquire Fantasy Castle and consult with a client in the same industry to launch two more businesses. Earlier. . . My wife started a small wholesale bakery in Boston in 1990. She did all right. Sales were good, on a relatively small scale. But cash flow was terrible. Her customers were slow paying. I got involved, partly out of interest and partly because I was having difficulty raising $3.5 million to launch the first in a planned series of 10 regional (city) sports magazines. I did some research and transformed the business into a large volume vendor to the in-store bakeries of major supermarket chains. Hired some food brokers. Found a plant to make the bakery products under contract. We went from a few thousand dollars a month to $30,000 a month virtually overnight. Two months later we hit $60,000 a month. In four years, we were grossing $345,000 a month with a profit before taxes of $31,000. Still didn’t have a plant of our own. Just a test kitchen for product development. The secret to early, rapid growth was simple. We chose customers we could get close to, and we stayed close to them, and we kept introducing new products. Some worked. Some didn’t. But we kept working at it and listening to customer feedback. On this point, see From a Former Customer.
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