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If talking about the weather is Canada’s favourite past-time, Pierre Morrissette is the nation’s weatherman.
Since 1989, Morrissette has been at the helm of Pelmorex Media Inc., the parent company of The Weather Network and MétéoMédia, which provides remotes towns, and major cities lined across the 2nd largest country in the world, with accurate, up-to-date weather information.
In this episode of Legends, Pierre Morrissette joins me to talk about the evolution of Pelmorex Media, from its start in radio and television, to creating one of Canada’s earliest and largest online presences through the web and mobile app revolution. He also shares the impact of his MBA program at Ivey, the importance of trusted advisors and mentors throughout his journey, and his growing role in championing entrepreneurship across Canada.
The Entrepreneur Podcast is sponsored by Connie Clerici, QS ’08, and Closing the Gap Healthcare Group, Inc.
Transcript
Eric Morse
You are listening to the entrepreneur podcast from Western's Morrissette Institute for Entrepreneurship powered by Ivey. In this series join me Eric Morse as we uncover the stories of our entrepreneurial legends. These Western founders have revolutionized industries, built recognizable brands and added richness to lives across Canada and beyond. Discover their origins, their greatest moments, their deepest challenges, and what makes each of them tick. Welcome to The Legend series. If talking about the weather is Canada's favorite pastime, Pierre Morrissette is the nation's weatherman. Since 1989, Pierre has been at the helm of Pelmorex Media Inc, the parent company of the Weather Network, and meteo media, which provides remote towns and major cities lined across the second largest country in the world, with accurate, up-to-date weather information. In this episode of Legends, Pierre Morrissette joins me to talk about the evolution of Pelmorex media from its start in radio and television to creating one of Canada's earliest and largest online presence through the web and mobile app revolution. He also shares the impact of his MBA program at Ivey, the importance of trusted advisors and mentors throughout his journey, and his growing role in championing entrepreneurship across Canada. Pierre thanks for joining us today. Really great to see you as as always. Wanted to have kind of a far ranging discussion today, but really about your entrepreneurial journey and life's journey through education a little bit as well. And so maybe just to kick things off, was entrepreneurship always on your radar? Is this something as a you know, a school kid you were you were thinking about as you were growing up?
Pierre Morrissette
Well, as you know, I've wanted to be an entrepreneur from a pretty young age. I remember in high school, I would sit down on Sunday mornings with my dad, who would be going through different files for the company that he led; it was a large food company. And he'd be working on an acquisition, I'd ask him questions about the target, how he valued the business and, and what he was looking for, and stuff like that. And still in the same vintage, I be reading some of his Fortune Magazine's and found a lot those stories to be very interesting. And that's a time where I decided, you know, I'm going to run a company to someday, but the one difference was that the company I would run would preferably be a company that I would also own. So that's, that's when the idea was sort of formed in my mind. (Okay) And, you know, I resurrected that idea several times along my journey until I took the plunge in 1989. To, to start up Pelmorex.
Eric Morse
Okay, well, we'll come back to that a little bit. So early, early days, high school, you're already very interested in business and following both, I guess, the popular press, but also getting some private tutelage from from your father in terms of business and key issues and things like that. When you went to university was that? Did you go with the idea of building on that knowledge? Was it always part of the plan in terms of what you would study and where?
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, I did take a bachelor's degree and majored in economics. That was something that would apply to, to a whole bunch of things. Some of my electives were accounting courses and stuff like that. I just wanted to get a good education for a generalist to be a good communicator in in whatever I would be doing. So, but I was basically shaping it up to to become a rounded, general business practitioner.
Eric Morse
Okay. And you've always spoken glowingly about your experience at Ivey and we appreciate that very much. You know, what was it about your MBA experience that that maybe helped continue or push you on that journey?
