International Expansion and Execution: Locatrix CEO Scott Jackson

“Leadership Quarterly Priorities  –  small cross-functional teams trying to solve something that's important for the quarter – are really the foundation of the execution machine and it's part of Scaling Up. It’s an execution weapon, if you can get it right... we’ve done over 60 of them.” 

We’re joined by Scott Jackson, CEO of Locatrix, a safety-tech platform modernising fire compliance through digital mapping and emergency planning. Their platform is used by 2,000+ industry professionals, and services some of the world’s largest  property portfolios.

Scott’s journey spans founding, exits, and now leading Locatrix through disciplined execution and international expansion, while anchoring culture in humility, gratitude, and hope.
 
 In this episode, Scott shares:
 • Using Leadership Quarterly Priorities (LQPs) to drive accountability and cadence
 • Evolving a partner model from efficiency gains to global distribution
 • Going international: regulation fit, product-market fit, and learning fast via trade shows
 • Upgrading go-to-market: interim CRO impact, tighter segments, and hiring a Head of Growth
 • Succession with integrity: COO → CEO and protecting culture through change

Guest: Scott Jackson, CEO, Locatrix
Host: Mark Bryan, Managing Director, Pemba Capital Partners
Podcast Producer: Martine McMahon

Ask a Question: Have something you'd like to ask the Pemba team? - email viewtothesummit@pemba.com.au

Thanks for listening and keep striving for your next summit!

Transcript

(0:00 - 0:44)

This series is produced on the land of the Gadigal people of the Eora nation. Pemba respectfully acknowledges traditional custodians throughout Australia. We recognize their continuing connections to country and culture, and we pay our respects to elders and leaders past and present. A very warm welcome to View to the Summit, the Pemba podcast for founders looking to scale to their next summit.

I'm Mark Bryan, one of the managing directors here at Pemba, and today we're delighted to have Scott Jackson, CEO of Locatrix, join us on the show. Locatrix is a fast-growing software platform revolutionizing safety compliance through digital mapping and emergency planning technology. Their platform is now used by over 2,000 fire and safety industry professionals and services some of the world's largest property portfolios.

(0:45 - 1:40)

Locatrix has become a trusted technology partner to fire services businesses, facility managers, and enterprise customers. We're very proud at Pemba to have Locatrix as a partner company and to be able to support Scott and his team on their growth journey. Today, the business has customers across Australia and New Zealand and is now driving significant international growth.

So Scott, great to have you with us and thanks for joining us today. Thanks Mark, super grateful to be here. Excellent, so today we're going to explore setting growth priorities, managing teams, succession, developing an enterprise sales framework, and the importance of values.

So let's jump straight into today's episode. So Scott, in your own words, can you please tell us about your business and career journey to date and we're really keen to hear your business successes and what inspires you as the leader of Locatrix. So for nearly 20 years I've been an owner and operator in the tech world.

(1:40 - 2:10)

I started my early career in my early 20s as an analyst in an ASX listed business where I was building ROI financial models for the board and also doing cash flow modelling. There were great early lessons that took me into my career. The business was highly entrepreneurial, both of the owners ended up on the BRW 100 rich list.

I reported into some Americans in Texas for a while and that taught me about big ideas, the power of believing in your people and how to make it happen. They believed in me and so I believed in me. It was a great lesson later in life.

(2:11 - 2:33)

I was studying a master's part-time at night, finished my degree at an MBA school in South Carolina, headed to Ireland where I met up with my wife who at the time was living in London. I got a job working for Pfizer Pharmaceuticals and I was working as a project analyst, but that night I was working on a side project for another entrepreneur. I built funding models for a 400 home and golf course development in Louisiana.

(2:33 - 3:12)

He told me that if I got funded I'd get paid and if I didn't it'd be great experience. It was pre-GFC, it got funded and so looking for more adventure we set off to Baton Rouge, Louisiana but it was time to go home. And so we embarked on some properties, we did four in two years and we got engaged, married and then used the money to buy my first business which was really where I started off.

I liked the business, it was an IT company and I bought it because it was early on the contracted income idea and so it made sense to me. We had two daughters, life got busy, we managed to triple the business in the time that I owned it which was exciting. We had an amazing culture of deep alignment with our customers and we had a great team.

