1. Thanks for joining us for an interview, Jason! Tell us about who you are and how you found your way into the RF/microwave/wireless world.

My pleasure, Del! Many thanks for inviting me to tell my wireless story. I spent 30 years of my 34-year professional career in the wireless data space. I started in sales, then moved to sales leadership and ultimately served as CEO. Since retiring from full-time work in 2018, I have served on the boards of several publicly traded tech companies in the U.S., Canada and France.

My journey to and through the RF/wireless world started in the 1980s. Shortly after graduating from university in the early 80s, I began my career with NCR Corporation, selling Point of Sale systems to restaurants in New York City. My sales territory stretched from 42nd Street in Manhattan to the northern tip of the island. These were the very early days of automation in the restaurant business. The technology was new, and restaurant owners were wary. Selling new technology to scrappy New York entrepreneurs was, to put it mildly, a challenge…but also a fantastic training experience for a newbie. After 4 fun years at NCR, I started to look for my next challenge. Conducting a diligent search of the classified ads in actual printed newspapers, I eventually responded to an advertisement for a sales position with a company called Mobile Data International (MDI), which had just opened an office in NYC. At my first interview, I was blown away by the technology and solutions this small Canadian company was bringing to the market. MDI had developed a new packet data protocol (MMP) that enabled reliable two-way data messaging across land mobile radio networks. Around this protocol, MDI developed an end-to-end solution including small/rugged computers (mobile data terminals), radio base station controllers, central site controllers and eventually computer-aided dispatching software for field service fleets. The result was real-time two-way data communication between central systems (often dispatchers) and mobile vehicles (often police cars or service trucks). This was long before the wide deployment of cellular networks, and the early 1G cellular networks were not designed to support reliable packet data communications. This was truly breakthrough technology. When MDI offered me the job to sell mobile data solutions to Utilities and Police Departments in the Northeastern U.S., I jumped at the opportunity. The year was 1988…and accepting the job marked the start of my 30-year career in the wireless data industry.

In 1993, a small team of my former MDI colleagues founded Sierra Wireless and received venture funding. The company was an early developer of protocol stacks, and ultimately devices, that worked on emerging packet data standards for cellular networks — the first being Cellular Digital Packet Data (CDPD). CDPD was based on the emerging Internet Protocol (IP) and enabled reliable packet data communications over 1G analog cellular networks. By 1996, the team had developed and launched their initial wireless data connectivity products and reached out to me to gauge my interest in joining the senior MGT team. I joined Sierra Wireless in July of 1996 and spent the next 22 years there. I joined as VP of Sales, progressed to COO in 2004, and was appointed CEO by the board in 2005. I served as CEO of Sierra Wireless until my retirement in 2018. During my 22 years at Sierra Wireless, we survived the startup phase, launched an IPO in Canada and a NASDAQ co-listing and drove revenue growth from approximately $6 million in 1996 to $800 million in 2018. Five years after my retirement, in 2023, the company was acquired by Semtech for $1.2 billion.

2. The Sierra Wireless story is an impressive business case in smart pivots leading to great success. Can you give us an overview of the Sierra Wireless transformation, including how the business looked at the beginning of your time there and how it looked when you retired in 2018?

In 1997, we launched the world’s first CDPD modem in a PCMCIA form factor — this product enabled users to easily connect their laptop computers to CDPD networks being deployed in the U.S., Latin America and Asia. We branded the product “AirCard,” and it became the gold standard for data cards on cellular networks. Over the years, the AirCard product line evolved to support new generations of progressively faster and more pervasive cellular data standards. This became complex with the launch of 2G cellular networks as two competing standards emerged — Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) and the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). CDMA networks were deployed by Verizon in the U,S, and in select international markets. GSM networks were deployed by AT&T in the U.S., across Europe and in other select international markets. For Sierra Wireless, this meant two separate development efforts and two primary AirCard product lines to serve network operators around the world. This technology bifurcation persisted through the 2G and 3G cellular phases before re-converging with the deployment of 4G (LTE). As cellular technologies evolved, so did the AirCard form factor preference. The PCMCIA form factor began to fade in the early 2000s and was briefly replaced by ExpressCard and then by USB. Eventually, the market moved to the Mobile Hotspot form factor — replacing the physical connection to the PC with Wi-Fi and providing the ability to connect multiple devices, much like your home Wi-Fi router.