Pierre Morrissette
Well, Ivey at the time, as 50 years ago. So the class of 72 was a school that it focused on preparing people for the financial services sector for the consulting sector, but also the general management sector. So entrepreneurship was still not part of the school and so I focused on learning the skills that you get from an MBA and I did, you know, focus on the financial side, on acquisitions and stuff like that. But that was a slight focus for me, but it's, in general, the business school gave me the, the skill sets required to be a very good top level C suite manager. And that I could put that into any kind of field, and so on. But, you know, that that's, that's what it gave me and all the soft skills of an entrepreneur's such as the, the mindset, the the attitude, the never say, die. Attitude, there's always a way there's always a solution. It's don't give me the problem, give me the solution type of thing. I mean, that kind of attitude, that's innate. But the, all the skills that make up a strong business person, were, were given to me by Ivey. If you fast forward to today, today, you've got, you know, the entrepreneurship program that basically will prepare somebody to launch an entrepreneurial career. But...
Eric Morse
you know, for me, here, it was, it was a logical next step in that we were always a general management school. And an entrepreneur is a general manager on steroids to some extent. And so, you know, I think you and I kind of came together about the same time and with the similar visions for what entrepreneurship could be at Ivey, and I sure appreciate all these years having the chance to work with you.
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, that's been a lot of fun. That's for sure.
Eric Morse
So, um, you know, traditional story, you said at the time, it was mostly, you know, finance and consulting, and I know, your first job was at Royal Bank. What was it about that, that, you know, appealed to you in terms of again, you know, continuing this journey towards entrepreneurship?
Pierre Morrissette
Well a place like RBC is just an excellent place to carry on your studies. (Yeah) It prepares you for the financial side of a business. And what I wanted was to find out what would make them say "yes," okay. And it's... so being involved on on their side of the desk, in considering applications to operate a simple, to fund a simple business, to fund a major acquisition in the company, major capital project. All the stuff that would lead up to a "yes" decision was something that I wanted to learn. I was there five years. And, and then I went to work for Telemedia. (Right, which is family business) Well, family business, Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien, and his wife owned it at the time, it was the largest in radio in, in one of the largest in Canada web largest and consumer publishing (right) in Canada.
Eric Morse
What was it about that space that interested you at the time?
Pierre Morrissette
Well, it was the opportunity. They came to me and, and said, 'Are you interested in, in financial role, the CFO role,' and has just a young guy at the time, and I say, Hey, this is a great opportunity. It will enable me to learn the media sector, but also learn the discipline of being a CFO and a company. This company was also significantly involved in investments and so on. And so one of the companies was Cantel, you know, one of the first three partners of Cantel. Another one was Cancom. And I was on the board of both of those entities in their formative stages, because I was responsible for putting the deals together for Telemedia. And, you know, in terms of Cancom, it was a group of five of Canada's largest broadcasters that came together to create this satellite communications company. And so in year two, I was on the board, the president of Cancom went to CRTC as its chair. And we were in the process of going public. So they said, Pierre, why don't you go and run the company for six months, take the company public and then go back to Telemedia in your previous role? Six months became six years because number one, I love the space (Yeah), we're are at the center of everything going on in the media side in those days. And sure it was a startup, but it was a rapidly growing startup. We made Canada's top 50, fastest growing companies list, very successful IPO. But we had to grow the business to be able to transcend the break even point. And it was, it was just a real adventure. So one day, you know, we, we had gone public, very successful public issue, we had grown to the point where we're very profitable, very successful for shareholders. It did become a subsidiary of one of the partners through a creeping takeover, (okay). Basically, they became the controlling shareholder. At that time I reevaluated the landscape, I said, I don't want to be running a subsidiary of another company. So basically, I said, if I'm going to take the plunge, now's the time. And I was turning 40. And I basically gave myself two and a half years to acquire a base, (okay) in the communication sector (yep) and then to build on that base.
Eric Morse
If I remember, you founded the company, before you really had a company and built a board of directors is that first...
