Hello everyone.
I want to thank the committee for giving me the opportunity to testify here today.
As you already know, my name is Patrick Lamothe. I am retired now, but I served in the Canadian Armed Forces for 28 years. In the meatime, I am the founding president of a few companies, including Altitude Gym and other startups. So far we have created around 200 jobs in those businesses.
That being said, I am here to talk about the program. I want to make clear that I am not attached to the program. I am only an amabassdor. I want to say that the help we have received from this program has been pivotal to the success of our companies.
Let me share some of my personal background.
I had the luck and privilege of attending training camp in Halifax in 2015. I was able to participate in it despite the fact that I was already at the head of a company.
I have to say that soldiers who return to civilian life, especially infantry soldiers, whose training is mostly in combat arms, are a bit behind compared to others since their skills and aptitudes are not really transferable.
I will now talk about the strengths of the program.
The program helped us to understand several concepts such as the words marketing, operations and human resources. It also helped us to understand their legal implications. These are words that everyone knows, but as entrepreneurs, sometimes we get their implications wrong. There were impartial intermediaries who put us on the right track.
I owe the success of our businesses to this program.