With each launch of a new and faster cellular technology, market adoption of our AirCard products grew — and we were well positioned to lead. In the early 2000s, we had the largest global market share of the data card market by a considerable margin. Business was great — growing rapidly and highly profitable…but storm clouds were brewing.

Around the 2003 timeframe, we began to form a thesis — That the AirCard business, while great today, was likely to be strategically vulnerable in the future. With rapid growth in the data card market, new low-cost competitors were quickly entering. Additionally, early smartphones, such as the Handspring Treo, were starting to gain traction and could become an alternative to the AirCard. We concluded that margins would come under pressure and that the data card market might contract as smartphone adoption grew. We made the tough decision that AirCard was not our future — instead, it was a vital bridge to our future.

Ultimately, this led us to a pivot — away from AirCard and toward the nascent “Internet of Things” (IoT) market. We decided on this pivot because 1) we believed that the IoT was a fundamentally more defensible business with great growth prospects, and 2) we already had a small footprint in the market and the technical and commercial know-how to compete and thrive in IoT. We started this pivot to IoT with one small acquisition in 2007, followed by a transformational acquisition in 2009, followed by a series of smaller add-ons. As we built a leading IoT franchise through a combination of acquisitions and organic investment, we managed AirCard for profitability. Ultimately, we sold the AirCard business to NETGEAR, which completed our transformation into an IoT pure play. The change in the composition of our business over a period of 10 years was truly remarkable. In 2008, at the peak of our AirCard business, our total revenue was $567 million, with over 70 percent coming from AirCard. In 2018, as an IoT pure play, our total revenue was nearly $800 million, with zero coming from AirCard.

3. When we spoke, you mentioned different “chapters” of transformation, including repairing the business, entering the IoT market, becoming the IoT market leader and finally evolving to device to cloud solutions. How did those different chapters play out?

Looking back on the successful transformation, with the full benefit of hindsight, all the tactical and strategic moves we made seem to fit nicely into four “predetermined chapters.” However, at the time, in the heat of the battle, it didn’t feel so “predetermined.” Obstacles popped up, unexpected opportunities emerged and industry dynamics changed. These unpredictable realities also impacted the decisions we made as we navigated the transformation.

The first chapter of the transformation, “Repair the business; Determine what’s next,” was probably the most straightforward. In 2004, we had our best operational results to date. Revenue grew by 108 percent from 2003 to $211 million. We had a dominant market share in the growing data card market, and we were launching our first major diversification play — the Voq smartphone. Reflecting on where we are today, it’s hard to believe that 2003 was still very early in the smartphone market — the leading incumbents were Blackberry and Palm — Apple wouldn’t enter for another four years, and Android was still five years in the future. Voq was tightly integrated with the Microsoft mobile operating system and Microsoft Exchange. We positioned Voq as the “Professional Phone” with seamless native integration with the Microsoft backend. To fund the development and launch of Voq, we took resources away from our growing AirCard business. In the end, we lacked the resources to effectively execute on both Voq and AirCard. The result was that Voq failed in the market, and the AirCard business was severely injured. This combination set us up for a terrible 2005. Revenue fell by 50 percent, and we had to implement a painful restructuring, including layoffs.