Pierre Morrissette
First thing I did, when I decided to, when I left Cancom and create this company, first thing I did was to hire a blue chip board of directors; they were five people. And they were just first class directors. And I said, Look, I'm a Pisces, I'm a bit of a dreamer, your job is to keep my two feet on the ground. And my, my commitment to you is I will listen to whatever you you, your advices and then great things will happen. (Yeah) So they were on the board up until 2010 or so (that's amazing). And they were involved in every single strategic decision that we had to make. They were all great directors. In fact, the they're on the list of our Directors Emeritus, and they have an open invite to any board meeting any prior board dinner the night before. And many of them show up and participate.
Eric Morse
Bright group of people and and having met them nice group of people as well. You want to spend time around that group?
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah totally! And, and, but they're from disciplines that each brought a perspective to the company that was value added. And they were great.
Eric Morse
So the first acquisition was radio, if I going back on memory a little bit, and you got into radio and then somehow that pivoted into weather. Can you just a little bit take me through that?
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, well, the first acquisition within six months was a group of 16 mid market radio stations, and we quickly formed the satellite programming network. But same time, an economic meltdown happened in Canada, early 90s. And that really affected those stations. So we lost half of the top line. And now the satellite programming network meant that we're cutting back half of our people and, and supplementing all live programming with regional feeds and so on. But in 19, so that was in 89, late 89 that I I took them over the the recession started in late 90. In 91. I got a phone call, said Pierre, the Weather Network is for sale. Are you interested? I said You bet. And I got on a plane to Montreal. It was a Thursday afternoon. I got to plane in Montreal. Next morning and nine o'clock. I'm meeting with the the president of the company that owned the Weather Network, found out how much they wanted, and that we can. I convinced our board, convinced the bank to support it put together the term sheet the following Tuesday. By Friday a week later, we're negotiating the the agreement and it was signed and the following week, a bunch of Canadian players found out that it was for sale and tried to unwind my deal, (Wow) unsuccessfully. (Okay) Then the CRTC finally decided, in 1993, two years later, it was on the rebound at that time long story, but that, basically they, they would allow the transaction. So two years after the deal. Yeah, it was the first transaction involving the sale of a satellite programming network in Canada. And, you know, there were some questions on the first application regarding, you know, cash flows and stuff like that. And I said, guys, you know, here are the facts. Yeah, you know, it's not a something these are facts. And, you know, so at the end of the day, they, they held a new hearing with, you know, the corrected application, and the deal was approved.
Eric Morse
Fantastic. It's, uh, you know, back then it was not a brand that that many people know about. And boy has that change, but what strikes me in your story, and I'm going to come back to the brand because I think it's, it's really exciting, is that all of your past experience kind of came together and had prepared you for that moment? You know, whether it was media or the bank or doing deals or, you know, really putting together some, some big deals in your days back then. And it all kind of came together to this. What was it that about the Weather Network that that was interesting that you saw the opportunity in it?
Pierre Morrissette
When I when I created Pelmorex in 89, I had the thought of interactive distribution of information. Okay. And while I was at Cancom, I got involved in using satellites to exchange information. And I created VSAT networks which suppliers interact interactive data, we signed up Canadian Tire and co-operators insurance to to move a lot of their data around back and forth. And you know, so basically, it was to create an interactive information that work (okay). Radio didn't quite know, satisfy that about the Weather Network was a great interactive platform potentially. Now, when I bought the Weather Network, who was one satellite transponder, distributing both services. So when French service was distributing local data, the English part would be distributing video (okay). And then they alternate. First thing I did was create two transponders. And you separate the networks, that opens up a whole bunch of time. And they weren't selling any advertising. They were just relying on the subscription, the subscription fee. Well, the potential of advertising was all upside. So then I put together a salesforce. So now we're creating advertising sales, which is all gravy (right). Then two years later, internet came along. And we created one of the first one the early Canadian websites. It's since so grew up to become Canada's largest Canadian website. (Right) And that was the Weather Network and Meteomedia brands that did that. Then mobile came along. (Yeah) We created mobile web services. Then we create mobile apps. And by the end of the well into 2010 and beyond, we've become the largest mobile player. So that these are are just some of the logical steps and the evolution.
