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TRANSCRIPTION WITH SPEAKERS
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[00:00] SPEAKER_01: Welcome to Candace Podcast.
[00:05] SPEAKER_01: Hi, I'm Phil Bliss, founder and CEO of Candace Podcast.
[00:10] SPEAKER_01: And today we're going to meet Dennis Jones, CEO of DeVro Group.
[00:15] SPEAKER_00: I will, how are you?
[00:17] SPEAKER_01: Very good.
[00:18] SPEAKER_01: It's great to see you here and congratulations on making it into the sort of the regional award
[00:27] SPEAKER_01: and now into the sort of national finish, if you like.
[00:33] SPEAKER_01: What I really want you to talk about is the journey you've taken to get here.
[00:40] SPEAKER_01: Just highlight some of the key things that really kind of say why you're here.
[00:51] SPEAKER_00: Well, I think the most important thing, Phil, is being able to adapt, being able to pivot,
[00:59] SPEAKER_00: being able to have a business plan, but realize that the business plan that you have is going to change,
[01:04] SPEAKER_00: you know, 10 times, 20 times, 30 times over the course of your career.
[01:09] SPEAKER_00: And being able to adapt, being able to add on, we've successfully vertically integrated throughout the company,
[01:17] SPEAKER_00: which gives us a lot of resilience.
[01:20] SPEAKER_00: You know, we take profit at different levels.
[01:22] SPEAKER_00: And because of that, we're able to give discounted rates on all of our services,
[01:27] SPEAKER_00: make our product very, very cost effective and appealing in the market.
[01:32] SPEAKER_00: And that's really driven our success.
[01:35] SPEAKER_00: You know, the other thing that we've done is we've really focused on core talent and great people.
[01:41] SPEAKER_00: You know, you could have a dream, you can have a business plan, you can have a great model,
[01:47] SPEAKER_00: but if you don't have the team to help you execute it, you're not going to get there.
[01:52] SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, I'd say the two things that I would value the most are my team members,
[01:57] SPEAKER_00: their abilities, their, you sort of never say die attitude.
[02:02] SPEAKER_00: And, you know, and my ability to sort of encourage people to adopt a can-do attitude
[02:09] SPEAKER_00: and find ways to make us more resilient in a tough market.
[02:15] SPEAKER_01: That's great, great advice.
[02:17] SPEAKER_01: I just want one more thing from you.
[02:20] SPEAKER_01: You know, that was good general advice, but when it comes to your personal characteristic
[02:27] SPEAKER_01: of being a successful entrepreneur, which you are,
[02:33] SPEAKER_01: what is that kind of magic that, you know, made you achieve so much?
[02:41] SPEAKER_00: Well, if I had to use one word, it would be tenacity.
[02:46] SPEAKER_00: You know, the decision or the ability to never give up to find a way around it.
[02:53] SPEAKER_00: I tell my team every day, we're going to hit obstacles.
[02:56] SPEAKER_00: We either go over them, we go under them, we go around them,
[02:59] SPEAKER_00: and if we can't find a way around those, we go through them.
[03:01] SPEAKER_00: But we're not stopping. If we're going to fail, we fail forward, and we get up, and we go again.
[03:05] SPEAKER_00: But we don't go backwards, and we just keep going.
[03:09] SPEAKER_00: And it's tenacity. Tenacity, I think, is everything.
[03:13] SPEAKER_01: You got it. Thanks for coming on Canada's podcast, and good luck with the EY Awards.
[03:21] SPEAKER_00: Thank you very much. It was great meeting you.