I was appointed CEO in late 2005 in the midst of this painful reset. The formula to stabilize the business was simple — exit the Voq smartphone category and return to prominence in the data card (AirCard) market. While we continued to believe that the AirCard category was strategically vulnerable in the long-term, our thinking around timing had evolved. We concluded that we could get several more years of growth and profitability out of AirCard by relying on our proven strengths in rapidly developing and launching new technologies and form factors. The first half of “chapter one” was really all about maniacal focus and execution. Success in this “repair the business” part of the chapter meant that we would have time and resources to carefully determine “what’s next.” The strategy worked. Focus and execution on AirCard enabled us to quickly return to growth and profitability. A technology arms race amongst global wireless operators also helped. Operators were very focused on the constant deployment of new technologies, with all the major players trying to stay one step ahead of their competitors. This was helpful to our AirCard business, as we were generally first to market with products supporting the newest (and fastest) cellular data technology. In 2006, we turned our business around — doubling revenue to $221 million. In 2007, we doubled revenue again to $440 million. By this time, we had determined that the IoT would be “what’s next.” Our thesis was 1) We had the experience and capabilities to lead in cellular solutions for the IoT — the technology was nearly the same, while the use cases and go-to-market motion was quite different and 2) The IoT represented a secular growth opportunity as more and more machines would be connected over wireless networks and 3) The IoT represented a fundamentally more defensible market than data cards.

Importantly, we also concluded that we should accelerate our position in the IoT through acquisition. Our reasoning on this topic was that it would take too long to develop the channels and customer base organically. To lead and lead fast required acquisitions. Furthermore, we concluded that acquisitions would require more capital than we had on our balance sheet. Fortunately, as a result of our strong business performance, our stock had been up 300 percent in the last three years. Our stock performance enabled us to raise money in the equity capital markets at a very favorable price. In October of 2007, we closed on a deal that raised $81 million at a share price of $22.40. This fortified our balance sheet and gave us the capital we needed to acquire key IoT assets. Our timing was also very fortunate, as the capital markets plummeted just a few months later when the economy entered the Great Recession.

With a strong balance sheet and a well-defined strategy, we were now ready for chapter two of our transformation: Enter the IoT.

In 2007, we bolstered our “IoT Gateways” business with the acquisition of AirLink in Haywood, Calif. In 2008, our revenue growth trajectory continued, growing 30 percent to $567 million. Despite the Great Recession, our business was strong as we actively explored IoT acquisitions. We determined that embedded cellular modules for IoT were an attractive segment of the market. Embedded cellular modules are essentially cellular modems in a form factor that enables them to be embedded into machines made by other OEMs. Such machines include cars, electricity meters, alarm panels, consumer devices, etc. We determined that this highly diversified channel and customer base made for a defensible business that could scale rapidly as the market grew. This conclusion led us to actively explore potential acquisitions of the leaders in the embedded cellular module market. Wavecom was a company that had been on our radar for some time. Based in France, Wavecom was known for its innovation and strong market position in IoT. We had informal discussions with key executives at Wavecom about a potential combination of our companies for a few years. Then, at the height of the Great Recession, the opportunity to acquire Wavecom arose. Gemalto, another (much larger) French company, made a hostile bid to acquire Wavecom. Believing that they held unassailable leverage, Gemalto vowed publicly not to increase its bid price. This gave us an opportunity to negotiate a friendly deal with the Wavecom team at a superior price to Gemalto’s bid. Wavecom’s proverbial White Knight had arrived, and it was us. For Sierra, the acquisition of Wavecom was transformational — they were a company of similar size to us, and the deal enabled us to enter IoT in a very big way.

The acquisition of Wavecom also marked the beginning of the transformation chapter three: Create the IoT Leader.

In chapter three, we reorganized the company to enable maximum investment in building our IoT franchise — both organically and inorganically. A key part of this reorganization was to narrow our scope in the AirCard business. As opposed to servicing all mobile network operators around the world, we focused the AirCard business on our three largest and most profitable customers: AT&T, Sprint and Telstra in Australia. These three operators were known for evolving their network technologies rapidly and for having exacting schedule and quality performance expectations. These demanding customers fit our DNA and capabilities perfectly — and they appreciated our performance. Narrowing our scope in this way enabled us to execute fantastically for these important customers, while also running a profitable business. Profits and cash flow from our AirCard business were used to fuel our IoT growth.