Eric Morse
Well I'm not sure how logical they were. But I think you were you had some foresight and getting in early on all of them. And it was a rapidly changing technological landscape in the field. And for what I think a lot of people imagined was a government enterprise. You moved really, really fast and actually created a brand that is one of Canada's best known brands. And I think it was keeping up with the technology and staying ahead a lot.
Pierre Morrissette
It is one of Canada's best known brands. It's... when you're in every home, through TV, and every home uses your service. And mostly every day, you know, the mobile app it's used about 20 plus times per up. (Yeah) So with all that repetition, you know, basically you become a household brand, right. And also you become a trusted brand because of the information that we're providing. So in terms of Canada's most influential and trusted brands, we ranked in single digits amongst all Canadian companies. This includes everybody. (Yep) And amongst all brands in Canada, many of which are from the States and Europe and so on (Absolutely). We ranked in the teens. Yeah. And that is absolutely phenomenal. Yeah, you know, and that was, the brand strength was driven by TV. So now that TV is sort of, we call it this slow melting ice cube, still a very large iceberg. But it's, it is slow melting. It's still driving the brand, but in in a diminishing way. So we have to one of our projects is really identifying new, new methods to protect the brand.
Eric Morse
Well, and I, you know, I'm one of those users that has it on my phone and use it every day. And I know that data is more and more important to the business all the time. And that's been true for some time now. But I think even more so today, you know, just as you look ahead, what are some of the things that you think about when you think of the Weather Network?
Pierre Morrissette
Looking ahead, one of the key jobs of one of our, of our CEO is, is to manage the day to day, but it's also to look over the horizon, to see the big trends that are coming up. And, you know, so basically, what, what's in place today is, is the data business. It's, we have two databases. One is our weather data. And the other one is our user data. And both of them are, are unique, and very, very large databases. We use that data in the most legal way. I mean, it's totally anonymous, and so on. We protect our consumer data, like, there's no tomorrow, but but we do have all this data, and we put them in buckets. And, and we get insights from those buckets. And it's a very rapidly growing business. So while we're the gold standard for protecting our consumer data, it's also a huge message, massive, rather, data market opportunity. So it's within those constraints, it's managing it so that you, you can milk that that opportunity. So that's one thing. Climate change is, is the long term form of weather. Weather information is tends to be short term forecasts for any place in the world. (Sure) Climate change is really long term trends. That creates create risks for the public's of every country. So climate change for us is, is a new frontier, how to get people's carbon footprint down to negligible and replace the old with a new right, for individuals, for businesses, for governments. And that's an area that now, I don't think you'll get the same kind of volumes that you get from a weather business. But you definitely get a very captive audience who will consult it minimum a few times per week of times a month.
Eric Morse
You know, you could even foresee a way that the data you collect could help people reduce their footprint is as we go forward.
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, I'm speaking to a company who is a start-up. You're familiar with those? Based in the States, that meant that measures helps people measure their carbon footprint, individual level, business level and government level, and then translates that into action plans. So it's an it's all done by an app. I want to talk to them I want to find out about them. We're talking to another company that gathers all kinds of information from and commitments, financial commitments via crowdfunding from individuals, and basically they translate their initiatives into saving the planet, the oceans and all that. So they are up to $10 million in annual funding that then, you know, to support their, their, their structure and so on. So it's it's partnering with those kinds of people. And it's just basically making the difference in that category. (Yeah) That's what I see on the horizon (Absolutely). It's not there yet today. (No, no) but that's (looking forward)...
Eric Morse
No thanks for sharing that. One more kind of Weather Network question. And then we'll shift gears just a little bit. I know that you and Pelmorex had a major role in Canada's public alerting system. Just tell us a little bit about how you got involved and how that kind of came to be?
