Case Study

Client Snapshot

Company: S.i. Systems – national IT staffing and consulting firm
Engagement: Branch Manager, Ottawa (later promoted into national leadership roles)
Market: Ottawa IT & consulting – public and private sector
Tenure: Approximately 18 years with the client

The Challenge — A Shrinking, Fragmented Ottawa Operation

S.i. Systems didn’t call Perry-Martel because things were going well.

The Ottawa operation had been built through tuck-in acquisitions and then left to drift. Revenue in Ottawa had contracted by more than 25% since acquisition, even as the rest of the company was in growth mode. There were three competing cultures (S.i. plus two acquired firms), each clinging to its own “we’ve always done it this way” habits. The team wasn’t a team: mixed commitment, inconsistent effort, and no shared definition of “good” — no KRAs, no standards, no accountability.

Externally, the Ottawa private sector was still recovering from Nortel and the telecom collapse, and the city was crowded with recruiting companies fighting over the same limited pool of talent and clients.

S.i. Systems needed more than a caretaker. They needed a leader who could reset culture, rebuild margin, and turn a shrinking asset into a serious P&L.

The Mandate — Find a Builder, Not a Cowboy

Inside Ottawa, there was a long list of “obvious” candidates: big personalities with big books and all the usual bad habits of a wild-west recruiting market — side deals, shortcuts, and short-termism.

Perry-Martel did the opposite:
• We systematically eliminated the flashy, high-risk candidates who would have imported the very culture S.i. Systems was trying to avoid.
• We reframed the brief from “find someone who knows everyone in town” to “find the builder who can reset this branch and scale it.”
• We looked for a leader with real team-building experience, comfort competing in tough markets, a systems mindset (process, KRAs, margin discipline), and the fewest bad habits with the highest ceiling.

That filter produced Brian Brady.

The Search — Why PMI Picked Brian Brady

Before S.i. Systems, Brian was a young manager at Manpower / Harrington, running a team of 10 recruiters and salespeople with 80 consultants billing in a private-sector Ottawa market full of recruiting companies (small and large) and intense competition for talent.

The key signals we weighted:
• He had already led in a crowded, unforgiving market where retention was brutal and internal competition was high.
• He thought like an operator, not just a salesperson — focused on team structure, expectations, and performance measurement.
• He was clearly obsessed with culture, training, and alignment, not quick hits.

The process mirrored that:
• The first contact was a referral from his manager at Harrington — a strong signal of reputation and staying power.
• The initial meeting was a coffee focused on S.i.’s vision and Ottawa’s reality, not a glossy sell job.
• We were open about the challenges — the free-falling branch, cultural mess, and aggressive growth expectations.
• He was grilled by top producers and executives, who made it clear that the standard was 150% of what the industry expects.

That’s when he knew the culture fit was real and that this was the right challenge.

Perry-Martel’s internal call: This is the person who can reset the business and grow it, not just run it.

The Playbook — What Brian Did in Ottawa

Resetting Basics and Expectations

In the first 6–12 months, Brian attacked fundamentals:
• Set office hours and expectations so everyone knew what “showing up” meant.
• Moved salespeople to sit with their recruiters, forcing real partnership and alignment around winning business.
• Spent time in Calgary and Vancouver to understand why other S.i. offices were growing and what needed to change in Ottawa.

He quickly diagnosed that everyone was doing things differently, with no standard processes; marketing and RFPs were trial-and-error, not repeatable; and there was no accountability for success, with junior staff lacking direction and training.

Building Structure, Accountability, and Margin

Next came the structural reset:
• Introduced KRAs and exited poor performers quickly.
• Mandated a minimum number of in-person client meetings per month to drive real market contact.
• Joined the team “in the pit,” on client meetings and in bid prep — leading from the front.

He rebuilt the go-to-market model by diversifying into both public and private sectors, building partnerships with other vendors and integrators to co-bid on bigger projects, and focusing on gross margin, intentionally raising GM% on each deal instead of chasing volume.

Key inflection points he highlights include ensuring they had the correct people on the bus, setting clear expectations, providing good training, and resetting culture — celebrating wins, sharing the vision, and working alongside the team.

Creating a Second Engine — The Private-Sector Business

Once the core branch was fixed, Brian created a dedicated private-sector group inside Ottawa:
• Motivated by diversification and the need to build new references and expertise (for example, SAP and higher-end roles).
• Structurally separated as a dedicated team that had to build and own its own success.
Over time, this unit became a strong revenue engine on its own, balancing business cycles and complementing the government portfolio.

Developing Leaders, Not Just Results

The most important part of this story isn’t just the P&L swing — it’s the leadership bench Brian built.

Over his career at S.i. Systems:
• Brian himself was recognized with a Forty Under 40 award in 2012, a public acknowledgment that his impact went beyond one branch P&L.
• In 2011, he led a Fight for the Cure campaign, raising money for cancer and demonstrating the same “all-in” leadership in the community that he brought to the business.
• He also served as a leader of the National Association of Canadian Consulting Businesses (NACCB) for several years, helping shape the voice of Canada’s consulting and staffing industry at a national level.

Inside the branch and across the company:
• From the Ottawa operation, Brian grew multiple new leaders who went on to become Vice Presidents and Managing Directors in Toronto, Vancouver, and Ottawa.
• Ottawa consistently exported talent to other regions, seeding growth and strengthening leadership benches across the country throughout his tenure.

This isn’t just a case of PMI placing a strong operator. It’s a case of PMI placing a leader who delivers results and produces more leaders who can carry the business forward. That’s the compound effect CEOs and investors actually pay for.

The Results — From Shrinking Branch to Strategic Asset

Under Brian’s leadership, the Ottawa operation:
• Grew from roughly $18M (and declining quickly) to about $130M and growing.
• Improved gross margin from 13% to 20%.
• Increased RFP win rate from 15% to 65%.

On top of that, the Ottawa/government engine:
• Greatly increased the value of the company, directly supporting private-equity events.
• Converted roughly 50% of gross margin to EBITDA, driving profitability.
• Became the largest segment in the company, with government work reaching around 35% of total GM.
• Provided a natural hedge against private-sector swings, especially in oil and gas.

This work increased the value of the company greatly, delivered consistent year-over-year growth, and gave S.i. Systems a scalable model for government and complex project work across Canada.

Why This Case Proves PMI Picks Winners

This isn’t just a story about a good manager doing good work. It’s evidence that who you pick changes the trajectory of the whole asset — and the leadership pipeline behind it.

In this case, PMI:
• Rejected the “usual suspects” with big books and bad habits in a wild-west market.
• Redefined the spec around leadership DNA: culture builder, systems thinker, long-term upside.
• Invested in a deeper, slower search, using multiple interviews and honest conversations to test fit from both sides.
• Backed the candidate with the highest ceiling, not the loudest résumé.

The payoff:
• A multi-year, $100M+ swing in branch revenue.
• Higher margins, better win rates, and a durable culture.
• A division that became central to the company’s profitability and valuation.
• And a successor leadership bench groomed inside the business that could take over and keep driving it.

What This Means for Your Business

If you’re sitting on an underperforming division, a messy post-acquisition unit, or a strategically important region that’s drifting, you don’t need “a body in the seat.” You need the right builder — someone who can reset culture, rebuild margin, and develop the next generation of leaders so the asset keeps compounding.

That’s the work we do.

Talk to Perry-Martel about your hardest leadership role — or, if you want the deeper playbook behind searches like this, grab the opening chapter of “Revolutions Need Leaders” and see how we rethink executive hiring for the 4.0 era.