In our IoT business, we did some market consolidation acquisitions in the embedded cellular module space in both Europe and Asia. We also bolstered our profitable IoT gateway business with an acquisition in Canada. By 2010, we were the clear global leader in cellular IoT solutions — principally in the gateway and embedded module space. That year, total revenue reached $650 million, with IoT accounting for more than 50 percent.

Profitably maximizing our AirCard business was a key enabler of growing our IoT business — it also made AirCard attractive to a potential acquirer. NETGEAR, a leading network equipment maker, had expressed interest in a potential deal to acquire AirCard as early as 2011. In 2013, NETGEAR’s interest persisted and our mutual interests and timing finally aligned. We divested (or carved out) our AirCard business to NETGEAR for $138 million. The transaction recharged our balance sheet and also transformed Sierra Wireless into an IoT pure play.

Having pivoted into an IoT pure play leader and fortifying the balance sheet, we were ready to commence chapter four of the transformation: Evolve to device to cloud.

In 2013, we had a world-leading franchise in IoT — providing embedded cellular modules to large OEMs across many market segments, and industrial cellular gateways to enterprises. Both our modules and gateways were deployed in myriad applications and across mobile networks all over the world. Global IoT deployments were very complex — sophisticated machines and cellular devices at the edge, connecting to wireless networks (often multiple) around the world, connecting to device and SIM management platforms in the cloud, and ultimately integrating with use case-specific applications for corporate users. There were lots of players in this complex ecosystem, each capturing the profits related to their part in the value chain. Given the strength of our position in the edge hardware part of the value chain, we concluded that we should be able to capture more of the solution value, and in so doing, secure high-value recurring revenue. Moving up the value chain required some very careful navigation — if we attempted to move too far up the value chain, we would run the risk of alienating key partners and end up in a part of the market that did not fit our capabilities well. We determined that the optimal place for us to occupy was the horizontal “device to cloud” layer of the solution: devices at the edge + tightly integrated global connectivity services + cloud services for device management and tools for easily developing and deploying IoT applications. This device to cloud layer often represented confounding complexity for customers (OEMs and Enterprises) and application partners developing and deploying IoT solutions. If we could simplify this layer, we believed we could add tremendous value to customers and partners, while also capturing more of the value chain.

Elevating our position in the value chain required some additional pieces of the puzzle that we lacked. We had edge devices, and we had device management in the cloud, but lacked connectivity and application building/deployment services. To fill in these missing pieces, we decided to redeploy the proceeds from our sale of AirCard to acquire global connectivity service capabilities and cloud services.

Having concluded this, we set out to acquire mobile virtual network operators (MNVOs) who specialized in providing connectivity services for IoT applications. Over a period of four years, we acquired four IoT MVNOs — two in Europe and two in the U.S. We also acquired a company that had developed an innovative data orchestration layer and toolkit that made it easier and faster for customers to develop and deploy IoT applications in the cloud and at the edge. Having acquired these pieces, we then set out to “stitch” all these services together into a secure and seamless “device to cloud” solution. It was a heavy lift on both the product development and go-to-market sides of the equation. I must say that success required nothing short of a cultural transformation as well — moving from making and selling only edge hardware to full device to cloud solutions was a monumental challenge. But, in the end, we had completely repositioned the company into more attractive markets and deeper into the value chain, including high-margin recurring revenue from connectivity and cloud services. We accomplished this complete repositioning while also growing the company and improving shareholder returns. In 2018, our total revenue was approximately $800 million — all of it from IoT and approximately 12 percent of it from recurring cloud and connectivity services.

4. What key moves did you make to ensure you progressed through these transformation chapters successfully?

Our 2005 challenges provided us with some very important lessons that were valuable as we plotted our transformation course. A few hard lessons that I still reflect on to this day:

  • When embarking on a large, complex, expensive diversification move, you should have the capital and focus to execute on both the “new thing” (Voq in our case) AND the “old thing” (AirCard). In our case, we ended up under-investing in both the “new thing” and the “old thing,” and as a result, we almost ended up with nothing. We learned that we should not have put AirCard at risk as, at a minimum, it represented an important bridge to “what’s next.”
  • You may be right when declaring the “old thing” strategically vulnerable, but you might have the timing wrong. In our case, we were correct in concluding that AirCard was strategically vulnerable — but it took several more years for that vulnerability to negatively impact our business. AirCard ended up having a much longer tail of growth and profitability than we initially thought it would. This long tail ended up providing a vital bridge to our IoT pivot.