Pierre Morrissette
Well, the official name of the service is Alert Ready. It's a private-public partnership involving every province in the country, and several branches of the federal government, and in ourselves, as the operator of the network. Ourselves as the operator of the network are really responsible for creating this network. (Yeah) It started in the early 90s, right after we got to ownership of the Weather Network. We started working on developing new technology, which would be inserted into our local cable systems. And and would receive a message from a central point. (Okay) That was the local alert. Yeah. And because of our technology, it'd be restricted to distribution in that
Eric Morse
People are already looking for local weather, I suppose...
Pierre Morrissette
We are providing local weather to through our network of local terminals, that would just capture the information that applied to that region. (So you could follow that) So then we'd say, well, let's expand that to the message. (Right) And so we, we've developed a technology, we applied to the CRTC, a number of times, I guess, one of my skill sets as well, yeah, totally; it's not taking no for an answer. And reacting. So after four or five tries, fast forward to, to 2007, or something like that. Um, I applied to the CRTC. And, you know, basically, if you got a negative response, what are the obstacles, then you fill those, and then you go back again. And finally, we offered a fully subsidized free service. And the one trade off is that we stay on basic, basic cable and, and the CRTC approved that. And so then we launched, we embarked on launching. Alert, ready? (Yeah) This public private partnership is probably one of the most satisfying deals that we've put together at Pelmorex. And today, I think we operate one of the top if not the top, emergency broadcast systems in the world. And so we we started off by distributing on TV, then we put it on web, then we put on mobile, by issuing alerts across everybody's phone. And, and we expanded the messaging to Amber Alerts, and so on. And now, you know, not every province was totally onside when we started it; everybody showed up at the board meetings that we had for this service. But, you know, today everybody seems to be on site. That's a great and it's evolving together with the board. We set the standards, we set the security, we set the goals for each year. And and, you know, it's it's just a fantastic success story. And, and it saves lives, ultimately.
Eric Morse
it's a great, really a great service and a great win win private public partnership. And that in that sense, which I know is one of your values as well.
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah. And I it is, and so I'm, I'm not quite sure yet what the next step is for Alert Ready, but it's definitely now that we're into mobile and so on. So what is the next thing that we developed for that? It's, you know, that'll be an interesting challenge to figure that out.
Eric Morse
Sure. All right. I'm gonna shift gears just a little bit and talk about maybe some lessons for for some of those that might be listening around entrepreneurship. You've led this company through some tough times. disappear, maybe maybe not tougher, maybe maybe that's not true than the last couple of years with COVID. But I know financial crisis, and there's been several of them over the last couple of decades, what what are some of the things that you've learned as an entrepreneur and as a person that's maybe seen you through these periods?
Pierre Morrissette
Well, look, we've had four big downturns, actually a fifth starting now with the Ukraine war, and the inflation and, and high interest rates that, that, and the supply chain crises and so on. One thing is that we're a very resilient company. And it's, we've emerged through each of these crises, first one was the economic meltdown of early 90s, then there was the.com, bust of 2000, then economic meltdown of 2008, then there's a pandemic of the last two and a half, three years, and now it's a war in Ukraine. Like everybody, you incur an initial shock, but then there's a quick recovery period. And then you come out of those events, with results that are every bit as strong as when you were going into it. So we're very resilient and our philosophy is plan for the worst, and hope for the best, (Yeah) but move fast. (Okay) And we we've moved very fast on all of these situations, and, and it stood us stood as well. We don't look for these events. But when, when they're they're happening. We say, 'Oh, this is...' so will will tend to freeze a whole bunch of stuff that we're doing right, then when the event is when people start acting on them. We're already in place. Yep. And, and we tend to see it through.
