Who I am
Louis-Philippe Vézina P.Eng., MBA
- 25 yearsfrom the shop floor to the executive office
- EBITDA doubledin 3 manufacturing companies
- 100+ projectsin energy efficiency
- 10+ initiativeswith First Nations communities
I started on the shop floor, as a mechanic's assistant and machine operator while I was studying. It has stayed my reference point: before they are systems, organizations are people working with real constraints.
I went on to coordinate training and continuous improvement for a large industrial group, where I received my Lean Six Sigma training. I then led more than a hundred compressed air system design projects subsidized by Hydro-Québec, cutting energy and maintenance costs — which is where I learned to cost out and plan a project across its full life cycle and payback.
Those methods have followed me everywhere: into sales roles, project management, and operational and financial leadership. They allowed me to double the EBITDA of three manufacturing companies and led me to the role of President and CEO.
That path took me to remote regions and across four continents, and brought me into contact with many communities. I have supported mining and pulp and paper teams, sat on non-profit boards, negotiated numerous commercial and socio-economic agreements, and coached more than a dozen entrepreneurial ventures — from the initial idea through financing and into delivery.
What I take from all of it is that a lasting solution is never written in advance: it is built by listening. Listening to the client, but also to the managers, the employees and the partners who will have to live with it. My first instinct is to go out on the floor, ask questions and understand the real constraints before proposing anything. Textbook management practices work at every level of large, mid-sized and small companies — provided they are translated into the reality of the people who will apply them.