Some of the key initiatives that underpinned our successful transformation to IoT leadership were:

  • Communication. Simply put, the team needs to know where you are leading the company and why. Furthermore, the team needs to know the progress the company is making along the way and how their role impacts the transformation’s success. The transformation mission requires team buy-in and passion. If you don’t have it, you are doomed to failure.
  • Walking the talk. It’s not sufficient to create an alluring strategy and direction — the strategy also needs to be backed with real (often difficult) operational decisions and changes to resource allocation. For example, we very decisively moved AirCard to a “Profitably Maximize” mission so that we could use the profits and cash flow from AirCard to fund the growth of our IoT business. It’s important to note that this move did not “underfund” AirCard. Instead, we narrowed the scope of the AirCard business to our three largest customers, consciously ceasing sales and development activity with other, less profitable, mobile network operators. We then fully funded this more focused mission so that we executed flawlessly and repeatedly — always maintaining our leading position with these key customers, while also reaping profits and cash flow.
  • Careful, yet bold M&A. We executed several deals in support of our transformation — but we also consciously avoided catching “deal fever.” We did not do deals for the sake of doing deals. When we chose a strategic direction, we always did a “make or buy” analysis — asking ourselves, “can we do this alone/organically, or do we need to acquire our way into that attractive segment”? We carefully chose our strategic lanes and proactively targeted potential acquisitions that aligned well with the strategy. We developed a detailed M&A scorecard that rated the attractiveness of potential targets. We would often work on potential targets for years before finally having an opportunity to consummate an acquisition. When a large, transformational deal (like Wavecom) was available, we were ready — ready with capital, ready with analysis, ready with financial models, ready with an integration plan.
  • Cross-pollination. The acquisitions we made in support of the transformation were varied — often by location, segment and culture. Acquisitions often fail due to poor cultural fit — corporate culture, or even geopolitical culture. We spent a lot of time and effort to ensure that once a company was acquired, the acquired team was immersed in our corporate culture — this took lots of travel and constant communication. Another key enabler was the cross-pollination of key team members. For example, when we acquired Wavecom, key executives from the French Wavecom HQ relocated to the Sierra HQ in Vancouver. Similarly, key Sierra executives from the U.S, and Canada relocated to France. Such cross-pollination helped to accelerate the integration and to successfully merge the two cultures into one.

5. This transformation continued its successful track through the 2008 financial crisis — as we face more financially uncertain times — what advice do you have for MWJ readers and business leaders to successfully navigate market challenges that are out of your control?

Uncertainty can be kryptonite for any business. Uncertainty can cause paralysis, and it can inspire impulsive/poorly analyzed decisions. Uncertainty can be particularly hard on smaller companies that lack the size and capital to weather storms. Having navigated a very uncertain period — the Great Recession — and having emerged stronger than our peers, I would offer the following:

  • Raise capital when you don’t need it. Whether you run a private company or a public company, I would urge leaders to strengthen the balance sheet when they really don’t need to, for the following reasons: 1) You can optimize price and control shareholder dilution. Simply put, a healthy company that is not desperate for capital will tend to attract a higher share price and therefore have to issue less equity to raise the desired capital — it’s just cheaper money. This is what we did in 2007. Our business was strong and growing, and our share price was at a three-year high. We successfully sold a new share issue at an attractive price, just before the bottom fell out of the markets. We were very happy to have the additional cash. 2) If your business is affected by the uncertain times, you will have capital to weather the storm and come out on the other side. 3) You will have capital when many of your peers/competitors don’t. You can use your position of relative strength to make key investments in new programs or make important acquisitions that your peers and competitors can’t. You will emerge from the period of uncertainty stronger than ever compared to your peers.
  • Be very careful with debt. Debt certainly has a role to play in the capital structure, but I encourage caution. Too much debt and unfavorable terms can put the business and stockholders in a very precarious position — particularly if business softens during periods of uncertainty. I have seen several cases where the debt terms couldn’t be met, and very quickly, the debt holders became the owners of the company — a bad outcome for shareholders and the team.
  • Have a risk management plan. Have a plan in place for what to do if/when a recession or period of uncertainty puts the brakes on the business. Review the plan regularly. Update the plan as real world events take place. This ensures that your plan is always fresh and contextualized for the real world and ready to be implemented if needed. And when it’s time to implement the plan, do it fast. Do it decisively. Monitor its impact regularly and course correct as needed.

6. What values drive you, and how did you apply them when leading Sierra Wireless to success?

Every business leader is competitive. Every business leader wants to win. This desire to win is an essential value, but also insufficient. Very few businesses are led to greatness by iconic thought leaders like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. The vast majority of businesses are led by mere mortals. Mere mortals lean heavily on values. For me, I always leaned on:

  • Trust. I believe a leader must earn the trust of the team — leaders need to demonstrate that their actions and strategic choices are in the best interests of the team and the company. The team needs to trust that what the leader says is true and transparent. The team needs to know that the leader is shoulder to shoulder with them on the journey — and unafraid to get their hands dirty when needed. The team also needs to know that the leader trusts them — trusts them to make the right decisions and to act in the best interests of the company and the rest of the team. This two-way trust can blossom into something extraordinary — a kind of battle-like camaraderie. People will try harder, reach further. With trust, all things are possible.
  • Teamwork. Teamwork is closely related to trust. The bedrock of team is indeed trust. Complex projects and businesses require teamwork — everybody playing their position, everybody backing up their teammate. As a leader, teamwork is something I absolutely insist upon. A lack of teamwork was about the only behavior I couldn’t tolerate. It’s something we all learned on the playground — either you’re on the team and working for a common goal, or you’re not.

7. What is the most exciting advancement you’ve seen in recent years?

Like just about everybody on the planet, I marvel at the current AI surge. The amount of business, capital investment and value created in a compressed period is simply mind-blowing…and this phenomenon is much broader than NVIDIA chips, LLMs and Hyperscalers. Startup after startup has built solutions on top of LLMs to deliver real business and consumer solutions. AI-powered robots and vehicles (land, air and sea) are being developed to perform a wide range of tasks and projects. Massive data centers are being built around the world, fueling a construction boom. New energy solutions have been developed to power these data centers. The list goes on and on. Is this a bubble? Perhaps…but 10 years from today, we will look back and marvel at how this AI chapter of technology has changed lives and businesses forever.

I would also be remiss if I didn’t comment on what we have witnessed in the cellular wireless space over the past 20 years. Technologies have progressed from 2G to 5G. With 5G, we can now perform data-hungry tasks over cellular links that were unthinkable 20 years ago. At the same time, we can connect to far flung power stingy IoT devices that cellular networks could never reach before. And now, our cellular connections are seamlessly augmented by satellite connectivity, so we are never ever out of touch. But the thing I marvel about most is how the smartphone has become the centerpiece of our lives — our work center, our family center, our entertainment center. 20 years ago, the state of the art was a Blackberry with a QWERTY keyboard, running on 2G networks. Slow, asynchronous messaging and corporate email were the killer apps.

Then, the iPhone launched in 2007 and Android in 2008. The first releases were very cool…but also somewhat unremarkable. But now, 18 years later, look at where we are. I often catch myself shaking my head in amazement while I use my phone — streaming football games and favorite shows, dipping into the massive app ecosystem to find the coolest solutions that solve myriad problems, reconnecting with friends on social media, launching small business ad campaigns…banking, making trades, transferring money, signing agreements. Executing business tasks — accessing massive libraries of documents in the cloud, modifying them in native Microsoft apps, sending them on to the people who need them. The list of amazing capabilities is long. In my view, the smartphone and the networks they connect to have driven an amazing lifestyle and business transformation.

