Starting a business takes courage. Growing a business? Now, that takes courage, plus strategy, long-term vision, and an incredible team.
To celebrate the tenth season of Invested in Our New Reality, our popular business podcast, we built the episodes around an important topic: scale. By definition, scale is when a company increases revenue faster than costs. Scaling up is the practice of organizing a business to support that growth.
This season, host Manjula Selvarajah welcomed 10 local leaders to join her on the podcast and discuss the process of growing their companies from start-ups to thriving businesses. Selvarajah, a national columnist, technology journalist, and radio and podcast host, expertly guided the conversations, drawing lessons learned and advice from a list of heavy hitters based in Canada’s Capital City.
“The start-up stories we read are usually the end journeys. It can be hard to pull these apart to truly understand where the mindset of founders and founding teams was at the inflection point, when they were about to scale or already in the midst of it,” says Selvarajah.
“These conversations are gems of wisdom from people with real start-up experience on how to navigate the scale-up road ahead.”
Now complete, Season 10 of Invested in Our New Reality is full of excellence, drive, and innovation. Each episode is packed with thoughtful storytelling and reflection as the interviewees share what they learned on the road to successful, sustainable growth.
SEASON 10 EPISODE GUIDE
- Episode 1 kicks off with Martin Sendyk of Lytica, who offers tips on scaling up, explores the ins and outs of supply chains, and explains why the right time to start a business is always now. Listen to this episode here.
- Our guest for Episode 2 was Mike Potter, the CEO of Rewind, an Ottawa-based tech company proving it takes real vision to build a business that can preserve the (digital) past. Listen to this episode here.
- Episode 3 featured Alok Ahuja, the Co-Founder and CEO of Trexity. In this engaging interview, he explains how he and his team turned a bad day into a flat-rate, on-demand delivery service with global potential. Listen to this episode here.
- We were thrilled to welcome Nia Bruno-Gibson, the Head of People, Culture and Operations at MASV, as the guest on Episode 4. Full of insights, advice and first-hand experience, this episode is a must-listen. Listen to this episode here.
- Good products solve problems, says Peter O’Blenis, the Co-Founder and CEO of Distiller SR. Listen to Episode 5 and learn how he and his partners applied their technical savvy to a time-consuming research task: lit reviews. Listen to this episode here.
- Starting and leading a tech company is a big job, and our Episode 6 guest certainly has a knack for it. Introducing Pierce Ujjainwalla, CEO and Co-Founder of – wait for it – Knak. Listen to this episode here.
- Keira Torkko is the Chief People Officer at Assent and the guest on Episode 7. Scaling up was the name of the game after the company received $350M in funding on a one-billion-dollar evaluation. Listen to this episode here.
- Episode 8 features Sanja Mitar, the Talent Acquisition Lead at Noibu, an error monitoring platform designed to support e-commerce. In this episode, she shares the ins and outs of hiring (and keeping) good talent. Listen to this episode here.
- Love marketing? Then Episode 9 is for you! Listen now and find out how Mychelle Mollot, the Chief Marketing Officer at Solace, developed the public face of a company some predict will hit $1B in annual revenues. Listen to this episode here.
- For the Season 10 finale, we interviewed Erin Kelly, the President & CEO of Advanced Symbolics Inc., to discuss artificial intelligence and AI partner Polly, start-ups, scale, and the latest in market research methodologies. Listen to this episode here.
Entertaining, informative, and interesting, Season 10 of Invested in Our New Reality just might be the best season yet. On behalf of the Invest Ottawa team, thank you to our outstanding guests for making the time to be a part of this podcast.
Thanks also to host Manjula Selvarajah and to our listeners for supporting Invested in Our New Reality through 10 incredible seasons.
Stay tuned! We’ll be back with Season 11 in Spring 2023 – so be sure to check the Invested in Our New Reality page often for updates.