(3:12 - 5:24)

And along the way we exited a small business, that was my first experience with an exit and then we had the main business was sold to a Sydney business that was looking for capability and enterprise selling and also a greater foothold into the Sydney market. I look back at those days fondly, there were brutal experiences that maybe only other fellow owners and founders can understand, but there were great times too. At one point we'd done 30 or 40 percent growth year on year, I hired a couple of helicopters, took our management team up behind the gulf coast and went out for lunch and it was one of those great moments in life where you celebrate your hard work and your successes, it was awesome.

I learned so much and I'm forever grateful for those people that share that experience. After the earn out I was looking for the next challenge and that's when I met the team at Locatrix where I planned to bring in what I'd learned along the way. You asked the question about purpose and so I think purpose, it evolves, it changes.

Leadership has become more about mentoring, building culture and shaping strategy. For me it's fantastic with Locatrix to lead a purpose-led organisation through this time. And you're certainly making a difference and it was wonderful to hear all those insights in your background and I know how hard that you've been working on the business, but one thing I noticed and really respect about you is just how dedicated you are to your family as well, to both your wife Carly and your two daughters as well.

So well done, well done to you. Scott, let's think about setting some growth priorities and how you think about the business in that respect. So having now been partnered with you for almost a year, it's clear that one of your superpowers is setting clear leadership quarterly priorities.

Can you please share with our listeners how you use LQPs, how you create accountability and how you dovetail this with the overall strategy? So LQPs are all about setting ourselves up for long-term success and growth. LQPs are really the foundation of the execution machine and it's part of scaling up. So at a high level, scaling up's about being able to articulate your business strategy and execution, a one-page plan.

So some of the key concepts might be familiar. Values are critical, it's where you start, it's the expected behaviours in the organisation. You set a BHAG, which is your big hairy audacious goal, which is your vision.

(5:24 - 5:39)

You set your purpose, which is your mission. You have a three to five-year plan, a one-year plan, quarterly priorities, which we'll talk about. And then that all comes together with rhythms in the business where you do quarterly planning, monthly meetings, weekly meetings, daily huddles.

(5:40 - 8:37)

So as part of our annual planning for the year, what we do is we check the three to five-year plan to see if it's still relevant and then we adjust the one-year plan into five or so key initiatives. And so when Pember came on board, we had the plan, which was great. And in your language, it's the value curation plan.

And so we looked at our plan and we compared it to the valuation plan and they were actually pretty similar. So that was great. So what's an LQP? It's essentially a small cross-functional team in the business, two to five people.

We're trying to solve something that's important for the quarter that aligns to what we're trying to do in the year. In the business, we usually run three to five of them. So you can't do too many, too little doesn't make sense.

It's trying to find the right balance. You report in monthly, and this is where the accountability steps in. And so you report in monthly to the management group, but also to the business.

You have to call it red, amber or green. As the leader, you need to decide where it's at. And then there's an order of priority.

So number one, number two, number three means that number one is the highest priority in the business. As we've grown, we've also this quarter, actually, there's a lot going on in the business. And so we've introduced this idea of individual quarterly priorities as well, which not everyone needs to be on a team to solve a bigger problem, if you like, but we want to hold people accountable in a management group.

So the reporting is similar, but you don't need the team to be able to do it. So that's good. We've done over 60 of them since I've been in the business.

So there's a lot, which means that we've made many mistakes and we've learned from them. But really, I guess my role has been teaching people how to run this. It's an execution weapon, if you can get it right.

So we're learning and they're doing good things. Excellent. That's really good.

Thanks very much for that, Scott. Thinking about growth and continuing on that theme, one of Locatrix major growth engine, of course, has been your partner model, working with fire protection companies and service providers who deploy your platform at scale. Can you share how you approach building and commercializing a partner strategy and how founders should think about partnerships for scale? Sure.

So it's a good moment to start to understand a little bit about our products. So we were commercialized out of the Queensland fire department when the building fire safety regulations dropped in Queensland after a fire in Childers. And so PlanSafe was invented essentially to help companies to comply with the building fire safety regs.

That was our business really for the first 10 years or so, was looking after customers and helping them comply. We're able to win fantastic customers. We look after Queensland government, Commonwealth Bank, Qantas, McDonald's, some universities, schools, and we have over 400,000 people on the platform and we train a few hundred thousand people a year.