8. You serve/have served on a number of boards now, including Sequans Communications, RF Industries and others. How has your leadership impacted these companies and what is your overarching goal when joining a board?

The boards on which I have served, and currently serve, are generally 1) in my industry wheelhouse — wireless, RF, IoT, 2) publicly traded and 3) small-cap companies with an aspiration to grow, perhaps transform and to create value. I understand companies with these characteristics deeply, and these are the companies where I can contribute the most. Before joining boards, I have often formed a relationship with the CEO, and through several discussions, we have mutually concluded that I can help. After 13 years in the CEO seat, and having experienced/led significant growth, a strategic transformation and the public markets, I have seen a lot…and navigated many of the same situations that the CEOs of these smaller companies will face. My goal is to provide support to the CEO — to be a sounding board for tough decisions and to offer my advice on strategy and operations. My goal is to support the CEO and the team with my experience as they strive to achieve the next phase of growth and the next leg of shareholder value creation.

I am comfortable with corporate strategy and operations. I offer advice on crafting a cohesive and compelling overall strategy and on how to operationalize the strategy — from go-to-market, to manufacturing, to investor relations, to securing capital to fund key initiatives.

While it is often tempting for a director to dive deep into the business, it’s very important for directors to remind themselves that the role of the board is governance, not operations. Transparent advice, encouragement, a point of view are welcome…but the board does not run the company — The CEO and their team do. An effective board should be “noses in; fingers out.”

On the governance side, there is a lot to do. The board supports and guides the management team, while also representing the interests of shareholders. The board is responsible for oversight of several important shareholder-impacting functions, such as the regular reporting of financial results, setting executive compensation and electing new board directors. These are beefy, detailed topics, and effective oversight is much more involved than showing up to board meetings and enjoying a nice dinner. There is preparation, lots of reading and real work. In my view, effective board directors must be willing and able to do the work, and not simply direct management to do all the heavy lifting.

9. What business philosophy or playbook have you developed and implemented over the course of your career?

From a leadership philosophy standpoint, I will once again point to the pillars of trust and teamwork. If team members trust the leader and trust their teammates, the work rhythm is easy — actions and projects can flow unimpeded. As a leader, I was very conscious of living these pillars every day — and demanding that team members do the same. Mistakes and errors happen. While disappointing, mistakes and errors won’t shake the foundation of the business — they are learning opportunities, and the team can take steps to avoid similar mistakes in the future. On the other hand, a lack of trust and teamwork can be terminal to the culture of a company, and ultimately the business itself.

To trust and teamwork, I would also add work ethic and attitude. In my experience, a superior work ethic and positive attitude outdo mere skills and knowledge every time. Of course, when you combine all of these precious ingredients, remarkable things can happen — it can truly be like alchemy. On work ethic, I was very intentional about setting an example. I was almost always the first to arrive at the office in the morning and often one of the last to leave in the evening. Without words, my work ethic demonstrated to the team that “I am here for you.” Early, late, whatever it takes. People noticed this — and many adopted similar work patterns.

On the playbook, I am committed to having a cohesive long-term strategy, backed by a rigorous operational cadence. These are the roadmaps and report cards of the business. Without them, you are lost in the wilderness — and so is your team. It’s amazing to me how many companies are undisciplined on these key topics. Operational plans often fail to tie tightly to a long-term strategy. Operational reviews and course corrections are often done ad hoc instead of regularly.

