People Power

In the last of our four-part series of blogs about the growth of CDN Con­trols, CEO/­co-founder Dean Fras­er talks about how they’ve built the diverse team that’s helped them to grow at an incred­i­ble rate.

Many peo­ple think that an entrepreneur’s suc­cess, through deter­mi­na­tion and hard work, is theirs alone. In real­i­ty, the peo­ple you sur­round your­self is crit­i­cal, and Fras­er and I often talk about how it takes a vil­lage for a suc­cess­ful CEO – and a great com­pa­ny – to grow and thrive.

For Fras­er, peo­ple real­ly are at the heart of their success:

• The accom­plished and skilled peo­ple they attract
• The strength of their strong com­mu­ni­ty rela­tion­ships and part­ner­ships, espe­cial­ly those with the indige­nous community
• Their close-knit, ​‘work hard, play hard’ culture
• A net­work of peo­ple who pro­vide insight, guid­ance and direc­tion when needed.

Lis­ten to us talk about the ben­e­fits of sur­round­ing your­self with good peo­ple here.

Dif­fer­ent Skills, New Perspectives

When Fras­er and partner/​COO Nick Stew­art first start­ed CDN Con­trols, hir­ing peo­ple who under­stood their Elec­tri­cal and Instru­men­ta­tion (E&I) busi­ness made sense.

But, as they grew, they had to expand their thinking.

“When you first start a busi­ness any­one (can) come into man­age­ment or senior man­age­ment. But when you scale and get to a cer­tain size, you…need dif­fer­ent skills, dif­fer­ent heads and dif­fer­ent mind­sets, all look­ing to achieve the same goal.”

One exam­ple is when, in 2015, they hired a CFO who wasn’t famil­iar with the E&I business.

“A big step for us was when we hired a great CFO, (which) we’d nev­er had before. As you grow, you get an oppor­tu­ni­ty to bring more and more peo­ple into the busi­ness who have real­ly good busi­ness acu­men. They help you to see a dif­fer­ent perspective.”

And like oth­ers they’ve since hired, peo­ple with the right skill sets no longer need to know the E&I busi­ness. As Fras­er says, they can learn. Lis­ten to Fras­er talk about build­ing a team of great people.

Sur­round Your­self with Good People

Beyond diverse skill set and per­spec­tives, a fit with their ​“heart and hus­tle” cul­ture is essential.

“You have to have amaz­ing peo­ple work­ing with you, arm-in-arm. It just helps make every­thing bet­ter. You want peo­ple that have sim­i­lar val­ues and who agree with the cul­ture through­out the organization.

“You can have the best cus­tomers in the world and the best ser­vices, but with­out great peo­ple, it does­n’t come to life.” Lis­ten to Fras­er talk about sur­round­ing your­self with great peo­ple here.

Want to hear more? Here is the link to our recent CDN Case Study and watch the full inter­view with Fras­er below.

Oth­er Blogs

• 91% A Play­ers: What’s Your Number?
• How Pro­duc­tive are the Peo­ple in Your Business?
• A Process-First or Peo­ple-First Company?

Old­er Podcasts

• Build­ing a Peo­ple Mag­net Machine
• Sev­en Hid­den Rea­sons Employ­ees Leave