That's pretty exciting and it's great to look after those customers. But at the end of the training, you click on an indoor map. It helps you to get out of the building and know how to get out of the building.

That was a relatively archaic process, generally a X fiery and a piece of paper and a board and mapping out an indoor building. And so in 2017, we invented PlanStudio and we sold it for the first time in 2019. And so fundamentally what happened is that we built it for ourselves and we were able to solve a problem for ourselves.

(8:37 - 10:14)

And at the same time, we solved an industry problem. And so since then, we've been able to sell that software to 150 partners. You ask about how we approach commercializing the strategy.

We set up an industry specific pricing model that other partners would understand. We understood it, so they understood it and the partnership program really took off. So when founders think about partnerships at scale, I think the answer might be specific to specific industries.

Some of the general things might be, you've got to develop the partner program. Are you going to be a reseller, system integrator, tech partner, reseller? What type of program are you going to run? You want to identify potential partners. I think what's super important is you want to clearly understand the value proposition for the partner and the end customer and yourself.

Ideally, everyone wins in the process. You want to set objectives and you want to support them with your legal and commercial frameworks. And there's onboarding consideration, which we've got some experience in where time zones can be difficult.

Language can be difficult and you need to think about that in your partnerships. And there's obviously ongoing performance. It's interesting for us and it's super topical.

We're evolving our partner program at the moment. Our original partners were really using our product to make their business more efficient to service their customers. What we want to do is enable distribution globally.

And so we want our partners, distribution partners, to be able to sell to their customers. It's a different partnership program and so we're working on that. We're already running at about 30% of the business in the partnership model.

And ideally, we're going to be growing that and it would be great to get it over 50% in time. Yeah, excellent. Excellent news.

Great overview. Thank you for that. So extending around that expansion, Locatrix is now establishing a global expansion strategy.

(10:14 - 20:12)

And that's obviously an exciting next chapter for the business. What were the biggest lessons from entering new markets? What advice do you have for founders taking their product globally? And particularly interested to hear about your game-changing partnership in the UK. So I'll just set the scene a little bit.

It's been a few years since we've gone into international expansion mode. It's been trial and error. And so we started in the US.

We've decided to focus in Europe, particularly on the UK and Germany because the fire regulations are stronger. The numbers are promising. It's a low base.

We've done 100% year on year in the last few years in revenue growth. So that's exciting. I guess if we think about what the biggest lessons were, two big lessons for us was that we want to make sure that the safety laws or the compliance laws are strong in the countries that we enter into.

And most importantly, product market fit is key. So for founders out there, if the market's not going to fit, it doesn't matter what you're going to do. You're not going to get a result.

Do your research. There's opportunity to engage with specialists in country to be able to give some advice. And what you're looking for there is to understand the market, key players, competitors, regulations, market fragmentation, et cetera.

We used interim pricing models as we went into the markets to see what fitted, where people saw value and how that worked. And so that was interesting. And one of the biggest lessons was that it's hard to do from Australia.

So we were trying to do the US. We're trying to straddle the US and Europe for a bit. The other thing we've done pretty actively, we're good at it, is trade shows.

Trade shows are excellent because they are another mechanism for research. And so initially you can just go as a delegate. You get to talk to other people out there.

You can meet some people, which can be helpful. When you put a stand up and people come to your stand, it's really, that's where you're really learning about what people are interested in. And the thing I've been saying to the Pembroke crews, you never know who's going to walk past the stand.

And so we won Mars Wrigley as an example, is a great customer in Western London. And so they just, they wanted by the stand and they were innovative and they saw our products and they were excited by them. If I give some advice, if you like, really look for early adopters and learn from them.

You're always going to have innovators and early adopters in the market. And so they can be interesting. There's specialist organisations in Australia that you can also help.

So we met a company called Think and Grow during the Australian tech competition. Their advice was excellent. So they have some tools for international readiness, as well as studies on how much investment is required to go into each market.

There's local agencies that you can use, and there's also government funding that you can tap into, export funding, other things. And in the government agencies, we're from Queensland, so we use Trade and Investment Queensland. They've got an office in London.

There's a boardroom. You can use the boardroom. They make introductions.

And so they've been helpful and really great to work with, which has been good. If you think about investment and thinking about partnering with a capital partner, the expansion into international markets is intensive. And so that might be a trigger for some companies to contemplate whether they're going to take on a partner at that time.