A cohesive strategy is the company’s lighthouse, showing the way to go. The strategy also provides vital context for making key decisions on everything from new product development programs to acquisitions. Once established, a strategy will (hopefully) not change materially — it should provide consistent direction on where to head. If a company changes its strategy materially and frequently, the business is likely broken. The strategy is also a great communication tool — for the team, board and investors. It serves as a consistent reminder of where we are, where we are headed and why we are making the decisions we are. While striving for consistency, I am also a proponent of revisiting the strategy regularly. At Sierra, we held quarterly check-ins, complemented by a multi-day annual strategy session. All of the strategy meetings were scheduled at least a year in advance. We used these sessions to poke, prod, table new information and to ask ourselves a myriad of tough questions: What has changed in the market? Are we effectively executing our strategy? Do we have the capability and resources to execute the strategy? What tweaks should we consider? Is the thesis behind our strategy still valid? Have the market changes been so significant that we should consider a change in strategy?

The strategy should also lead the company to a desired place, where market position goals are achieved, and value is created. Developing a credible long-term (3-5 year) financial model is critical to the strategy. This will inform the team whether successfully executing the strategy will likely lead to value creation. It’s also very important to be realistic — it’s easy to create a spreadsheet that shows massive revenue and earnings growth, but it's much harder to do it in real life. I suggest being realistic about likely competitive pressures, market dynamics and investments required. The model should show how the team believes revenue and product mix will trend over time, the impact on gross margin and the real investments required along the way. This should yield an earnings trendline over the three- to five-year period. By applying realistic multiples to earnings and revenue, the team can determine if the financial results create value for the company and shareholders.

I also believe that a compelling, credible strategy should be implemented through a rigorous operational cadence. Every year, a detailed annual plan should be developed. The plan should include the achievement of key strategic milestones, important new product launches, marketing and sales goals, etc. Of course, the plan needs to include the company’s target financial results — by month or quarter — including revenue, gross margin, expenses that support the investments required and earnings. The annual plan can be viewed as the next chapter in the execution of the company’s long-term strategy.

Execution of the annual plan should be supported by an operational cadence — a series of meetings or check-ins that help ensure the company stays on track to meet or exceed the plan every month or quarter, and for the full year. At Sierra, these meetings (or check-ins) were booked in advance with the senior leaders of the business. Our cadence was as follows:

  • Monday Morning Meetings: Every Monday morning, the senior leadership would have a 60 to 90 minute meeting or “huddle” — aligning on plays to run during the week ahead. Each senior leader provided a quick report for their area of the business — what issues and opportunities came up last week? What do we need to do this week to correct issues and seize opportunities? What help and support are needed from other senior leaders and departments?
  • Monthly Operations Reviews: These were more detailed meetings to do a deep review of the key operations of the business — mainly financial performance, sales, operations/manufacturing and engineering. In an operations review, each area of the business (or department) would provide a detailed report on results versus plan, results versus key performance indicators, and a variance analysis for each — Why did we miss? Why did we exceed? What is our plan for the coming month to correct course as needed? What support from other leaders and departments is required? At the close of the meeting, the team would align on the key actions to be taken in the coming month(s) and assign an executive to oversee each action. This action list would roll over to the next monthly operations review meeting.
  • Quarterly Business Reviews (QBRs): Our QBRs were essentially a longer form of the monthly operations reviews, expanding the departments reviewed and team participation. If the Monday Morning Meetings were our “huddles,” QBRs were our “halftime” — what went right in the quarter? What went wrong? What are we going to do differently in the next quarter? The timing for our QBRs also aligned with our quarterly financial results and generally occurred one to two weeks before board meetings and earnings releases. This timing ensured that the team was very well prepared to present and discuss results with the board and investors.

This cadence provided a critical rhythm for operating the business — with predictable schedules and agendas. As a result, the team developed in-depth knowledge of what was happening in all key areas of the business and established team alignment on the actions required to stay on track. I will add that the QBRs were also a great opportunity for team building — with lots of great discussion, debate and inter-departmental collaboration – usually capped with an informal/relaxing team dinner.

10. Is there anything else you’d like Microwave Journal readers to know about you, Sierra Wireless, or the great transformation you led?

Thanks again, Del, for the opportunity to share my wireless/RF journey with your readers. This industry has enriched so many lives and helped businesses all over the world. I feel so lucky to have played a small role. I hope your readers have enjoyed our interview and that they found our topics interesting and helpful.