Eric Morse
Yeah, I think you've done a great job of kind of seeing the trajectory and, you know, acting early both to freeze things on the way down, and then to invest on the way back up, whether it's technology or just geography and different services. So looking back since 2006, you have been intimately involved in growing entrepreneurship, education, research and outreach at Ivey. That's true, not just at Ivey but but now Western and all across Canada. And we've done that through the Morrissette Institute for Entrepreneurship. And it's a journey that I've had the honor of coming along with you for for all of that time, or most of that time. What what moved you to make the decision to get involved so intimately. And what do you see the role of entrepreneurship and in shaping Canada and the world?
Pierre Morrissette
Big question that could be a subject of a podcast on its own. Well, first of all, when we introduce the... when you introduce the entrepreneurship to Ivey, in the early 2000 period, and I came along around 2005 or seven, the...
Eric Morse
I played a really bad round of golf, and you still decided to get involved, is what happened...
Pierre Morrissette
So look, private enterprise makes up half to 60% of Canadian business activity. It's... it's major, and yet in Ivey, entrepreneurship was not really that present in the curriculum. And I had a vision at the time of creating entrepreneurship as a pillar of the school. So the school that creates people for financial services, creates consultants, creates top general managers, also creates great entrepreneurs. Yeah, and more, more successful entrepreneurs. And that basically, you tailor part of the program, to the needs of entrepreneurs, or wannabe entrepreneurs. And you know, so, so that was really the, the formative thoughts behind the program. Fast forward 10 years later, and Ivey is become very, very strong in the field of entrepreneurship. And then I said, well, the next big thing is, why not make it available to all students? of Western and not just Ivey. And that's something that you shared at the time, and you initiated too. So that let's let's join forces on on these efforts and let's, let's take the powered by Ivey, entrepreneurship program, (absolutely) to make it available to students across the board. And, and you've, you've taken that mandate, and you've turned it into a real success story. An the evolving success story for Western students who are not at Ivey. And when you look at the the most recent board of, of the Institute for Entrepreneurship, it it's, you know, 40% people from Ivey but 60%, from everywhere in Western, and it totally reflects the mandate of the program. Yeah. And it's, it's working, and it's working very successfully. And everybody's very passionate about it. And so the end result is Western benefits from it. I think the country benefits from it. And ultimately, I think it will result in extra funding for programs when successful entrepreneurs decided to give back because they forme the nucleus of most fundraising campaigns to begin with, right. So it's, it's that vicious circle. And so it's, that was an easy one.
Eric Morse
Well, I don't know if it was easy. Well, boy, we sure appreciate and have benefited from, you know, not just your your resources Pierre, but from your time and thinking about it as well. And, you know, the the push to think bigger always... So it may have been my idea earlier to get into Western, but it was Pierre ringing in the back of my head of, you know, "think bigger, think bigger." I was gonna say, I bet, thinking quarter to quarter is not in that list.
Pierre Morrissette
And that's Look, our company, we have a 50 year plan (right). People laugh when I say that, but we do have a 50 year plan. The average tenure of a CEO in Canada is about seven years (And shrinking). Yeah. And that means that you have to become really good at grooming the next CEO, even when that CEO is is starting his mandate or her mandate (Right). And, you know, so that that's, that's one thing, but it's, it's also, you know, when you have to replace the board, it's when heirs will come into the business and what's their entry level? And how do you groom them and so on. That 50 Year Plan answers so many questions. And that's a difference of an entrepreneur, basically, you're thinking long term (right). You're not quarter to quarter (right). And you're always so you're always thinking, what's that next big thing over? One of the biggest threats to to any company, is to not reinvent itself, right? Because every business has a product lifecycle. And unless they, they add new areas of growth, to take care of those areas that are mature and starting to decline, then basically, if you don't reinvent yourself, you will die. And so an entrepreneur with a long term plan for the company that keep it in a family that stretches and stretches out 50 years, even 100 years, there's a study right now that I'm looking at, it's it's almost 100 of the top companies in the world that are 100 years old (Wow). What are the factors that they share in common to have made them succeed for over 100 years? And and it's summarized down to about eight or 10 points. (Okay) So you always have to be looking long term over the horizon. Absolutely not. Absolutely not.