Thinking about team culture and leadership, you've flagged already how you use clear and concise LQPs for the executive leadership team. You've also dedicated time to building a clear rhythm to team communications and into team building. Can you please help our founder listeners understand how you ensure team unity and keen to understand the group's core values? So if we go back to scaling up, this is where I think the key ingredients are values, as we spoke about your BHAG and your purpose.

Then we're united by our strategy and our execution plan. We run the business to a consistent cadence of meetings. I think this is some of the power that you've seen in these LQPs, if you like, in the business.

And so we have quarterly strategy planning, monthly management check-ins, weekly team meetings, and daily huddles. And we have dashboards on the wall to track the progress. The next section is unity on communication.

Personally, I'm super focused on our values, which is to act with integrity. And as part of that, we want to We have quarterly barbecues, we've been to financial year celebrations, and we have end-of-year parties. We run anonymous happiness surveys monthly.

I take the feedback super seriously. I respond to people personally, and we act on the feedback that we get given. And just recently, because there's been so much change in the business, I've been taking each staff member out for lunch, just a quick bite to eat, asking them how they're going, what I could do better, what the team could do better.

And that's been super insightful, and some of that feedback is feeding back into our all hands. So finally, to unify through change, there has been a lot of change in this business in the last 12 months. And so without some of the structure I've spoken about here, it would be difficult to implement it and keep the integrity of the culture together.

And so that framework that we've been able to implement has helped us to do that. No, that's excellent. There has, as you say, been significant change through the business over the last year, and again, applaud the success for the whole team there.

And I personally really enjoyed one of the quarterly barbecues as well, so long may they continue. Let's think about celebrating wins for the business. You did touch on this earlier, but how much importance do you place on celebrating the wins within the business? Locatrix, of course, recently won the accolade of winning the build category of software businesses in the National Australian Technologies Competition, a big accolade.

So how important was this for the business, and what did you learn through the process? Wins can include little things like anniversaries, your birthdays, babies. We've got lots of people in the business that have been with us for a long time, and so really celebrating people's anniversaries is a big thing. For work, we have the employee of the quarter that we celebrate in all hands.

You've experienced that. We're all celebrating together, clapping hands around people that have made a difference and have lived by our values. And we also share new customer wins, product releases, and generally just great work from the team.

For me and my team, one of my favorite things actually is the good news section at the start of our meetings. It's a moment to reflect on something in your life that either personal or in the business, which is good news. It takes about 10 minutes at the start of the meeting, and it gives us a moment to go into each other's lives, and not from a business sense totally, and you get to know about people.

You get to know what's important for them during that time. Specifically on the Australian tech competition, it ended up being fantastic. We were totally out of our depth.

We hadn't done anything like that before. Amazing to see you on the stage winning the prize. Well done.

Well done to you and the team. Let's switch gears a bit and think about driving a business sale process. Interestingly, unlike some of our listeners, you have already successfully helped build and sell a business, your IT service business, of course.

Can you please tell us more about this process, how you prepared for the sale process, how you managed that process, what the outcome was, and indeed, perhaps, what some of the challenges were that you learned from? I've been fortunate to experience a couple of trade sales, two trade sales, one small, one big one, and then a sale to PE. Each sales experience has increased in sophistication and complexity. I think it's key to founders out there that are contemplating selling.

It's called a process because it is a process. It takes time. There are gates that you've got to go through, and so I think that can be frustrating when you're in it, but it's really just, that's part of the process.

So when we sold our IT services company, COVID had hit, we had the best revenue, the best profit, the most cash, no debt. It was just, it was a beautiful thing, but it was also, there was consolidation happening in that world, and so that we were getting tapped, and so it was a good time to move on. And so the way we did it is we got organized by getting corporate advisory in, and we let them run the process for us.

For people out there, the process is detail heavy. You go through the offers, you go through the legals, due diligence, and so you need a team around you that you can trust. For our business, we ended up with five offers, and then we chose the business that we thought was the best long-term fit.

I learned a lot in the process, both good and bad. I think it's not easy transitioning as a founder into another business, if you like, and to a degree, losing control. Just a key lesson for me, which I've seen in my involvement in these exits, is that you need to run a tight ship.