Eric Morse
That's right. You know, thinking back to when you were leaving Ivey, what was something that maybe you wish you would have known about entrepreneurship and the journey ahead, before you left, that, we need to make sure we're instilling in our students?
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, there's so many things. So one thing that does leap out, is funding the business. Look, every... every startup has a thirst for capital (right). To fund organic growth, to fund m&a growth and stuff like that? Well, how do you maintain control of the company, if it's going to have a repeated requirement for new capital. And sometimes you have to sacrifice some growth to build up your capital base (right). So in my company, I start off with, you know, I had voting control of it, but I only own 13% of it. Today, we control 100% of the company. And we control 100 percent of the votes too. So that means that along the way, I had to make a lot of trade offs in terms of expansion for growing our equity position. And that's...
Eric Morse
But I think you've made the decision the other way too, is to give up some equity in order to grow at the right time or partner at the right time. But with a longer term plan of how do I get that equity back? Is that fair?
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, there have been some, some of those steps along the way. But most of the time, it's resulted in us not sacrificing, giving up the equity. And, you know, but it's it's a study that we constantly do. It's one of the big areas of decision making that we face every year. And if we want to acquire a company that's going to be beyond our debt capacity, then either you don't do it, or the you have to be able to give up some capital.
Eric Morse
Yeah, I don't think we spend enough time on that. I think you're absolutely right, in terms of what are the trade offs in that regard? And what's the long-term plan? And how does this fit into the plan? We, we just don't.
Pierre Morrissette
Yeah, the other thing, too, is that an opportunity comes along. And oftentimes, there'll be bought out by a private equity firm. Well, you know that three to seven years later, that company will be up for sale again. (Right) And when you have a long term plan, then you say, well, I'll wait for the next time. (Yeah) And that's, and they they do come around quite often.
Eric Morse
I'm sure that's true. Well, you've built a legendary career, I think there would be no, no dispute about that. You've been recognized as a member of the Canadian Broadcasting Hall of Fame, you've received an honorary Doctor of Laws from Western, named the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year, and in 2016, you were inducted as a member of the Order of Canada. That's, that's quite a career. Is there a lesson or piece of advice that's held you in good stead that you'd be willing to pass on to maybe an aspiring entrepreneur, ot to the rest of us?
Pierre Morrissette
Well, nobody has a monopoly on wisdom or on making the right decisions. So something that I mentioned earlier in this podcast, a lesson that has really stood me well, time and time and time, again, is to surround yourself with great people. Listen to them, and great things will happen. That... I repeat that several times a year, in speeches or in conversations and, and what have you. Look, our company when we own the company. Yet we have an independent board of nine people in our operating company. There are two family members, my son and I, and seven independents (That's great). We seek their advice, wisdom, connections, network, all that stuff. Time and time again, in our holding company. We have six board members, again, that's two family members. But we operate six board members. I have a governance and succession committee, right with two members on that and the same people in the operating company is in the holding company. We have a compensation committee. And we don't have an audit committee in the in the holding company, but we do have one in the operating company (Sure). So we behave like we're public. Without the the focus on quarterly results (Yeah). And we every strategic issue is brought to the board and discussed and hashed out, and we build in their input into our decision making. That is the one lesson than that I follow. And that's one lesson that I want my successors to follow as well.
Eric Morse
Yeah, I think that's great advice. So you know, just surround yourself with smart people and listen to them. And then set up a governance structure that that will help serve you for the next 100 years. That's what you've done up here. Thanks so much for joining us and for your lessons and for your story. I think we'll have a really great discussion about this with the listeners over the years. So thank you very much. Thank you. The Entrepreneur Podcast is sponsored by Quantumshift 2008 alum Connie Clerici and Closing the Gap Healthcare Group. To ensure you never miss an episode subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast player or visit entrepreneurship.uwo.ca/podcast. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.