If you run a tight ship from a financial point of view, you can show that you've got a system-like scaling up in place where you're in control, and you're really driving the place. When people are looking at you, they are buoyed by the confidence that you have in your own business, and so in preparation, I think you should be thinking a few years out from sale about getting yourself organized, making sure you've got clean books, that your legals and any of the documents in the background are clean, and most importantly, there's no surprises that can pop up during discovery. And my last piece of advice around exits is that we got given this advice, every deal needs to die three times, and so when you're in the process and things look like they're getting wobbly, have patience and have hope.

Excellent, that's really good. Thanks very much for that, Scott. Working with a growth partner now, many of our listeners and founders may be considering partnering with a growth capital provider.

Why did you decide to bring on a growth partner, and what's been important to you when selecting the right partner for Locatrix? It's a good question. Timing, timing is really what we were talking about. So I guess I was fortunate to come into the business that had an experienced board.

So we had John Hummelstead, who was ex-Microsoft and IBM in venture. Rick Anstey was on the board of Technology One for 15 years, and we had Fraser Kala, who was a 20-year veteran in the finance sector, and had also been raising capital and had some exits under his belt as well. The board were experienced with corporate development, and I guess what was happening in that moment was the stars were starting to align for an exit.

One of the things that was happening in the business, as you've heard, is we had great products, we got A-grade customers, and we had green shoots for the international piece, and so there was an opportunity to launch the business into its next phase. And then at the same time, Rick, our chairman, and John were looking to retire at some point in the future. We had a cap table that had some investors that were also looking to exit, and so it was a good opportunity to refresh the register.

And I guess from my perspective as the future CEO, I was really looking for a partner that could support our ambitions as a business and launch us to that next level. So we ran the process in Australia and the USA. We were happy to receive a variety of offers from PE, from family offices, and also from multinationals.

(20:12 - 22:04)

It was a good variety which gave us an indication of valuation, but it also gave us choice. And so in the choice, really what it came down to in selecting a partner is that I've spoken a lot about values, and so we wanted values to be aligned. We wanted someone that supported our vision and purpose, and really that was about keeping people safe.

We wanted validation of our strategy, and we wanted someone that respected what we built and could help us to unlock their growth into the future. Most importantly, we wanted someone that was honourable. Really appreciate those comments, Scott.

Thank you very much. Let's think about the enterprise sales team. In recent months, Locatrix has been upgrading the go-to-market strategy with various hires and a new enterprise sales approach.

Can you please share some of your insights into how you've been successfully driving improved growth outcomes? We're an expert in compliance and what we do. We're not necessarily a sales machine, and so really we'd identified that before Pemba came on board. That was an area that we needed to focus on.

So for me in the last year, this has been a really exciting part of the business and really shows what you can do with a growth partner. You can think out of the box, you can invest heavily, and you can set yourself up for success. So we've got a great team of passionate people in our sales and marketing team, but what we don't have is external experience.

We brought in an interim CRO in Dave Hodgson. We agreed a six-month plan where ultimately Dave's plan was to hire someone. We needed to hire someone to become permanent in the business, and so key parts of the CRO engagement was working with the team to understand capabilities.

We needed to implement some systems to be able to provide information around how we were performing. We wanted to align the sales reporting to the financial reporting for board, and we wanted to also identify some customer segments to focus on. And so instead of the machine gun, let's go more sniper in particular segments.

(22:04 - 22:29)

And then also to identify other areas that we need help in. So Dave was awesome in that he referred us to Rochelle Tognetti, ex-Deloitte CMO. She built a marketing strategy for us.

And then Rochelle introduced us to Ika Levick, who's been helping on the marketing front, particularly with profiles and other pieces that are helping to raise our publicity. In the last few weeks, we have hired a head of growth in Katie Moore. I am super excited to have her on board.

(22:29 - 23:11)

Yeah, me too. This first period has been about understanding what we need to do. We had a cracking first quarter, which is super exciting, the best in the company's history.

And so based on what we've already done, I think what's ahead is exciting. Yeah, it's really exciting. Like some of our recent guests, including Emily Pritchard from Axis and Peter Angelini from Stanards, you've had to successfully manage succession.

Over the last year, you've of course taken on the CEO position from John Hamilstad. John himself was a highly accomplished and well-respected leader. How did you manage the succession planning and any tips for founders contemplating how to bring through the next generation of talent? So I was hired into Locatrix by John and the board as a succession plan for John.

(23:11 - 23:23)

We unfortunately lost a CFO to cancer a few years before, and I guess that exacerbated the need and the timing to bring me in. And I came in as a COO. In the first six months, I was finding my feet.

(23:24 - 23:59)

And then in the following 18 months, we really went on the investment journey. We had agreed that at some point in time, we would enact a succession plan. And then when the dust settled from the investment, we decided to pull the trigger on it relatively quickly.

And so I moved into the role of CEO after three months. I deeply respect and admire John and the company he built. John chose me, and he believed in my capability.

I believe deeply in what Locatrix is doing and the values of Locatrix. So I think fundamentally at that starting level, if you like, at the foundation, that's cool. Locatrix is a strong culture, a very caring and supportive culture.

(23:59 - 24:18)

And it was important to me to protect that culture. I've been very strong around protecting the culture. So in my first couple of years, John allowed me freedom.

So I respected him a lot for that. So I came in with big ideas and I've had this experience around scaling up and some of these other things. And even though the business was well-established, he let me run free.

(24:19 - 25:48)

That wasn't without its challenges. I bought in change. And I think what that did with John and I is it gave us the opportunity to go through some bumps together and see how each other would behave and to build mutual respect and trust along the process.

I think that was a key thing that happened in those first few years. Another thing he did, which was big, I think that worked really well, is all staff reported to me from the outset. And so I was the only report to John from the moment I walked into the business.

And so that gave me time to build respect with the team, to build trust and respect with the team before I took over the CEO role. I think a big piece of it was that John and I were basically joined at the hip for two years. And so we spent all of our time together in DNA transfer.

We worked together, we ate together, we traveled together, we pitched together. And so I really got to learn the business in the way that he was running and also how he was applying the values. When he handed over, he created space immediately.

It was a bit unexpected. I think what ended up happening was quite intimidating. And I was running into our first PEMBA board meeting.

I was already CEO. And so enter the imposter syndrome. Can I do this? There's this doubt that comes inside you.

But it had been set up wonderfully and John moved to the board and he's there for my support. And so I think that I'm pretty passionate and emotion can get the best of me sometimes, but in that all hands that you attended, it was a great moment for the business to be able to send John off. And I think for him, and if I think about my career, if I'm in a similar position where you've brought talent in, been able to successfully set them up for success, I think that's a wonderful thing.

(25:49 - 26:34)

I think since then, it's been a steep learning curve. One of the things for me, which I've been learning is how to navigate the new board. So we've got a new chairman, we've got new investors, John stepped to board.

And so you're juggling communication with who you're talking to, what about, and also we're going through significant change. So there's lots going on and lots of initiatives going on. And so that's been interesting.

And I'm also still learning about it, but I'm super grateful for the support of John and for Kat and yourself on the PEMBA side and also Alex. But most of all, we've got a super team in Locatrix and I have their support, which I'm grateful for. A great team, as you said, and it's been a very active year, but certainly no need for the imposter syndrome because you're kicking it out the park.

So well, well done to you. Thank you very much. We've talked a lot today, Scott, about values already.

(26:34 - 27:30)

But a question we ask all of our guests is how to describe in a few words, what are the important values to you? They could be, of course, values you expect from the team or principles you live by. It does feel particularly relevant for Locatrix, given I know as a business, you've dedicated so much time to values and respect within the business. So I have three.

They are humility, gratitude and hope. Great. And so in humility, I think it is kind of one of the cornerstones from a cultural point of view in Locatrix that it encourages openness, learning and collaboration.

And I think that it's foundational for us. It shapes how we treat each other and it also shapes how we treat our customers. It keeps us grounded and it also keeps us curious.

Gratitude is kind of about looking back with appreciation. And so it fosters positivity and connection. And it really shows up in our business through recognition, celebrating wins and a strong feedback culture, as you've seen in my in my conversation today.

(27:31 - 27:38)

Hope. What is life without hope? Yep. It inspires optimism, resilience and a belief in better.

(27:38 - 29:59)

And I think in Locatrix, it fuels our commitment to continual improvement and believing that tomorrow can be better. And you act on that belief. And so if I can just tell you a little personal story.

Please. In our family, we used to say grace when we were growing up. Now I do this little thing at big events, which is grateful and hopeful, tying it back to the values.

And so we go around the table and each person says what they're grateful for and what they're hopeful for. And Christmas is coming up. Maybe try it.

Yeah. But it is actually wonderful to see what people say, what they're thinking about and particularly your children. Excellent.

Now that's a great tip as we come into the year end period. Thank you for that, Scott. Final question.

You're leading a successful SaaS business in a specialist industry. Do you have any favorite apps, hacks or business tools you swear by or maybe even a book that's influenced your thinking as a founder? So first of all, my new favorite podcast after a week of listening to it is A View From The Summit. Congratulations.

Look, I think to be clear from today, I'm a fan of Scaling Up by Verne Harnish. Secondly, one that is actually a cornerstone to some of the cultural stuff that we do in the business is a book called The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Liacone. What that does is it essentially you need trust and conflict to unlock commitment to accountability and results.

And so being able to trust each other, be vulnerable with each other so that you have conflict in each other's best interest to be able to call each other out to try and get the results. And so that is an awesome book to read. Yeah, really good.

Thank you. So Scott, thanks so much for sharing your story and your insights today. Congratulations on everything you and the team at Locatrix have achieved.

We're excited to watch your continued international success. In particular, listening to you today, I love the idea about celebrating success. That's really important.

It's very clear that values are critical within the business. And you have emphasized a lot around strategic planning, first class communication from you as a leader there, taking advice from experts. I think that's really important.

And a great reminder for founders to also think about the trade and government angles. It's a really insightful comment. So with that, again, Scott, thanks so much for joining us today.

Awesome. Thanks, Mark. 

As a regular feature of view to the summit, we invite our listeners to send in questions and have one of the pember team of Sherpa's answer the question.

Mark Bryan: This time we're delighted to have Katrina Engelbert, an associate director at Pember Kat is also on the board of Locatrix, and led the partnership with Scott Jackson and the team. So Kat, how does Pember think about supporting founders on building an improved employee value proposition? 

Kat Englelert: Thanks, mark. It's a great question.

I think I'll start with noting that at Pemba we really understand that any business, even software businesses, are only as strong as the people behind them. Uh, so for this reason, we're extremely focused on implementing strategies to attract, [00:46:00] retain, and incentivize talent. Um, there's a number of ways to drive this, but everything is ultimately driven by a strong employee value proposition.

So it's a great question. I think if we take a step back as to how you sort of form a strong EVP, the starting point for this is often the creation of a, a really clear, easily communicated strategy that links you back to the company's purpose and values. Uh, really with the main aim of aligning the organization with, with one ultimate vision or goal.

So I think once this strategy is cascaded through a business and, and the employees and people become really involved and engaged in the priority growth initiatives, there's inevitably room for individual growth and progression within a scaling organization. And I think a big part of an EVP needs to sort of be centered around career development pathways and really strong systems to recognize and reward good work and outcomes.

So I think in addition to [00:47:00] that, it, it's really important to also ensure that a business has a strong focus on employee wellbeing and inclusion initiatives as part of their EVP. This one's probably more obvious and there's a lot of things that are sort of baseline expectations if you think around parental leave and, and general flexibility.

I think everybody approaches this one differently. Um, and things might be quite industry specific. So for example, we've got a, um, a vets consolidator that we've partnered with Vet Central. Um, they have parental leave within their business that enables employees to take some leave when they adopt a new animal.

Um, another one of our partner companies put some budget away for a getaway at the end of the year for the sort of top performers, um, who win prizes, um, in different categories. So. Whatever it is and whatever the business needs, we can help to brainstorm different initiatives, um, look to share learnings from our partner company network, and also benchmark the initiatives across the market to make sure we are sort of leading, leading the charge.

Another key area that we often consider, and it's probably a topic in itself, but um, is bringing in a management equity plan or esop. So this is an, an obvious one when it comes to incentivization and retention, but this tool can be really powerful in attracting new talent, um, and also bridging any salary gaps for earlier stage businesses who might not have the budget for the top talent yet.

So we find that to be a really powerful tool in conjunction with a strong EVP. 

Mark Bryan: Kat, that was great. Thanks very much for those great insights. To our listeners, thank you for tuning into this episode of View to the Summit. If you've enjoyed today's chat, please follow the show and share it with someone who would benefit from it.

Until next time, keep striving for your next summit.